Artificial intelligence may be transforming the world, but not everyone wants the infrastructure powering it in their backyard.

Across America, communities are questioning the electricity, water and land that massive data centers need. Supporters point to jobs and tax revenue. Opponents worry about utility bills, the environment, and losing control of what gets built where.

Now Missoula is in the middle of it. Local company CubCloud AI — 18 employees — has sued the city over new zoning rules, arguing they violate Montana’s 2025 Right to Compute Act.

This isn’t just about one business. It could help decide how much say Montana communities have over the infrastructure behind the AI boom.

Bookkeeping is the hat most small business owners would happily hand to someone else. Lynn Davis built her Northside business on exactly that.

A certified QuickBooks ProAdvisor who has been both a business owner and an operations manager, Lynn offers monthly bookkeeping, payroll support, financial reporting and catch-up work for books that have fallen behind.

Her point is that good bookkeeping does more than tidy the records — accurate monthly reporting is what makes a decision about spending, staffing or growth easier to make.

She is offering Missoula business owners a free 30-minute review. “I am here to help you thrive.”

The crowds are gone, the light is better, and all three of these are open right now.

Introducing the Outdoor Desk, with three late-fall escapes close to town: the M Trail, the Rattlesnake and Blue Mountain — each one checked against its land manager before we wrote a word.

What to know before you go: where the ice forms first, which one has 41 miles of trail, and why blaze orange is the right call through Nov. 29.

About 6,000 current and former Missoula school employees and job applicants may have had Social Security numbers, email addresses and home addresses exposed.

The district says it was notified Oct. 26, and that the breach happened entirely inside the systems of Frontline Education, a software vendor — not on district networks.

The company’s own letter traces it to a vulnerability found on Aug. 14. It still has not said which product was involved.

A Social Security number cannot be changed like a password. Here is what a credit freeze does and how to tell a real notice from a fake one.

The crews on Higgins this week are not fixing anything. They are looking for things.

Through Nov. 20, weekdays 7 a.m. to 5 p.m., crews are cutting small test holes along Higgins, Front and Main with pressurised water to find buried utilities and check their depth and condition.

It is groundwork for the downtown SAM project, which the city expects to start in 2027 — and it is far cheaper to find a gas line now than to hit one then.

Expect flaggers, parking restrictions and minor delays. The city says business access stays open throughout.

Count Missoula’s restaurant closures this year and the scene looks like it is shrinking. Count the openings and it looks like the same rooms changing hands.

The old Drum Coffee space on South Avenue is Biscuit Hound Cafe now. The former 4B’s is Suzette’s Organics. Sumac took a room in the Florence Building, and the Double K opened a second bar downtown.

Linda McCarthy of the Downtown Missoula Partnership says a lot of it is retirement — owners “at the end of their work life” — plus labor costs and a recovery still running: “It’s been six years so just like a recession, it takes time to recover.”

And one co-owner named the question every new Missoula restaurant is now designed around.

The listing said open until nine. You drove across town and the lights were off.

Restaurant information online is assembled from sources that update at different speeds, and the slowest is often the one at the top of the search results. Four checks take about two minutes.

Start with the business’s own Facebook or Instagram, sorted by newest — the date of the last post tells you more than any rating. Then call. And treat the website as the least current thing about a restaurant.

The one that catches everybody: a room that changes hands keeps the old restaurant’s reviews, photos and sometimes its hours.

Aster is five, she came to Missoula from Heart Butte, and she is mostly blind.

The Humane Society of Western Montana calls her sweet, demure and loving — a dog who likes meeting people, and is shy at first because she cannot see them coming.

She needs someone with patience, who will leave the furniture where it is and “literally show her the ropes” in a new home.

Meet her Wednesday to Sunday, 1–6 p.m., at 5930 Highway 93 S.

Save Our Doggy is proudly sponsored by Aragon & Partners.

A blind dog navigates by memory, smell and sound — so the kindest thing a household can do is stop moving the furniture.

Speak before you reach. Use a different rug at the stairs and the door as signposts. Keep the bed and bowls in permanent places, gate the stairs, and walk the same route until it is familiar.

And nothing punitive: a dog who bumps a doorframe is not being stubborn, and scolding a frightened animal only makes the world less predictable.

Mostly it is a decision not to rearrange the living room.

Montana 57, Portland State 24 — and Eli Gillman is now the Big Sky’s all-time leading scorer.

His 78th career touchdown, an 84-yard run, broke a record Cooper Kupp had held for a decade. Gillman scored four times on nine touches, rushing for 196 yards on eight carries.

He swept the national, conference and Shrine Bowl weekly awards on Monday, and now holds Big Sky career records for touchdowns, points and rushing scores.

The Griz are 7–3 and host Idaho State on Saturday at 8:30 p.m. on ESPN2 — Senior Day, and the last home game of the year.

Missoula Big Sky is one win from the state championship game. The Eagles beat Great Falls CMR 38–21 on the road on Friday.

They travel to Glacier on Friday at 6 p.m., against a Wolfpack side that put 53 on Bozeman in its own quarterfinal.

Sentinel’s season is over — Gallatin won 24–13 at Sentinel. Hellgate did not make this year’s Class AA bracket.

The state championship is Friday, Nov. 20.

Your review replies are not for the customer who left the review. They are for the one deciding in December.

Set aside an hour in November to clear the backlog, while you still have a clear head. Keep each reply to two or three sentences, name the specific thing they mentioned, skip the sales pitch and sign it with a first name.

Answer the critical ones first. A calm, specific reply under a bad review often does less damage than a page that looks curated — and arguing in public is read by everyone who comes later.

Then set your holiday hours while you are in there.