Brad Sondahl's blog

Brad's Blog

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Oct. 2
With all the disasters starting last November, I'm beginning to think Congress should pass a bill designating half-mast as the default position. Unfortunately I don't think they're up for it...
So here's a meaningless bit of fluff taken on the Mill Pond a couple days ago. I like abstract patterns.

Oct. 11
This time of year, with the waterfowl migrating, it's good to check out the mill pond daily. What just looks like ducks to the casual observer yields a variety of beautiful birds to the binoculars, or to a better telephoto than I've got :-)

A case in point is this guy, of a pair we saw yesterday... The photo resembles ones circulated of perps from surveillance videos, but it was good enough to I.D. it as a hooded merganser...

This blurry character is a merlin we saw yesterday. There's been a pair of them around all summer... Today I was watching a kingfisher dive for a fish through my binoculars. When it came up from its dive (without a fish), we both were startled to see a merlin almost pounce on it. In a minute they took their drama into the woods...

In the winter we see muskrats like this on the ice, having dived down to get some of the grass like seaweed from the bottom. In this case, although the water looks like it's slushy and the muskrat's on ice, it's actually got a bunch of the seaweed floating on the surface and it's so shallow the muskrat is standing on the bottom, or a rock or stump...

Books read and other media of note

The Hogfather by Terry Pratchett. I'd avoided reading this previously, as it seemed to be a parody of St. Nicholas, but Terry Pratchett is always more than simple parody, and it was touching, and suspenseful, and satisfying...

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