These two video shorts on the theme of EVOLUTION
The lasting influence of Carl Sagan’s Cosmos series is explicit. They even used voiceover from one of the episodes. I was blown away.
This short features art from an independent artist. It also echoes the morphing evolutionary sketches from this episode of the original Cosmos.
Rachmaninoff’s Elegiac Trio
The Columbia Slough Trail and the Willamette River
In the past 48 hours I observed:
- A purple martin house and its occupants. The Wikipedia page is full of astonishing facts about them and their “synanthropic” status.
- A Cooper’s hawk or sharp-shinned hawk that had taken a swallow in its talons and was flying off to a wooded place to eat it. Other swallows were swooping at it and calling as if to harass it but they just sounded plaintive and sad (they can’t squawk or caw like other birds).
- A bald eagle that hangs out in the same cottonwood tree a lot. I have not found its nest yet.
- A red-tailed hawk flying by and scattering all the birds in the waters of the slough. I often forget how large this buteo is.
- A male belted kingfisher. They are easy to distinguish by sex because the males lack the chestnut breast band.
- Cinnamon teal, a richly colored brown duck
My visit to Seattle
I took a calculated risk (I had six days off, so I had to do something). Seattle is a beautiful city. I visited Discovery Park (a large natural area with woods and coastline), hit up the abundant trails along the water, biked through the empty downtown, ate a chicken tandoori and naan, the first espresso from a shop that had reopened, Fort Lawton Military Cemetery, and checked out other natural areas.
I came across an interesting sign in Discovery Park that put driving into its place. It explained that people with disabilities, the elderly, children under six and pregnant women can apply for a limited number of permits to drive to the beach. All others can walk or bike there. This makes it a more pleasant, natural area instead of just another road and parking lot. Since the main roads and parking lots were also closed due to virus precautions, it made Discovery Park a very pleasant place to visit (even in the rain).
I saw terns and murrelets, and sea lions barking from atop a buoy. I saw a crow fly up and drop a clam from a height in order to break its shell.
My wonderful rats Salt and Pepper
They are bonding with me and becoming more calm and photogenic. They finally have a scratch post to help with the claw marks they leave on my neck, shoulders and chest.
pseudoisaac 