Oystercatchers and eagles
I’m back. The CFI talk was good fun. CFI Vancouver did a great bit on the CBC’s Marketplace a couple of weeks ago: they gathered outside a hospital emergency room (“just in case”) and took an overdose of homeopathic “medicine.”
It rained almost the whole time on Friday, and the same Saturday. It was a bit tragic, because I was staying in a borrowed apartment on the 34th floor of a tower next to the harbor, which was spectacular, but I knew it would be considerably more spectacular if it were clear, and it seemed that it was never going to be clear. But then Saturday evening, after I’d gotten thoroughly soaked three times, it started to clear and then clear some more, and Sunday was cold and crystal clear. I went out at dawn to walk around the edge of Stanley Park. It was…well it was a hell of a good walk, I can tell you. I saw a bald eagle sitting at the top of a fir tree on the north side. I saw four oystercatchers digging around in the rocks near Third Beach. I saw an eagle flying overhead near Second Beach, then I saw one sitting at the top of another fir tree. I don’t know if that was three eagles, or two, or one.
Then I went back to the borrowed apartment, and nearly fell over when I saw what the view is like on a clear day.
And now I’m back.
Update: I forgot to say: Fred Bremmer took the pictures. I stole them from Facebook.
And yet what you post pictures of is yourself. Ego much?
;)
Oystercatchers and Eagles: what a good name for a blog.
Welcome back Ophelia. And what do you think of the revolutions in the Arab world?
Looks like you did have a homeopathic overdose :-)
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Once in a while here in Detroit I watch Marketplace on CBC Windsor and lament the fact that nothing like it is regularly on US television, not even PBS. Thank you, corporate media.
Sili, I don’t have a digital camera! (Go ahead, laugh. Most of what I spend my time doing doesn’t pay.)
Anyway a camera wouldn’t really have been much use. The size of the view is so vast it would seem just silly to take little pieces of it. It’s a “ya hadda be there” kind of thing. I suppose a video would do it, but again, I ain’t got the equipment.
Gulls were flying below me all the time. Often way below me.
Egbert, I dunno. I’m afraid they’ll go Islamist, I suppose. And hoping they won’t.
Ophelia,
I think that is the unfortunately and inevitable direction, and things are moving so fast, it’s hard to keep up.
Yes. Hence my leaving it alone. Too big, too complicated, too newsy – no need for me to weigh in.
Went to UBC in the 90s. Nice town. Birds were fun, except when you had to step in the tons of crap the Canada Geese left in the grass as they gathered in large groups. Although I imagine most of the geese have migrated south for Winter.
Thanks OB- a little bit of nostalgia for my hometown- haven’t lived there for more than 30 years.
Well done OB! Looks like you left your mark on this thoroughly engaged Canadian audience.
http://twitpic.com/3vgczx