Predator at Grandma's house

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Yesterday as I worked on my computer in the study, I heard a big ol' thwack on the window in the living room.

I'm fairly used to such sounds, as birds often — for some crazy reason — bang into the windows throughout my house, usually leaving feather-dusted imprints of their wings and more on the glass as proof of their poor navigational skills.

This time, though, the intensity of the thwack seemed doubled. So I got up to see if a bird had been bonked lifeless and might be dying (or dead) on the ground below the window.

Sure enough, I saw a baby bird lying spread eagle, face down, just below the window.

My first thought: Shoot! Now I have to go out in the cold, pick up that bird and throw it in the garbage so the dogs don't get it.

I then noticed that just beyond the obviously dead bird was a bigger bird, stumbling about as if stunned.

It was this guy:

hawk

I've no doubt he had been chasing the smaller bird, hoping for an easy feast, when they both banged into my window.

I watched for a few seconds as the hawk gathered his wits. Then he stood there, staring back at me. He looked from me to the dead bird, back and forth, back and forth.

I ran to get my camera, quickly returned (he was still there!) and snapped several shots of him.

hawk

Though I was just a few feet from the guy, separated only by glass, the predator seemed unafraid of me and my movements.

hawk

Now, I've seen hawks in our yard several times, but Jim — as much a bird lover as I am — has lamented his lack of hawk sightings. So I quickly put down my camera, ran to get my iPhone, then called Jim at work for a FaceTime chat so he could see the hawk.

(Yes, such things are important enough to interrupt Jim at work. He agreed without hesitation.)

When I returned to the window, the hawk was still there, oblivious to my scrambling about.

Colorado hawk

I held up the phone to the window. Naturally, Jim couldn't see the hawk very well. (FaceTime needs a zoom function!)

hawk

As I turned the phone about trying to provide a better angle, calling out to Jim to Look right there!, that darn hawk swiftly rose from the ground, swooped over to the dead bird below me, snatched it up in his claws, then soared fast as could be over the fence and off into the wild blue yonder, all in the blink of an eye.

Gah! The nerve of that thing!

My first thought: Oh, that poor baby bird.

My second thought: At least I no longer have to go pick it up and throw it away.

Such is the nature of nature, I suppose. The predator had served his purpose. (The least of which was serving as blog fodder for today's post.)

My final thought: Jim has yet to see a hawk in our yard.

Today's question:

What wild animal do you wish you could see up close?

Photo replay: Desert sunset

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It's been bone-chillingly cold at my place all weekend. The low temps and high winds have made me long to visit my grandsons in the desert. Not just because Bubby and Mac warm my heart, though, but also because chilly evenings there look like the photo below, which I took from their back yard in January.

It was colder during my January visit than any other time I've been to the desert, yet it was still far more colorful and warm than the whistling, windy, white weather here at home the last couple days.

Best wishes to you for a warm, cozy, and colorful Sunday!

Three-word Thursday: New camera lens

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(Jim gave me a new telephoto lens for Christmas. This is my first shared photo using that lens, taken from my living room window.)

(PS: This week you got Three-word Thursday instead of One-word Wednesday because, to be quite honest, I forgot what day it was when I wrote yesterday's post. The holidays can do that to you.)

(PSS: Words italicized and in parentheses don't count in post word counts today.)

Today's question:

What unexpected gift did you receive for Christmas, tangible or intangible?

Fun at the park

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As much of the country is shivering about now—perhaps even experiencing snow fluttering about to one degree or another—I thought I'd warm you up a bit with some (semi) warm shots of what my grandsons and I did on our last afternoon together in the desert on Tuesday.

Fun at the park with Bubby and Mac:

There was no one there to capture a picture or two of the three of us sliding down the twirly slide together in what we dubbed "the Gramma Train Slide," but you can imagine it was lots of fun for all three of us. You also can imagine Mac saying "gain!" after each time, in hopes we'd board the Gramma train another time or two.

It was a delightful way to end my stay in the desert.

(Note: Because the slide show crops my photos a little funny, you're welcome to view the original pictures—plus a shot of the boys' reaction when a park caretaker arrived on his riding lawnmower—in my Brag Book, if you'd like.)

Today's Christmas-y question:

Which Christmas song's lyrics have you memorized better than any other?