Griz Along The Parkway

We were treated to a rare sight the other day as we drove along the Columbia Icefields Parkway.
We were blessed to see a Grizzly Bear.
This one is a young adult, we think it might be about three years old. Despite it's relative youth, it was huge.
The photo above shows off its shoulder hump. That's one of the distinguishing characteristics for telling a griz from an ordinary brown bear or a cinnamon black bear.




This shows griz in profile. The dished in look of the skull is another distinguishing physical marker. Brown and black bears have rounder faces.

Alberta Grizzlies are a threatened species. There are only a few hundred left in the Province due to the massive oil exploration here and up until recently, they were hunted.

We'd be a much poorer people without the grizzlies.

Twofer Tuesday -- Ducks In A Row?

A Common Goldeneye duck and her ducklings out for a late morning swim.

I'm still editing A Fly on the Wall. I had a particularly sticky problem in chapter eight that took a while to sort out. Or, to make the photo relevant, I had trouble getting all my ducks in a row.
I eventually sorted it out. The rest of the corrections in logic should be easier.
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Here's a freshly edited passage:
"Brelyan turned on his stomach and buried his face in the pillow. What was he missing?"
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Our current bedtime story is from The Complete Tales of Nikolai Gogol, Vol 1. (University of Chicago Press, 1985)
We decided to read Gogol after my husband found a reference to him in one of my cookbooks. Gogol's Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka sounded like our kind of stories.
A quick internet search sealed it. In the second picture Gogol looks quite a bit like my husband. I ordered both volumes and offered them as my husband's birthday present.

Here are two sentences, and two extras from The Fair at Sorochintsy:
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" ' Why it looks like two men: one on top, the other under. Which of them is the devil I can't make out yet!'
'Why, who is on top?'
'A woman!'
'Oh, well, then that's the devil!' "
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Gratitude Monday -- Reflective Edition

Waterfowl Lake, Banff National Park

Still lakes in the early morning offer grand reflections of their surroundings. On Saturday we were up and away early enough to catch this sight on Waterfowl Lake.

It's moments like this that make me as reflective as the still waters. I am grateful for many things, including how close I live to the Jasper-Banff Highway.
This road, also known as the Columbia Icefields Parkway, runs through Jasper and Banff National Parks and offers the most stunning mountain scenery in the world. I can be in Jasper, Banff, or Lake Louise in a few hours, or I can drive along the highway for the sheer joy of seeing the sights and still be home in the evening.
What sights are you grateful for?

Photo-Finish Friday -- A Quiet View

A nearly deserted street in Camaguey, Cuba.

Sandhill Crane

We get sandhill cranes around here. A local lake just a wee bit north and west of is a know breeding site for them.
It's more likely to see them feeding in fields in the evening, but they can be found at any time of the day.
This one is an immature crane. It was having its elevenses in a field just outside of Rocky.



Intent on feeding.


Profile.



The other profile.

Time to Wake Up

Crescent Falls

I had big plans to sleep in this morning. I figured I was good to, say, 6:30 a.m. at least.
The Universe, however, had other plans.
The phone rang. It only rang in my mind, but it's just as insistent there as it is in real life. The Universe's call is just one ring although I suspect it happened twice this morning. The first one was part of a dream. The second one was about 20 minutes later. It left no room for doubt.
I tried to stay in bed anyway, but the best course of action when the Universe calls is to answer.
That said, I love the mornings, especially this time of year. The air is fresh and cool and sweet, the birds are singing, the light is new though muted, and there is peace in my world no matter what else is going on around me.
Perhaps the Universe wanted to remind me of this. Perhaps it's got something up its sleeve for later on.
Whatever happens, I'm awake and ready for it.
Anything similar ever happen to you?

Twofer Tuesday -- The Write Hat for the Job

It was nagging at me for quite some time, but I was unsure what to do about it. I felt the need for a hat. Not just any hat either. It had to be a fedora. The question was, where does one go to get it?

The nagging grew more intense late last week as I got stronger pulls to work on all four of my novel mss. even the one that is unlikely to ever see the cold light of day.

Then we went to Red Deer last Friday ( a central Alberta city 50 mi. to the east) and as we approached the feeling intensified. I must have a fedora. Now.

I was walking through a mall when I passed a hat store that always seemed to be overfilled with ball caps. But this time as I walked by a shelf display teeming with fedoras threw itself at me.

I'm pleased to report the fedora and I are very happy together. I wear it as I take chapter notes on A Fly on the Wall. Stray scenes from other mss. flow into my mind with suggestions on just what I need to do to satisfy them.
The hat keeps them in check, corralling my thoughts and organizing them into a chute for later launching. It's a good hat, and it's helping me write.
I still have the chew toys as needed and pick out a tune or two on the guitar as needed, but the hat is helping me get it done.

As I said earlier I'm taking chapter notes. This is my way of finding all the times I was repetitive, or contradictory, or simply made no appreciable sense. I also see more mistakes and have the sense to fix them as I find them.

Here's a bit from A Fly on the Wall:

She moved her head in closer to his. "I think she's got a drop or two of the blood in her, that's what. I studied Cryptozoology, you know. Crosses and half-bloods and miscegenation, if you will. Happens all the time."

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I'm currently reading some Philip K. Dick. Why, oh why didn't I get to this man sooner? Science fiction is my first love and I'm just now getting back to it after years of straying.
We went to a bookstore during our trip to Red Deer and I bought two of his books: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? ( the inspiration for Blade Runner) and A Scanner Darkly.

I had a quick look at both before consigning them to the TBR pile, but the second one called me. I had to read it.
Here are two sentences :

" 'The receptor sites in his brain are what I've read usually goes first,' Donna said placidly. 'Someone's brain where he's gotten a bad hit or like that, like too heavy. ' "

-A Scanner Darkly by Philip K. Dick (Vintage Books 1991, copyright 1977)

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