The eagle in my backyard.

I saw a bald eagle in my backyard this morning. I was working on my bike, and heard this weird sound -- more like a scream than anything. I looked up into the trees to see an enormous white headed bird, and I felt a shock spread from the back of my head as I recognized it from hanging around in Juneau, where bald eagles are much more common.

Then came the crows, yelling after the eagle, trying to take a beak at it. The eagle moved, the crows pursued, a noisy angry mob. The eagle took off, soaring in long, lazy circles way above while the crows gathered in the tops of the trees, calling to each other and complaining.

I stood in the grass, my bike on the stand with pedals off, 15mm wrench in hand, and laughed.

Hamfisted metaphor time: I've been having problems putting up with the overhead at USSM, specifically the amount of crap heaped on us as authors. In particular, I've lately been told that I "need to take my meds" before writing about baseball, I'm a vile person, blah blah blah, and then today I got a snitty letter from a dude who pointed out a grammar error. His email started off "how about paying a little attention to grammar?"

I have, within arms reach as I type this, a good dictionary, thesaurus, Strunk and White, a set of style guides, a slang dictionary, and a book on modern American usage. I sometimes read them for fun. Saying I don't pay attention to this stuff because I made one stupid error is exactly the kind of constant sniping that makes me want to stop doing things in front of an audience.

I went out for a ride, and burned around Lake Sammamish. On the east side -- saw the eagle again (I assume it was the same one -- having seen one so rarely here and knowning it took off in that direction from my house). This time it was chilling in a tree, all by itself, and there were no crows anywhere near it.