Saturday reflections

Keeping it simple: a window, a tree.

Urban poetry

The giant Snapple bottle over Eighth Avenue during yesterday's snow.

Noooooooo!

It's my fault.

Yesterday I realized that by this time last winter we'd already had two huge blizzards, but the snow we've seen so far this year has basically melted as soon as it hit the ground. Whew. Maybe this winter won't be so bad after all.

Somehow between the time I woke up this morning to gray, but clear, skies, and when I left for work an hour or so later, several inches of snow just materialized. For some reason, this seemed horribly unfair.

Astronomy Tuesday

Two galaxies, NGC 1055 in the upper right, and Messier 77, in the constellation Cetus. I think they look as though they're dancing, but they're actually 500,000 light years apart.

Image Credit and Copyright: Dieter Willasch (Astro-Cabinet)

Sunday bird blogging

A tufted titmouse performing an oral pedicure.

Saturday reflections

Here's something a little different: the fan in my bedroom, reflecting the window gate and slices of the world outside.

Winter evening

            Gentle and just pleasure
It is, being human, to have won from space
This unchill, habitable interior
Which mirrors quietly the light
Of the snow, and the new year.
       Margaret Avison -- New Year's Poem

Icy winds today, whipping scraps of paper so high up in the air I thought they were birds. There's no doubt that one of the great pleasures of winter weather is being inside, away from it, and I am reveling in the quiet warmth of a day when blessedly little happened.

Urban poetry

I got out of the office early, and fortunately the people pens for the big ball drop in Times Square were not all in place yet, and I was able to get home without having to cajole my way across the barricades. The NYPD is not in a terribly cajole-able mood these days, and you just never know.

Sometimes they have let me cross as soon as I say I'm just going home, sometimes they've made me show my driver's license to prove that my home is indeed on the far side of Times Square, and sometimes I've had to walk all the way up to Central Park and then back down again because there was no crossing Broadway, period, end of story.

This is one New York ritual I've never been the least bit tempted to join. I'd rather be warm and have access to a bathroom, and anyway, from my apartment I can actually hear the roar of the crowd at midnight. Or that is, I could hear it, if I were awake, which I won't be.

Happy New Year and pleasant dreams of a bright 2015 to you all.

Astronomy Tuesday

The Star of Bethlehem may not actually have been a comet, but here's one in Christmas colors -- Comet Lovejoy, discovered in August, set for its pass by Earth on January 7th.

Image Credit and Copyright: Damian Peach/SEN

I've been for a walk on a winter's day

Two more photos from yesterday.

All the leaves are brown and the sky is gray

The sky was actually bright blue yesterday, but that's rare; typically these days it's as gray as the landscape.

Here's a look at the world without the distraction of color, Central Park in winter, when we're left with the consolations of shape and texture. The beauty isn't as obvious -- you have to work for it -- but it's definitely still there.

Sunday bird blogging

Okay, this is not exactly fine wildlife photography -- you can't even tell what kind of bird it is -- but it made me laugh so I'm using it.

The bird -- it's a junco -- landed on the path right by my feet in the park yesterday. Of course by the time I'd hoisted the camera to my eye it was hopping away, and I caught it mid-hop, en pointe like a ballerina. Except that what it makes me think of isn't ballet, but Michael Jackson moonwalking.

Here's a better picture of the same bird.