Photographic frustration

I was sitting at my desk, half-dressed, finishing up the weekly column I write for a local paper, when I saw something outside the window that brought me to my feet in excitement.

Not twenty feet away, perched on the raspberry canes post, was a hawk, a big, grey hawk or falcon. Naturally, my camera was in the car. In the ten seconds that it took me to dash out the door half dressed and barefoot, retrieve the camera from the car and get back to the study room where I could take its picture, the majestic bird had already gone.

For ten years, I have been sitting in this chair, looking out at this view and I have never seen such a sight. And today it happened and I wasn't ready for it.

What you can learn from your dog

Dawn should like this:

Being a grown-up human is like being a dog, in more ways than one. You seem to spend your days gnawing endlessly on the same old bone or pile of bones -- in people terms, worrying at the same old problems which defy speedy or tidy resolution. Once in a great while, you break through to the tasty marrow and finally finish off the bone. In people terms, you achieve a measure of success.