June 9: Do I seem any smarter?

Eddie brought me a salmon from Egegik yesterday (probably an intercepted Kvichak fish. Harrumph!) I thought I would have some for breakfast, so I poached it using a cake pan... and ate three-quarters of it all by myself! Really - it was small. But I was hoping that for the calories, at least since it was salmon, I might be a little smarter.

Last night was gorgeous and after a day of pounding away at the keyboard trying not to be distracted by the juiciness of life here, I decided to go for a walk as the sun was setting. It's the best time of the day to find agates. You wouldn't think that the little rocks on the beach make much of a shadow, but they do. But even more surprising is what the setting sun does to agates. Since they're translucent, the sun just lights them up. So it's a pleasure to walk at sunset partly because of the pleasure of collecting agates, but it's also a great pleasure just to see little lights on the beach. But... it was cold and I was under-dressed, so I didn't stay out for long. Instead I came back, bundled up, and took my camera out to wait for the sunset.

While waiting, I saw a couple of sandhill cranes flying off the mud flats, back into the tundra.

And then an eagle passed by

And then, the sun set.