Here is a fella that anyone who has been to Yellowstone should recognize. The other night I was sitting by the Yellowstone River doing some paperwork when this Raven flew in and then sat and stared at me. They are huge and noisy birds and extremely intelligent. At a ranger talk one of the rangers touched on the topic of the ravens. He told stories of how these birds have swooped down and stole sandwiches, credit cards and cell phones right out of unsuspecting hands. I'm not sure as to why people were waving their credit cards around outside but I'm sure they regretted doing so as they watched their card fly out of sight in the grasps of one of these huge birds.Today at work I started with stocking gifts and then was moved to the register in groceries. One of the readers of this blog stopped in to say hi to me. He was here from Las Vegas. Unfortunately, I was not able to visit long. I had just moved to the register and in one of my 'everything must be clean' moments I dropped the bottle of cleaner on the floor............twice. There is an obvious reason why it was a good choice on my parents part not to name me Grace. So between moving to the register, cleaning up liquid cleaner (a clean freaks dream!) and grabbing my supply of bags I had to cut short my visit with him. But I do thank him for taking the time to stop in and see me.
I did swing through Hayden Valley this evening. I got to watch a coyote trot along the edge of the Yellowstone River. He seemed to just meander around but I'm sure that his intent was to find a nice fat rodent for his dinner. He finally disappeared into the brush and I moved on. I did get a chance to snap a couple of pictures of him. Both coyotes and wolves can be heard from our dorms singing at night. Great sound.
With it getting darker sooner I usually can't stay out very long. I really have an avertion to driving at night especially with the bison on the move. But coming up to the north through the valley it is quite a sight to see the ribbon of headlights weaving through the valley. I could even see headlights coming down Dunraven Pass when I looked up to the mountains.
The Dorm Bison has been around. There is actually three of them but only one is usually by the dorms at a time. Today two of them showed up together so I might have to pluralize to Dorm Bisons. Of course they stopped traffic. I haven't seen the Boys of Summer lately but there have been a nice herd of elk in the area. Maybe they have hooked up with some these ladies to form their harems. I'll have to look closer to see if any of them in the herd have antlers.
I just finished the book Death in the West by Chris Becker. It was a good read. Last week I finished The Oatman Massacre by Brian McGinty. Excellent. Now I am reading Pioneer Women by Joanna Stratton. And if your interested, I finished up the Suicide or Murder book about Merriwether Lewis and I have to vote for................murder.
