Eagle

#26

01.26.10

When we decided to move to Alaska in 2003, I remember being more excited about seeing wild eagles than anything else.  It didn't take long before we had seen literally hundreds of them, yet I still never tire of seeing one in nature.  These are powerful, powerful birds.  I know many people here in Alaska without known history of illicit street drug or alcohol abuse who insist they have seen eagles swoop down from the sky and pick up small dogs and cats on the fly.  

I remember fishing for king salmon on the Kenai River with my father in 2005 or 2006 and we saw an eagle take about one dozen passes at a small family of ducks.  Every time the eagle approached, the mother duck would beat her wings against the water and the ducklings would dive in unison.  Around the twelfth pass, the eagle finally got a duckling, flew to the top of a nearby tree, and that was that.  I was pretty upset and sniffly over the event, so my father had to put his arm around me and tell me about the Circle of Life.  I admired him so much for being so knowledgeable and comforting at a time like that... but only right up until I saw the Lion King at the Anchorage Performing Arts Center last Summer, when I realized he ripped the whole speech off of Disney's Mufasa.

So, eagles are cool alright.  Never mind Ben Franklin voting for the Turkey as our National Bird; this is one area where he was just wrong!  He told his daughter the eagle "is of bad moral character".  Yet Ben is also known to have suggested the Rattle Snake as our National symbol.  I am unaware of any official debates as to the 'moral character' of rattlers; but I suppose History Detectives on P.B.S. will search that out if I ask them nicely, someday. 

The featured photo is obviously grainy due to poor lighting and distance; but I still like that it captured the fleeting moment as desired.  I'm not sure why there is so much yellow and green in the clouds.  I tried zooming in for a closer shot with both Camera Genius and Camera Zoom apps, but the images got progressively worse as expected:

Nevertheless, my expectations going in to the photo were low, so I suppose these photos ended up exceeding my expectations.  I'm not ashamed to post them in the slightest, for better or worse.  However, since I was carrying my Canon Xsi at the time, I shot a couple more photos.  Though they are clearly superior images, I was amazed at how "less fun" it felt to use that camera after these last few weeks of concentrating on the iPhone's camera.  Here are the Canon shots taken on the same day as above:

 

Here are two photos I got in Homer a few years ago with my Nikon 8800:

 

 

Hmmm... now what to choose for the soundtrack.  Certainly not the Steve Miller Band fave; I'm focusing on Jazz / Folk / Alt-Country / Indie rock / and Psychedelic for this blog.  'Why?', you ask?  Uh... I don't know.  I just am.  Maybe because the Classic Rock genre is so 'known', and I'm trying to support lesser known groups / songs so the artists can properly feed their many children strung out near concert halls like so many cheap bracelet charms across the land.  I'm really thoughtful like that.

Well, here I go again with Leonard Cohen.  Even still, again I go with a cover version rather than his own original.  He has such a unique voice and delivery, I don't expect most to find it attractive on first listen.  Just like Modest Mouse was a gradual or acquired taste for me, and I used Sun Kil Moon to "smooth out the rough edges" in this blog on Grey Ice Water; I suppose I'm covering a titch for my man Leonard here.  But I hope in time you will give his original tunes  try.  I really do consider him an absolute genius as a lyricist in particular.

Here I play his Bird on a Wire, which has been covered by a host of musicians over the years (I own versions by Cohen, Ian McCulloch, the Neville Brothers, Johnny Cash, Joe Cocker and k.d. lang).  I'm playing the k.d. lang version, because I think she did a wonderful job and it best fits my photos of eagles.  

I'm not an overt fan of k.d. lang, because I think her to be rather broadwayish or theatrical even though she is classified as a singer-songwriter or country musician.  Or at least I think I'm not a fan... but I'll be chuck-darned if I don't keep buying her tunes, usually song-by-song, over the years.  One exception is her immaculate "Hymns of the 49th Parallel" which I consider a "must have" album.  It is an amazing collection of music which covers songs from her fellow Canadian musicians like Neil Young, Jane Siberry, and in this track, Leonard Cohen.  You already know that I'm in to latitudes if you've read my blog to date; and the 49th parallel, or 49th latitude, is a major dividing line between Canada and the U.S.A.  

She just doesn't miss any notes, this one... I hope you enjoy the song.

Until tomorrow... thank you for looking, listening and reading.  CCE