More signs of spring in the city:

• Downy woodpecker sounding his snare against our neighboring trees. I thought I heard him a few weeks back, too, but it may have been water furiously melting off the roof.
• Flock of robins on the city hall lawn. Didn’t hear them singing but did hear:
• A mockingbird mocking robins. “Yeah, and robins, you’re totally all like, chirrup cheerily chippaw, and hey seagulls, you’re all, cree, cree!, oh hey and chickadees you know what you are? You’re like, chickadeedeedee! Yeah that’s right! I said it!”
• Two red-tailed hawks engaged in what looked a lot like mid-air flirting and frollicking
• The season’s first cat hairball

In the country:

• Dopey fireflies looking somewhat nonplussed to be out and about on tree bark and shingles. What is it, 40 degrees out? What were we thinking?
• Something that may well have been a red-winged blackbird. It was black! It darted into reeds!

Well I wasn’t in the country very long. Checked quickly on the bees. They looked groggy yet restless, like someone waking up on the living room floor after a party’s wound down and trying to find his things. Except imagine 20,000 people at that party all doing that.

JinxGuard: I hope I have 20,000 bees! I hope I have 50,000! Won’t check for another week at least.