I hate it when I am doing my best and I screw it up anyways. I've had a run of screw-ups in the past few days. If I screw something up at work, I can go out with my camera and jogging shorts and console myself that even if my SQL queries suck - at least I know how to have fun.

So today I grabbed my camera and set out under a partly-cloudy sky that glowed - excited that I would get a good shot for the weblog. Just as I was thinking, "Tim, you have to be on the ball, because good nature shots take quick thinking," I heard a bird crying in distress. I looked up and a starling was being followed by a hawk. They were about five feet below the crowns of the trees and maybe all of thirty feet away. If they were any closer Teton would have started barking.

It took me a few seconds to realize how lucky I was to see this drama in action. I switched my camera on and started shooting. Each click of the shutter seemed like eternity as I panned through the forest, following the pursuit of the hawk. The clouds in the background added to the drama - billowing black against backlight and a blue sky. I was so excited I could hardly stand it. Seconds later it was over: the hawk had sailed on and the squawks of the terrified starling faded into the distance. I looked at my camera and realized that the reason each click took so long is that the lens cap had caught on my lense. ARGGGHHHH! In a nutshell that's how everything has gone this week.

I'm never one to dwell on my defeats, so I hung out by Mr. and Mrs. Swan's nest until they came over to hiss at me and I took this picture. I plan to deal with the SQL query sucking issue by learning the hell out temp space and complex joins. At least databases don't fly away.