Transporting COVID-19 Positive Passengers In The Taxi & Progressive Insurance Dispute Resolved & Bakersfield Update & Shake Your Flabby Booty? Insane Antics On Aurora Avenue North & Passenger Expectations & A Bakersfield Portrait In Rhyme

 Last Week I Transported A Coronavirus Passenger to Goldbar, WA

My most recent COVID-19 tested-positive passenger originated from Kirkland's Evergreen Hospital, a medical facility I haven't picked up at in at least ten years or longer, rarely finding myself anywhere close to Zone 411 (Totem Lake), it not making much sense battling the usual heavy traffic on I-405 to get there.  That day I just happened to drop off a regular customer of mine at her dental appointment, and since the offered call was .02 miles away, I accepted it but not knowing it was yet another coronavirus-infected passenger, this lady making my sixth such variety of customer.  

Given I am vaccinated, and double-masking both me and the passenger, while also properly ventilating the cab, I feel I am taking a very minimal risk, if any risk at all, providing rides to those who really need to get home or to a quarantine shelter.  What makes the quarantine passengers so inviting is the extra $50.00 King County adds to the fare, something designed to calm the soul and soothe the anxious brow.  

But in this case, as with accounts other than the King County one, there was no such added surcharge bonus.  I have asked Yellow/Puget Sound Dispatch to explore the possibility of our other major account customers also providing a "risk fee" when requesting transport of COVID-19 patients, a kind of monetary acknowledgement and thank you.  And it does remain a potential risk for many of the drivers because this kind of fare is offered to our entire pool of drivers minus warning or notice, PSD not restricting the fares to vaccinated drivers only, something I have suggested more than once.  

To me, the liability issue for PSD is immense, because, if in theory a driver does get infected while transporting a virus positive customer, and dies, or perhaps worse, spreads the virus to a family member, with that person succumbing to the virus, I think it would be hard to defend PSD's current policy.  And to that point, it would be very wise to limit these kinds of fares only to fully vaccinated drivers, thus avoiding the needless hazard of endangering everyone involved.  

As to my Goldbar customer, she, like two others I have given rides to, was in denial that she was virus positive, saying she was only dealing with kidney stones and nothing else.  The ride out on Highway 2 was very pretty and enjoyable save for some heavy eastbound traffic near Sultan.  Being in Sultan brought back many memories, as I once lived there for a few months back in 1973 with my cat Sniffer, having then only recently turned 19 years old, and was at that point attempting to understand just what the hell I was doing.  The house was maybe a hundred feet from the railroad tracks, and I always appreciated that Sniffer was wiser than me, staying clear of those many rumbling trains passing by.   Only a young fool would move next to an active railroad.  That Sniffer and I could sleep through all that clatter was a gift of nature, thank goodness we were able to ignore the penetrating roar. 

Progressive Says I am not Culpable

This morning I got an email from a Progressive Insurance senior supervisor informing me that I hold zero responsibility for the recent accident I have been dealing with over the past few weeks.  It was a very friendly letter and I responded in kind, only interested in my declared innocence and vindication and little else.  But since the issue of damage was brought up, I will be getting an auto body repair estimate on the wound inflicted upon 1092.  That Crown Victoria is one tough car, lots of steel making it more impervious to damage than other cars.  

My personal car, my wonderful 2012 Chevrolet Sonic, would have been demolished in a similar collision but "Taco" does contain 10 airbags, hopefully pillowing the passengers from serious injury.  Thank you Progressive, for your conclusion, and if there is a next time, I will not delay in writing up an accident report and creating an accident diagram, being busy no excuse for not doing what is obviously necessary. 

Sad News Concerning my Sister JoAnn

I am very glad I was able to visit my sister over that recent six-day span as JoAnn passed away yesterday afternoon at 12:12 PM in Bakersfield, two Stage-Four tumors taking her away less than two months after her initial diagnosis.  She was 76, and born in 1945, the second of four children.  JoAnn was responsible for my first car driving experience, when in 1967, when I was age 12, she insisted I get behind the wheel of her beautiful 1955 Ford and drive down the road.  Scared, I made it a total of one block before putting the car in park and leaping out of the driver's seat.  Later that year, "dear old Dad" made me learn how to drive, this time in our 1952 Dodge Cornet.  RIP JoAnn! and thank you for taking me to the movies in Denver  1962-64 and buying me all those one dollar Woolworth's pizza slices. Who ever knew Elvis Presley was a boxer?  Or that Vincent Price would introduce me to Edgar Allen Poe?

Some Local Seattle TV Station Needs to Take Live Footage of the Ongoing Madness

I couldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it myself, last week seeing this prostitute wearing nothing covering her buttock, turning to the ongoing traffic and "shake, shake, shaking" her butt for all the world to ogle, a kind of "live-in-your face" advertisement for what you too can enjoy if only you would hire her for your personal pleasure.  Not that her buttock was in any way worth viewing but there it was in living color, whether wanting to see it or not.  

The situation on Aurora Ave North is getting fairly wild, with new hookers taking over for previous sex workers, new troops for the sexual trenches.  Does this make any sense?  Where are the Seattle Police?  Where are the King County Sheriffs?  This is nuts!  Shall we start calling Seattle the "New Amsterdam," and even there, in ribald Holland, these kinds of antics aren't happening.  Will it ever stop?

Passenger Expectations 

The passenger complained when I showed up a mere nine minutes late for her scheduled time call taking her to Sea-Tac International Airport and her flight aboard British Airways winging her to France.  As I told her, nine minutes late ain't nothing these days but here is the problem.  Customers are calling Seattle Yellow Cab all hours of the day and night with the old expectation that we are a fully operational twenty-four company, and when they find out the opposite, they complain.  Why do I have to be the one to tell them that we have been crippled, handicapped by a series of events over the past 7-8 years that were and are completely out of our control?  Did this particular passenger understand my explanation?  Maybe because she gave me a nearly $10.00. tip.  I liked that.

Bakersfield in Rhyme 

Merle Haggard and Buck Owens waving hello from the grave, while static filled AM fundamentalist Christian radio warns don't become Satan's slave,

be instead be a Cowboy road racer flying down Bakersfield's 151 square miles of streets and roads, like a mad hatter, like a Wild Mister Toad,

disregarding the reality of red lights and what makes sense to the common everyday woman and man, shouting I don't give a rats ass because I am a free Trump-loving denizen in our great American land,

shooting my guns bang! bang! bang! all objections be hanged and strung from the Great Oil Derrick floating high in the western sky, taking all the Colorado River's water to irrigate my carrots, grapes and 

lemons too, because out of the desert we have created a city bright and expansive and completely new, another kind of thinking, a combination of Mexican tequila and Budweiser beer fueling our unique human 

zoo, and we don't care what you say, we will drink unleaded gasoline straight and do what we gonna do, minus any Liberal crying, so please go soak your heads you damn assholes, straight into the nearest loo.  

 

 

Very Quickly, Greetings From San Francisco International Airport: What Is Normal?

Sitting here at the airport, and the race is on, can I get this posting done, edited and published before boarding at 9:05 AM, and what if anything do I have to say about taxi that will impart new knowledge upon the taxi hemisphere?  Nothing, I have nothing to say other than the new PSD policy having everyone paying monthly for their AT&T tablet services is a pain, my taxi colleague Rick reporting his tablet, the ability to get calls, went blank at 12:30 this morning.  Not nice, no, not at all.  Always something going wrong or astray in the wild, wild, wild world that is taxi driving.  Something good was a GEICO Insurance radio commercial touting the routing skills of cabbies, which I will repeat here once I can find the radio ad script or audio online.  It was astoundingly accurate which is rare when anyone other than a cabbie talks or writes about taxicab as it is and as I know too well. 

My time in Bakersfield and Tehachapi was at times confounding, bewildering and exhausting, dealing with situations unfamiliar and perplexing while attempting to get the cooperation of the various people involved with my sister's care and wellbeing.  It also didn't help that my sister has not been taking care of commonplace business for years, for instance not removing her husband's name on bank accounts, etc, even though John died in April 2009.  And adding to all this was my sister's off and on incoherence, simple decision making becoming something more than difficult but impossible, putting my poor brain in a spin.

But a huge positive, from a dining perspective at least, was the discovery of a very good Chinese restaurant, the Great Castle, located at 410 Union Avenue, Bakersfield, telephone number 661-325-3311, surprising me with some of the best Chinese Mandarin cuisine I've had in years.  As I find in my various travels, you never know, and if passing through Bakersfield, I highly recommend you find the joint and eat to your Chinese food heart's content.  And they seemed to like me too, one of the older waiters patting me on the back as I left yesterday evening's meal.  Why?  Maybe tipping but it seems I was the rare customer ordering "real" Chinese food.  Yeah, I've eaten Chinese 'round the world, and if I ever have the leisure time and opportunity, it would be fun writing a book concerning all my many thousands of Chinese meals here, there and China, Hong Kong and Saigon everywhere.  I still remember the canned Chinese food my mother would sometimes serve in our mobile home, La Choy and Chun King brands serving up overcooked and bland ersatz Chinese  Awful, truly awful American pretend Chinese food.

Greetings From Bakersfield, California, Population: 379,000---Home To The Most Craziest Drivers In All The USA & Progressive Insurance: What Are They Doing?

Bakersfield, CA, Home to Organic Carrots and Nutty Drivers

I'm in Merle Haggard's home town assisting with a family crisis, as my second oldest sister, JoAnn, now finds herself in palliative care due to a recent cancer diagnosis.  I arrived late last night and visited her this past afternoon.  Tomorrow I drive up to her house in Tehachapi, located up a desert mountain, meeting with a real estate agent, and Katherine, someone from JoAnn's local Catholic Church who has been helping my sister over the past month.  It is heartening to see community involvement joining in when a neighbor requires a helping hand.  Tehachapi is a small town, perhaps that explaining the kindness and care exhibited.   

But one Bakersfield community feature that isn't so nice is the deranged driving style embraced by nearly everyone, a standard 50 MPH speed limit upon ordinary streets encouraging true foolishness, folks more or less "drag racing" from light to light.  I've witnessed some dumbbell driving in our USA, especially in Los Angeles and Michigan but these automotive clowns might be the worst, Bakersfield's streets a nonsensical circus.  I now gun my VW Jetta rent-a-car off the line when the signal turns green just to avoid being crashed into.  The drivers here are truly vicious, out for blood.

I did notice three Bakersfield cabbies sitting at the airport as I drove away.  If I had noticed them earlier, I would have stopped by and chatted, curious what it must be like driving cab here, and now that I know, how the driving conditions are.  Ya gotta be fast to survive around here!

And know when you buy those "Bunny Luv" organic carrots at your local natural food grocery or organic produce section, know they were grown here in Bakersfield kissed by the desert sun and kept moist by water flowing in irrigation canals.  Where nothing should grow, everything does.  Ask Bugs Bunny.  He'll tell ya all about the California vegetable miracle story, almond trees drinking up all that precious water.

Boy, was I surprised!

Waking up yesterday morning, I got a call from my Progressive claims adjustor telling me I was being held liable for the accident I described last week, when the driver wanted me to die.  I was dumbfounded because it defies the known laws of physics, that when I was barely moving and the woman comes flying up beside at me at an angle, on the wrong side of the road, and hits me.  "No, no no!" I howled, this is not going to be!  

In one sense, I have only myself to blame because it took me two weeks, meaning this morning I finally filled out my online Yellow/PSD accident report.  And speaking of howling, I hounded my Key Insurance agents, fully expressing my displeasure with how this was being handled by Progressive.  To call me angry and disturbed by my own insurance company essentially telling me I was lying, that I am a liar,  that I made up this story, was, and remains beyond belief.  Someone at Progressive must have gotten my message because, later today, I received a email requesting that I fill out a diagram of the incident.  Now that's it more like it, and how it should be done. 

Anyone who knows me knows I'm an honest fellow, and if I had caused the accident, I would have fully admitted it.  It is that simple.  And when filling out the report, I only then noticed that the other driver's insurance info was expired.  Was she driving without insurance?  I wonder.   

Aftermath Of An Accident: "I Hope You Are T-Boned And Die! I Want You To Die!" & Who Are Serving Hopelink Customers After 6:00 PM? Anyone? No One? & Poem

Hit on South Atlantic Street

It is a small expectation, one would think, when turning left upon a familiar street, a turn done thousands of times, that proceeding forward unhindered would be the commonplace result but no, this time it had to be different, my simple wish for unimpeded motion suddenly quashed by the completely unexpected appearance of a frenzied driver flying through the intersection eastbound in the westbound lane, rudely bumping poor 1092's nose, bruising his left side just above the wheel well, the crazy lady scratching her car's right passenger side from one end to the other.  Why she did this, you would have to ask her but one thing I do know for sure is what she, after exchanging information, said, that is shouted at me, shaking like the proverbial leaf, and I quote, "I hope you are T-boned and die!  I want you to die!"  And that isn't very nice, is it?  Obviously not.  Oh, ain't modern life grand, everyone having such a good time in Seattle-land. 

After hours Hopelink? Good luck!

Now with Farwest Taxi's curtailed evening hours and Hopelink not wanting to deal with our overseas dispatch, how will Hopelink's evening and early morning clients ever get home?  A surprised University Hospital nurse was startled when I told her I wasn't her patient's cab.  Did the mother and infant ever get home this past Saturday night.  Don't know but I do care.

Poem

Title: "Again, Poetry"

Placing words upon the poetic page

a hopeful anagram----collecting, combining

letters and words into a literary endeavor expressing

what? the issue and problem,

merely made more difficult when not requesting 

slippered feet scampering down couplet avenues

to stanza heaven, or is it Hades---words, elusive words

bedeviling the unamused practitioner,

Marianne Moore's toad sticking out its tongue,

laughing at you.

___________________________________

Please note:  This is not my intended structure but the damn computer won't let me do anything else, goddamnit!  For reference, see and read Moore's poem "Poetry."  And maybe the toad will become a frog sitting upon a log, loudly croaking, croaking through the fog shrouded pond. 

And "slippered feet" would be traditional meter used to dance and prance down the metric line, ever so fine! for the Victorian English mind!

Uber's State of California Proposition 22 Ruled Unconstitutional & Tesla's Autopilot Accidents And Future Of Autonomous-Driving Vehicles

 "The entirely of Proposition 22 is unenforceable." says Alameda County Superior Court Judge Roesch

On Friday, August 20th, Judge Frank Roesch, a Superior Court judge in Alameda County, California, ruled that the 2020 California voter initiative known as Proposition 22, a law  passed by a 58% vote margin after a $200 million dollar promotion campaign paid by Uber, Lyft and other TNC companies, was ruled unconstitutional (violating the State of California Constitution) and unenforceable because it limited the California Legislature's ability to organize and access worker's compensation by requiring a 7/8ths supermajority to amend the proposition, something viewed as impossible.  Anyone familiar with how government functions in the USA knows that the most stringent majority requirement is usually 2/3rds of the elected body, a 7/8ths requirement something straight out of a autocracy, something that might make a Stalin or a Mao Zedong (Mao Tse-tung) smile in appreciation. What Proposition 22 accomplished was abolishing California Assembly Bill 5, a law recognizing gig workers as employees.  No, no, Uber and Lyft didn't like that, a concept undermining their ability to keep the drivers corralled and pinned beneath their corporate thumb.  

In further explaining his ruling Judge Roesh wrote "A prohibition on legislation authorizing collective bargaining by app-based drivers does not promote the right to work as an independent contractor, nor does it provide minimum workplace safety and pay standards for those workers. It appears only to protect the economic interest of the network companies in having a divided, un-unionized workforce, which is not a stated goal of the legislation."  He could not have stated it any clearer, dismissing the lie that Proposition 22 would enhance gig workers lives.  In a survey of 500 California gig workers, only 10 percent have received the promised health care subsidy, that is, a mere 50 out of 500 individuals. 

In a published comment, University of California-Hastings Law Professor, Veena Dubal, said that the TNC companies "erred in trying to completely take away the right of legislatures and municipalities to do anything on behalf of workers, as well as trying to take the workers out of the state workers' state compensation system."  

It is clear that Uber and Lyft are doing everything they can to survive because they remain on the verge of failure, of disappearing completely from the transportation landscape.  Uber lost $6.77 billion in 2020 and $8.51 billion in 2019.   Lyft lost $1.75 billion in 2020 and $2.60 billion in 2019.  Ther rates charged to riders have gone up 92% from January 2018 to July of this year, 2021.  As of this July, their overall workforce is down by 40%.  

A good, bad example of what is occurring was the fellow I took home from 2nd and South Jackson Street to his place on the 900 hundred-block of 10th Avenue East.  Uber quoted him $60.00.  My meter read just over ten dollars.  It is the wild, wild west and now the taxis are winning the fare-based shootout.  Hurray!

Tesla's Potentially Fatal Autopilot Operating System

Pre-pandemic, us cabbies sitting at the train station argued about how we would or wouldn't be replaced by autonomous or robotic cars, vehicles not needing a driver to safely operate.  Finally, after a more or less hands off policy, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is opening an investigation into the at least 11 accidents involving Tesla's Autopilot system, the crashes killing one woman and injuring a total of 17 people.  It seems the Autopilot has a knack for running into emergency response vehicles parked on the side of freeways.  Not a good thing.  

And what does it mean concerning the replacement of cabbies by completely hands-free vehicles?  That it isn't happening soon, if at all, is the answer.  Despite all the previous media hype, our society is years away from that science fiction reality.  Instead, like in Germany, teach people to really learn and know how to drive a car.  Do that and we will all be safer, happier and wiser.   

No Compliments Please, Money Instead The Best Commentary Concerning Your Ride & Dead Drunk In Queens & Hard To Get A Taxi In Pacific, Missouri

 Not Praise, $$$$

It may seem impolite or uncouth but spare me the lavish compliments and covering, instead, my sweaty palms with greenbacks.  I say this because yesterday Puget Sound Dispatch sent out a fleet message praising two cabbies for good service rendered to some account customers, thinking somehow this alone, this "pat-upon-the-head" was "just reward" enough for simply being professional, doing what you are supposed to do, all the while smiling, not snarling.  I say, hell with that, give the guys money or a break on their dispatch fees.  In this business, that is how to show your appreciation, because it is money that motivates us and little else.  Yesterday I got a $70.00 tip, and you know what, did I really deserve it?  Of course not!  But I was damn happy to receive it.  Yes, even I can fake generosity when in reality I am the worst Scrooge, stealing your Christmas pudding.  And it is still summertime August. Enjoy Sunday's full moon.

Two News Items from that rag, the New York Post

Not Drunk, Dead

A NYC cabbie, plying the streets of Queens, picked up what he thought was an inebriated passenger but instead, was in a fatal state, dying in his cab. Rushing the passenger to a hospital, the customer was DOA. The article doesn't mention if he was paid for his troubles.

There is one VERY dumb taxi company owner in Missouri

Charlie Bullington, owner of Yo Transportation Service in Pacific, Missouri (suburban Saint Louis), he of a small fleet of pink painted cabs, has a message for anyone interested in using his taxi service: if you wear a mask or have received your coronavirus vaccination, he will not allow you into one of his cabs.  That's right, he would rather you spread the virus to his drivers than take precautions to protect yourself and others. Yesterday I transported, on a King County account, a COVID-19 infected passenger to a quarantine center in Issaquah, Washington.  Both of us were double- masked while she wore gloves.  What would Charlie the Bull have done?  Why get sick and die, that's what.  And as the saying goes, doing us all a "big favor."

 

Greetings From Quincy, Washington: The American West Is Burning---I Got To See It For Myself & If You Don't Care, Why Should I? & Medallion Renewal Reminder---September 15th, 2021 & 2 Poems From The Road

You Should Visit the Quincy Public Library 

Today, this Sunday, my two weeks tripping around California, Oregon and now eastern Washington ends, yet despite all the smoke I will be unhappy coming back to Seattle and the cab, lonely roads like Oregon State Routes 66 and 31, nearly vacant of traffic, don't make me relish once again negotiating Seattle's  packed streets and crowded freeways and its forever foolish, too stupid drivers.  Especially in Eastern Oregon, there were few people, and returning to dumbbell Seattle is depressing, a backward city touting its imaginary forwardness, featuring spiraling costs but little true urban ambiance---a sprawling suburban center minus coffee after 9:00 PM.  

And the local governance is about to worsen, if that is entirely possible, with two of the poorest mayoral candidates possible, the wimpish  Bruce Harrell versus the "always theoretical" M. Lorena Gonzalez.  Yikes!  Let me run for the New Mexico hills, explaining why I am now registered to vote in Grant County, New Mexico and not King County, ready to vote for the first honest rattlesnake I see shaking its telltale tail.  There is venom and then there is the "I can never make up my god damn mind " poison that is Seattle and King County politics.  Quick, provide me an antidote, I am dying!

But reflecting a bit upon my recent travels, I can make a few recommendations for those traveling in and around north California and eastern Oregon, adding some pleasure to the drive.  If coming up from California, and thinking about exploring eastern Oregon, take State Route 66 eastbound beginning just north of Ashland proper and enjoy the quick accent up a twisting mountainside road, taking you first to the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument, an interesting meeting of climate zones, and where, if you have the time, take a stroll down that part of the Pacific Crest Trail.  From there you are eventually going to descend into the Klamath River Valley, the road crossing that great river a few times.  It is very nice country, especially in and around the tiny burg of Keno, Oregon.  Though before you've turned off of 1-5 at Ashland, first make sure you stopped at the wonderful mountain town of Shasta City, California, buying provisions at the Berryvale Grocery Natural Foods, then enjoying a picnic at the Sacramento River Headwaters city park.  Great place to rest up and fill those empty water containers. Just head north down the main street and look for the entrance taking you across the railroad tracks, turning left.  

Continuing east like I did,  on SR 66, you will eventually connect with State Route 140, and the roadway taking you to Lakeview, Oregon.  It was along that road eastbound that I began wearily noticing the biggest smoke plume I will ever want to see rising ahead of me to the northeast.  Expecting at any time to be stopped by the local police, the still open roadway took me ever closer until I was about 2-4 miles away from a smoky blaze consuming a mountainside.  A giant orange flame, like a kind of big, hungry animal, bit into the forest. I even got to witness airplanes dropping fire retardant, the pilots bravely swooping into  smoky, wind driven clouds.  It was dramatic, a prime time movie minus the theater, no ticket required.  No, I don't want to see the sequel. 

After gassing up in Lakeview, I continued north on Hwy 395 to State Route 31 and Paisley, Oregon and the Chewaucan River, a favorite of mine from two previous trips. Unfortunately, fire had scorched the hillsides forming the river canyon, saddening me, certainly not pleased to see the many blackened trees.  My favorite campgrounds closed, and anyway, with the road also officially closed, I pulled off  and slept above the Chewaucan, the sky clear despite lingering smoke, a breeze cooling down the heated air. 

A note on camping:  Camping is cheaper and oft times free.  Both with her and alone and camping a total of nine nights, I paid a total of $18.00.  Think of all the fresh air and the pleasure of battling mosquitos. It's worth it, camping out in the great outdoors. 

Only a Fool continues to Care

While I will still mildly advocate when necessary, I have decided it is futile to care when no one else does, because, short of a class-action law suit, nothing it appears will compel any of the involved actors to do anything whatsoever to improve taxi customer service while also providing much needed justice for the cab drivers.  It is now that I declare, like everyone else, that I will cease to care to whatever happens to all those passengers never receiving their requested cab, missing jobs and airplane flights and everything else. 

Why care?  I have yelled enough, alerting everyone to problems that never end.  If the City and County fail to heed my warnings, well, so they do, having other matters on hand, like seriously submitting my writing and departing the taxi asylum.  I want to get out of the cab and Seattle, lingering much longer obviously a big, personal mistake.  Then I will no longer write what "she-who-can't-be-named" calls "that damn blog."  Yeah, I am ready to go.  As some might remember, she is the one who encouraged me to start writing it.  The truth is she wants me out of the cab as much I want to be gone.  It's unhealthy and besides, I've grown "long in the taxi tooth," time to pull these yellowish fangs.  Good idea.

30 More Days to Renew your Taxi Medallion

The end date is September 15th.  I say this because I have yet to renew YC 1092's medallion.  I'll get to it within the next two weeks, and I suggest you do the same.  Don't wait to the last moment. 

2 Poems

Coming Home to Tolstoy

Moving my camp to the Russian olive tree,

I am home, we discovering and naming this site

Tolstoy, the tree bordering the south side of Quincy

Lake, in 1989, and now memories of me and you,

always seeing you, there you are swimming

far out into the lake, watching you from the shore.

________________________________________

In the Marsh

Whirling forward, a concentrated swooping mass, excited dunlins 

instant feathered acrobats, the marsh their circus ring,

and godwits and avocets and sanderlings too winging shore to air

to water and back again and again,

all chittering, chattering, talking, warning  "look! look out above you! 

watch out! those harriers wanting lunch!"

the harriers sudden lethal missiles but missing

the sharp turning zigzagging dunlins, backs flashing sunlight,

all avoiding harrier talons five, ten, fifteen minutes more until 

their adversaries giving up, everyone now nervously happy as  

brown pelicans slowly glide down to their communal island.

"Did anything just happen? they ask, their friends replying, 

"No, No, only another pleasant Tuesday afternoon in the marsh."   

____________________________________________

The actors in this real life drama:

Dunlin (calidris alpina)

American  Avocet (curvirostra americana)

Marbled godwit. (limosa fedoa) 

Sanderling (calidras alba)

Marsh hawk or Northern harrier (cirens cyaneus) 

Brown pelican (pelecanus accidentalis)

The stage was the Arcata Marsh, Arcata, California.