July 13, 2026

Where: the neighborhood

When: 7:45 am

Bird Species: house sparrow, house finch, American robin, northern mockingbird, northern cardinal, gray catbird, mourning dove, European starling

Things I Thought About:

• Another music morning. You know who holds up? Billy Idol. "Dancing With Myself" is music to wake up to.
• Maybe it should be showtunes month. The other night I was quite stupidly doing some late-night scrolling and encountered a kid watching and reacting to Hamilton, and before I knew it I had pretty much watched Hamilton, in it's entirety, in like 90 second reels.
• I say "before I knew it" but it was actually 3:30 am when I got to the end. On the whole, the internet was a mistake.
• I guess I can appreciate the need to find Lin-Manuel Miranda corny, but Hamilton is the work of a generational talent, a singular piece of art, and people who want to say otherwise just make me shrug and say, "Okay, tiger." To deny it is just...silly to me.
• I also listened to La Cage Aux Folles in its entirety yesterday, for the first time in probably decades. What an odd, old-fashioned score for that show.
• One absolute crusher of a showstopper, though. A strong case can be made that that's all you need.

BOTD: A gray catbird youngster. I am finding identification a bit of a challenge in these summer months. I wasn't paying as much attention last year, so I'm quite struck at the moment by how many birds that I see are very young and still growing into their adult plumage, as well as how many are in active molt. No one is looking their best, and some of the coloration is quite different in their juvenile form.

I was gratified to see the white Joker lips on this little guy, confirming his youth. He doesn't have those nice cinnamon-colored undertail feathers yet, just hint of a brown wash at the moment.