Each morning I try to get to my office an hour early so I can take a nice long walk before I officially start the day. I find it quite soothing. I started doing this during the summer and so now, as the days grow shorter and colder, it’s more of a challenge. But it’s still a great start to my day so even though now it is dark when I rise and when I leave the house, it’s worth the effort. I’m fortunate to have my office near the Columbia River, and there is a nice walking trail that I am on nearly every day. As the start of the days have grown colder, I noticed the mists rising off the river.

Now of course I don’t carry the fancy camera while I’m walking before work, so I’m stuck with taking pictures with my phone. On this walk I saw pheasants (when they flushed I nearly had a heart attack), quail (in *trees* which is weird because they generally seem to forget they can fly and just scurry everywhere), ducks, geese, seagulls, and bunnies. It was a lovely (chilly) morning.

The mists rising up are what I imagine Scotland looks like all the time. Which is silly, because I’ve been to Scotland and it didn’t look like this. It was snowing.

Nonetheless, I’m delighted that this is a poor quality photograph. It looks like a nice watercolor to me. I hope you enjoy it.