What's that noise...?

R and I had a fairly sleepless night, after a stressful phone exchange with the partner of a family member (R's family) who's having a mental health crisis.  This is not something I can, or want to, delve into here; suffice it to say, it's an intractable problem that reaches an acute level from time to time. So there was no straightforward step to take, no pathway towards feeling that we could do something useful.  We'll just have to see whether or not it becomes any easier in the next week or two.

So this rather wiped out the day, between feeling tired and feeling upset. On top of that, Jack texted this morning to say that he's tested positive for Covid. Aargh....!  Marianna and Frieda are in Greece for a week, so he's on his own. Good in some ways, not in others. One useful thing I did achieve was to drive over and deliver some painkillers, some bread and some home-cooked food.

Sometimes, perhaps, there's just a need to sit still and absorb feelings for a while. We were lucky in that nothing stopped us doing that, today.

It took me till nearly the end of the afternoon to feel like picking up the camera. But with the Nikon recently back from its service, I'm still getting a huge buzz from using it again; it's such a familiar companion. And with a long lens, there's the opportunity for some really easy photography from the back bedroom window.

We've been watching a changing pattern in goldfinch visits, in recent weeks: they're diversifying, and opting to explore the ordinary bird seed feeder, not just the nyger seed that they usually prefer. This one could hear my shutter clicks. The noise was enough to catch the bird's attention, but not enough to put him or her off the seeds.