Marty’s photo of the day #4082: Our vacation is over . . . sigh. First, Deb (wife), Nellie (dog), and I spent six days in the American Prairie Reserve of central Montana. There we stayed in a remote yurt, with no running water, no phone, no internet, and limited solar power. It was awesome! Then we returned to our home in western Montana for two days before leaving Nellie at the doggie spa (she was not pleased) and driving seven hours south to Salt Lake City. There we saw Evanescence in concert at the USANA Amphitheater. They were awesome! After that, we wrapped things up with a day exploring the Farmington Bay Waterfowl Management Area and Antelope Island. Some parts of both were awesome and some parts of both were awful. I’ll have commentary on that in the weeks to come.
One of the awesome parts of our Antelope Island visit was finally having success photographing a burrowing owl. These owls come out of there burrows at sunset and are quite skittish. The first owl I found hopped back into its burrow as soon as I took a step toward it, but the one in this photo was braver. Very slowly, I crawled as close to the burrow as I dared, and by the time I was in range the sky was so dark that I had to up the ISO on my camera to 6400. My knees took a beating on the sharp rocks, and the mosquitos instinctively knew that I had to stay still and they could suck me dry, but it was worth the bruised knees and the dozens of mosquito bites to finally make some pretty decent burrowing owl photos.
In other news: This is going to be a busy week, getting ready for the release of my seventh and most controversial book, Doctor Refurb. The official publication date is Sunday, September 18—to kick off Banned Books Week—but it might become available a few days earlier. Check back for updates, if you’re interested in being among the first to read one of the funniest and most controversial novels of 2022!