Gloomy Gus

It is a grey, foggy, drippy day. These red berries stood out to me against gloominess of the weather and the sky and the mood.

Recent observations:

• Coyotes... yesterday a large, healthy-looking coyote walked down the street right by our school. I didn't get to see it, unfortunately. It is the 3rd large-and-healthy coyote sighting within 8 days; I saw 1 about 10 miles SW of school last Monday, and another teacher saw one near his house -- several miles N of school -- last week. I guess a single coyote can occupy a range of about 12 miles, and these sightings were farther apart than that. (Plus, it would be a huge crazy coincidence for this to be 3 sightings of the same coyote.)
• I'm still seeing grasshoppers, spiders, milkweed bugs, boxelder bugs, etc. outside. I don't know how numbered their days are, but they are getting less populous. After our heavy frosts in mid-October, we haven't had one in over a week.
• I saw a junco on Monday. Those fellow migrate through here or are winter residents; the north edge of their winter range is in southern WI. So we're getting our winter birds already. Although I see a robin outside of the window right now... but then, they're permanent residents around here lately.
• And in sad news for locavores... I found out last night that our CSA farmers are moving to WI, so I'm not sure what I'm going to be eating come next summer. I remain hopeful that some options will pan out, or we might have to buy a larger tract of land!