it was back to running again this morning. temperature was in the 30's with a strong wind so it was brisk outside, but i gradually warmed up after about 10 minutes. the past week of above freezing temperature did much to thaw the river, leaving large geometric shards of melting ice. over the eliot bridge i spotted the pair of hooded mergansers from wednesday, as well as a trio of common mergansers (2 females and a male). the commons seemed to be weary of my presence and soon flew away when i stopped to watch. i ran for the most part today, stopping only to walk across the two bridges. i noticed they re-installed the drinking fountain on wednesday but it wasn't turned on yet.

back at home, i ate some leftover fried chicken and had a piece of cake. i was checking my birding field guide to verify what i saw. when i noticed it said hooded mergansers were uncommon, that inspired me to get dressed and grab my camera to get some photos.

so after running around the charles river, i was back out there again for an encore performance. the hooded mergansers were nowhere to be seen. however, i did spots the common mergansers, this time 3 females. i wasn't planning on it but i ended up walking around the river searching for these elusive ducks. at least on the memorial drive side of the river there were nice sidewalks; on the storrow drive side, it was mostly icy muddy paths along the river's edge.

a letter from my doctor awaited me when i got back. my blood work revealed a slightly unhealthy cholesterol level and a mysterious high sensitivity to the c-reactive protein test. nothing to worry about for now, but if it persists it may be a precursor to heart disease. happy friday the 13th!

after my friday evening bath hour reading the latest issue of entertainment weekly, i had some more leftover fried chicken and one final slice of cake. i watched the new series dollhouse that's been on a media blitz recently. i used to be a big eliza dushku fan but not anymore. dollhouse allows her to play multiple characters but i don't think she has the acting chops to really pull it off. later i caught battlestar galactica, the return of ellen tigh AKA the twelve cylon. season 4.5 of BSG is pretty bad, the show really lost a lot of luster when the scifi network decided to milk the series by breaking up what was supposed to be a single season into 2 seasons. the revelation of the final cylons was also a shark jumping moment in the show. when i hear "the final four" i'm thinking college basketball, not human robots. tonight's episode was the worst, featuring a lot of cylon dialogue, basically trying to explain all the plot holes. i'll still watch the series until the very end, but it's like watching a majestic animal dying a slow and painful death.