saw an interesting nature-type thing on the walk home from the bus stop yesterday. there was a large flock of some sort of migratory bird up in the trees, and it was HUGE! several trees had their upper branches literally blanketed, with hundreds more wheeling around in the sky, and still others flying in a steady stream over to another group of trees across the street, plus another stream heading off away from the whole group (on towards their final destination, i would assume). i don't know what sort of birds they were, but they were black and probably about a foot-wide wingspan. too small to be crows, but they definitely squawked like them. the noise was extremely loud, and looking at all those birds it wasn't too hard to imagine a scenario like hitchcock's movie... there were so many that if they did indeed have half a mind to peck my eyes out, it might have been hard to stop them. last night went with the slf to see "gangs of new york". i don't know what i can say about it that hasn't already been said, but there were some stellar performances in that film. liam neeson was brilliant in his short appearance, and it's hard for me to even describe daniel day-lewis' character, bill the butcher. alternating between bloodthirsty gang leader, caring patriarch, and outright crazed lunatic, dd-l should definitely take the oscar.

oh, and leonardo dicaprio's dialect coach should be shot.