Northern Shrike

Today, as I made pancakes for the girls ("...with chocolate chips please daddy!"), a bird alighting on the top of a white pine outside our greatroom window caught my eye.  "Why," I thought, "is a Gray Jay this far south?"  I stopped what I was doing and went to the window.  Upon closer inspection, I saw that it was in fact a Northern Shrike.  Seeing a bird I've not encountered before is increasingly rare, and therefore increasingly desirable.  It enlarges my world in ways I can't easily explain, even to myself.

Whether or not Shrikes like chocolate chips in their pancakes, and this is why it came today and never before, I leave you to decide.