Rain blowing sideways here in New York. Gorgeous out my writing desk window, branches waving in backyards, water splashing on roofs, leaves racing by. I was at the river early enough that it was only rain, not yet this cold-weather monsoon. The clouds were low and the water was high. Gusts of wind scattered tiny wavelets in all directions as the tide and wind both shifted. Slick black tree trunks glowed against the pearl sky. No whitecaps, but rolling swells, which lifted a pair of mallards up to the yummy moss on the pilings and then lowered them to the barnacles. They rode the waves, happily breakfasting. As my mother used to say, good weather for ducks.