And why did the moose cross the road?

One of the frequent corollaries of Murphy's law (there really was such a person, look up Aloysius X. Murphy if you like) is that when you really, really, need your camera you will not have it. Thus, I make an effort to carry it. Well, today was cloudy, ugly, and looked like rain. Not a day for the camera. They get wet in the rain. Not good for electronics. But it was a walk day, and I decided to walk on the bike path which parallels the Parks highway, the main connection between Anchorage and Fairbanks.

The virtue of this walk is that I can detour and check out the airplanes; the defect is that there isn't much ever going on. So I had this dialog with myself: "if it rains the camera will get wet. A hundred bucks down the tubes. " My alter ego said "yes, but what if you see a moose crossing the road?" I said, of course, "Alter Ego, you're as wet as my camera will be if it rains." Reply: "Trust me." Hmmm. Alter ego, maybe we'll listen to you. I tucked my camera into a sealable sandwich bag, which I had wisely purchased for just such a purpose. Off we went. A few minutes out of the Willow community center, what should we see but...
...a moose crossing the road! Good grief, Alter Ego was right! I apologize for the blurry quality of the picture. I was at least 300 meters away; I went to extreme tele and snapped. This pic has been ruthlessly cropped and enlarged 200%. It's mommy and junior. I think it's a pair I have named Jemima and Ginger. I have had several encounters with this pair. Ginger is a little slow, or perhaps merely curious, but eventually gets the idea. Notice Jemima's flawless road-crossing technique: walk, do not run. Just about every driver in Alaska will "give the moose a brake" but they have to see you to brake; if you bolt out there chances are you'll be hit, with fatal consequences for all concerned. Who says moose are stupid?

And the sun came out, but long after I had come in for the day. I think it's a conspirancy theory.