An encounter

I was walking to the farmer's market this morning, and as I passed the art museum I heard a slight rustle above me. I looked up into the nearest tree, and one of these was looking down at me:

It's a red-tailed hawk, and in person, it's quite big. And claw-y. As it stared at me with its round, unblinking eyes, I was very glad to know they don't like to eat people.

Quite an imposing and beautiful bird.

(Unfortunately, I was not able to get a good picture of my hawk, so I had to steal this image from wikimedia.)