Our apartment is on the second floor, and we keep a couple of pots of rosemary outside the living-room window--which is a magnificent mullioned affair.... Our apartment is on the second floor, and we keep a couple of pots of rosemary outside the living-room window--which is a magnificent mullioned affair that opens for the afternoon breeze. This morning, as I walked back from the kitchen, I noticed our local hummingbird from the jacaranda tree across the street. He hovered over the rosemary, his green back iridescent in the morning light, dippoing his slim, elegant beak into flower after tiny flower.

I've watched him before; he seems completely unafraid to have me there on the other side of the glass, only three feet away. He stayed two or three minutes, then went off on his rounds. A sweet start to the day....