The rising and setting of the sun...and tintinnabulation

I saw the sun rising while I was tucked up in my bed this morning. I've only recently become an early riser so seeing the sun rise is still a novelty for me. An awesomely serene novelty.

I live on the top floor of my three-storey building and am lucky to have an unobstructed view to the hills on the horizon from my bedroom window. At this time of year, I can see Mother Nature's morning show without even getting out of bed (although I admit I don't see it as often now that it happens earlier than it did in winter!).

I left my blind up when I went to bed last night and woke up to a strip of orange along the horizon and then golden light flooding into my room. Seeing the dawn of a new day always makes me feel insignificant - a "speck of dust inside a giant's eye" - but also exhilarated.

The sunset tonight was beautiful too. There was heavy cloud cover when I left work, but as the sun sank below the cloud line, it lit up the western sky pinky-orange, which reflected onto the river as I walked beside it on my way home. I kept twisting back to look at it. (I took some photos, but they don't do it justice. Those are the best ones above and below.)

Word of the day

Dictionary.com's word of the day is tintinnabulation...a tinkling sound, as of bells. I love it when I'm looking up a word in the dictionary and inadvertently stumble across a funny or cool word, but sadly it doesn't happen much now that I mostly use online dictionaries. Word of the Day helps though.

Are you an early riser? How often do you see the sun rise? Do you still use a proper dictionary? Have you stumbled across any funny or cool words while looking up something else?