This odd little trio of egrets has been dining on the Pepperdine lawn for the past week. You can see them early in the morning, right after the scores of sprinklers soak the grass and force worms and bugs to the surface, gasping for air. These birds are waiting.

The larger one is a great egret, tall and gawky on the ground but aloft, it's like something out of a fairy tale. The smaller pair are snowy egrets, with fringy feathers and big yellow cartoon feet. They shuffle up and down the lawn like tiny Richard Nixons, shoulders hunched, heads thrust forward, wings tucked in at the sides.

I shot a bunch of photos and they mostly turned out so-so, so I'm making up for quality with quantity. (Yeah, right.) These birds are so beautiful, though, it almost works.

Happy Thanksgiving from here in Malibu!