Sitting Under A Fosdic Lake Tree Trying To Talk To The Queen Of Wink After Visiting Marshall Texas

I ended up being a bit sore from Sunday night's fast running, due to downpours. I seem to have compounded this with Tuesday's Tandy Hills hiking.

So, today I had myself a really good swim, an activity which seems to make the aches and pains way less achy and painful.

By 11 this morning I was feeling no need for an additional endorphin fix. So, for my fresh air fix, or my fix of what passes for fresh air in Fort Worth, Texas I went to my favorite picnic table, overlooking Fosdic Lake in Oakland Lake Park.

I brought a book along, but prior to reading my intention was to call the Queen of Wink. Because the Queen of Wink told me to call her. I always do what I am told.

But the Queen exercised her Royal Prerogative and refused to answer her phone. So, I opened my book.

I was in the shade of several trees, with a pleasant breeze, quite a nice circumstance for doing some book reading.

Previously to heading to Fosdic Lake I had headed east to the Piney Woods Region of Texas for a virtual visit to Marshall. Interesting town. Both Martin Luther King and Jesse Jackson went to school there. It was a hub of the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. And a hub of the Confederacy in the 1860s. And Marshall puts on one of the world's most spectacular Christmas displays called the Wonderland of Lights.

It is currently 95 with a Heat Index of 100 in my zone of Texas. Two years ago today I was in a state of shivering shock, having spent an icy night in a Tacoma Basement Dungeon. Oddly, right now, it is 95 in Fort Worth. In Tacoma, right now, just reverse those digits. It is 59 degrees in Tacoma.

59 degrees is closer to 32, and freezing, than it is to 95. How did I ever manage to live in that brutal climate? I do recollect wearing shorts far less frequently in Washington, than I do in Texas. And I had a lot of long sleeve shirts and sweaters. And long pants, lots of long pants. And sweat pants. And long underwear. I do not clearly recollect if I ever went shirtless in Washington. I'm sure I must have gone swimming a time or two without being in a wetsuit.

If I remember right, tonight, 2 years ago, my sister got home from work and insisted I help walk the dogs at Point Defiance. It was brutally cold, I had a sore throat and my eyes had not yet adjusted to the extremely clear sparkling air and water. Brutal.

I must go find video of that brutal icy walk along the beach at Point Defiance...