Final 2025 January Day With Clear Blue Sky Walk Around Sikes Lake

Yesterday's predicted heavy rain, with flash flooding, thunderstorms and tornadoes possible, did not materialize. By late afternoon all clouds had vacated, with the welcome return of a clear blue sky.

Not even some heavy rain managed to drip. Just a drizzle for a couple hours.

Yesterday's eventual totally clear blue sky has continued on this, the final day, of the first month of 2025.

Tomorrow, February of 2025 arrives, with the current weather prediction being day after day of temperatures over 80 degrees. With no precipitation. That should be enjoyable.

On this final day of January, it was to Sikes Lake I ventured for some fast-paced nature communing.

The photo documentation, above, is looking west from the bridge across the currently Green Lagoon of Sikes Lake.

For the next couple months, I intend to amp up my physical activity level, hoping the increased endorphins give me some relief, mood-wise, from the current madness America is going through...

Happy Birthday 92 To My Favorite Mom

The Skagit Valley entity known as Linda Lou called this morning. During the conversation's course I made mention of the fact that today is my mom's birthday.

How old would Shirley be today, asked Linda Lou?

I replied I don't know for sure, but I shall consult the family history book once I am off the phone.

And so, I did.

To learn my mom's precise birthdate of January 30, 1933.

I used my phone's calculator to subtract 1933 from 2025 to get a calculation of 92.

Difficult math problems are not one of my many fortes, but, I think 92 is the correct answer to my mom's age question.

In the photo documentation above we are at my mom and dad's 50th Wedding Anniversary Party. With mom and dad opening presents.

I was a surprise appearance at this party.

This was on August 11 of 2001. My birthday, five days after mom and dad's actual anniversary date of August 6. 

This roadtrip back to Washington was the last time I drove from Texas back to Washington. 

Solo.

It was a great roadtrip. One month before the infamous events of 9/11 changed our world.

Earlier today I blogged about a New Zealand family crossing the I-90 floating bridge. And making note of seeing Mount Rainier hovering to the south of Lake Washington.

On that 2001 roadtrip back to Washington I'd been in Texas long enough to have my senses altered. As in, I so clearly remember how weird it was crossing Snoqualmie Pass over the Cascade Mountains, on Interstate 90, with the air smelling so strongly of Evergreen fir trees. I never made note of this, to that noticeable a level, whilst living in the Evergreen State.

And then heading west across the I-90 floating bridge over Lake Washington. I had never so greatly enjoyed being slowed by heavy traffic. The air seemed so crystal clear, everything looked so shiny and bright, as if it had just been washed and polished.

Talking to Linda Lou this morning made me feel a bit homesick. Linda Lou made mention of the Skagit Valley Food Co-Op, in Mount Vernon. No such thing exists at my current location. I've seen no such thing anywhere I have been in Texas.

Linda Lou also made mention of a new thing in Mount Vernon. A Mexican market, located on Riverside Drive, selling crafts and other Mexican type goods. I would hope maybe tamales. There used to be a Mexican market, of sorts, in the Texas town I am currently in, Wichita Falls, but it got itself turned into one of those ubiquitous Dollar General type joints.

One would think there would be many Mexican markets in Texas, what with the source nation being so close, that and there are many of Mexican descent in Texas.

Anyway.

Happy Birthday, mom. I hope you and dad are having yourselves a mighty fine time today!

Leaving Seattle With The New Zealand Family Heading Towards Fort Worth

 A week or two ago I blogged about a New Zealand Family's Seattle Visit Reminding Me Of Fort Worth's Infamous Trinity River Vision Boondoggle.

The New Zealand family had been on an RV trip up America's West Coast. I assume they began in Los Angeles, or San Diego. I only joined their visit once they were north of San Francisco, touring the Oregon Coast en route to Seattle.

Last night I watched a follow up video of the New Zealand Family's Seattle visit, titled We Had To Leave Seattle. That is a screen shot, above, from the video. The view of Mount Rainier seen whilst crossing Lake Washington on the I-90 floating bridge.



The New Zealand Family was quite taken with Seattle. The scenery, seeing mountains in any direction. All the bodies of water. Pike Place. The buildings. The stadiums. And more.

A Seattleite named Rebecca, a fan of their videos, was the New Zealand Family's tour guide. 

I don't think Rebecca took the New Zealanders through any of the tunnels under Seattle, either via vehicle or light rail. Or to West Seattle. Or to REI corporate headquarters. Or many other of Seattle's unique features.

The New Zealand Family reacted to Seattle the way I always have. And yet they only hit some of the highlights.

Before moving to Texas I'd only been to a few of America's big cities. Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, Denver, Phoenix, Vancouver and Victoria.

Well, those last two are in North America, but the Canada part of North America, not the United States part of North America.

So, when I moved to Texas, with the first home location being in the little hamlet of Haslet, located in the north end of Fort Worth, Fort Worth was my introduction to a new type of big city.

The big city downtowns I had previously seen, were big. Fort Worth's downtown was not big. The New Zealanders remarked repeatedly regarding Seattle's buildings and design looking so new and modern. I had the opposite reaction to seeing Fort Worth for the first time.

I'd never before seen a city with large areas being basically run-down slums. It was sort of shocking.

I early on was not shy about verbalizing my reaction. Eventually I made a website documenting much of my reaction. I particularly reacted with confused amazement when I repeatedly saw Fort Worth's newspaper of record, the Star-Telegram, have articles about some ordinary thing, making the claim that this ordinary thing was making cities far and wide green with envy about this ordinary thing in Fort Worth.

Soon upon my arrival I discovered the charms of Dallas, thus learning not all Texas big cities are of the Fort Worth quality level.

In the video where the New Zealand Family is leaving Seattle, the New Zealand mother is lamenting regarding what will they have to show Rebecca when she makes her promised visit to New Zealand, saying New Zealand has nothing of the level they'd experienced in America and Seattle.

I had the same concern when first in Texas, knowing I was expecting some visitors from Seattle to arrive about four months after the Texas arrival. By the time they arrived I'd discovered the charms of Dallas, like Fair Park, the Farmers Market, the Galleria Mall, the West End, Deep Ellum, the DART train, and more.

I remember when those Seattle visitors arrived taking them to downtown Fort Worth, telling them I was gonna show them something incredible. Way back then there were huge parking lots along the Trinity River. From those parking lots one could hop on the world's shortest subway. This rickety old thing which took you into a tunnel that opened up in downtown Fort Worth, with access to a now long gone vertical mall, and the downtown Fort Worth Public Library.

The world's shortest subway is long gone. Fort Worth allowed Radio Shack to build a corporate headquarters Radio Shack could not afford, built above the subway and on part of those parking lots.

Eventually the Radio Shack headquarters was turned in a college. I forget the name. Tarrant County College, maybe.

It was things like the Radio Shack debacle that helped me develop such a low opinion of Fort Worth. This was well before the debacle known initially as the Trinity River Vision, which began near the start of this century, with decades later little to show for the supposedly vitally needed flood control and economic development scheme.

Another thing which quickly bugged me about Fort Worth was upon first arrival I'd see signs pointing one in the direction of Sundance Square. I'd asked where the square was, to no avail. Eventually I learned this was the name given to a multi-block downtown Fort Worth renewal scheme.

After decades of confusing the town's few tourists with those Sundance Square direction signs, a couple parking lots were turned into a town square type thing, named Sundance Square Plaza.

This stuff is so goofy I've had people tell me they think I must be making it up.

Nope, it's all true, and I've only mentioned a couple items of the Fort Worth goofiness in this blog post. 

I recently learned that Heritage Park, a park at downtown Fort Worth's north end, across the street from the county courthouse, a park built to celebrate Fort Worth's storied heritage, a park with a unique, impressive design, is still a boarded-up eyesore. A sad state for at least a decade.

Fort Worth's Heritage Park got itself closed after multiple drownings in the Fort Worth Water Gardens, at the south end of downtown. The design flaw in the Water Gardens was obvious, a clear danger, which should never have happened. Heritage Park also had water features, shallow water features in which one could not accidentally drown.

And yet it was deemed necessary that Fort Worth's Heritage Park be closed, surrounded with a cyclone fence, with the park allowed to deteriorate into an eyesore.

Years ago, after I blogged about the Heritage Park scandal, a descendant of the well-regarded designer who designed Heritage Park, I think he was Japanese, contacted me, appalled, asking if it was really true, that this park had been allowed to be destroyed in this manner.

And all these later I recently learned from Elsie Hotpepper that Heritage Park remains a fittingly ironic homage to Fort Worth's actual heritage.

An eyesore....

Final January Tuesday Nature Communing At Lake Wichita Park

It was to Lake Wichita Park I ventured on this final Tuesday of the first month of 2025, for some salubrious nature communing.

As you can see, looking beyond the statue and above Mount Wichita, the usual blue sky is totally covered in gray today.

The temperature was in the 50s when I was in the outer world. 

What with the fact that little rain has fallen of late, I don't understand why Lake Wichita appears to be at full pool. Did heavy rain fall west of Wichita Falls recently? 

I have yet to see anyone launch a kayak from the kayak launching dock, now that it is floating. The dock sat on dry ground for a year, or so, waiting for the lake to rise and float it.

Rain and thunderstorms are on our weather menu for the next couple days. 

Saturday's Wichita Bluff Nature Area Linda Lou Poignantly Texted On A Bench

 It was to the Wichita Bluff Nature Area I ventured on this final Saturday of the first month of 2025, to commune with nature whilst enjoying some peaceful solitude. 

As I was walking my phone made its incoming text message sound. I sat on the bench you see photo documented, located on a side spur off the main Wichita Bluff Nature Area section of the Circle Trail which circles Wichita Falls.

The text message was from one of my favorite Washingtonians, Miss Linda Lou. The text asked if I had seen this, which is what you see copied below. I texted back that I had not seen this, and that upon reading it, that it mirrored my foul mood....

"In my life, I have watched John Kennedy talk on television about missiles in Cuba. I saw Lyndon Johnson look Richard Russell squarely in the eye and say, "And we shall overcome." I saw Richard Nixon resign and Gerald Ford tell the Congress that our long national nightmare was over. I saw Jimmy Carter talk about malaise and Ronald Reagan talk about a shining city on a hill. I saw George H.W. Bush deliver the eulogy for the Soviet bloc, and Bill Clinton comfort the survivors of Timothy McVeigh's madness in Oklahoma City. I saw George W. Bush struggle to make sense of it all on September 11, 2001, and I saw Barack Obama sing 'Amazing Grace' in the wounded sanctuary of Mother Emanuel Church in Charleston, South Carolina.

"These were the presidents of my lifetime. These were not perfect men. They were not perfect presidents, God knows. Not one of them was that. But they approached the job, and they took to the podium, with all the gravitas they could muster as appropriate to the job. They tried, at least, to reach for something in the presidency that was beyond their grasp as ordinary human beings. They were not all ennobled by the attempt, but they tried nonetheless.

"And comes now this hopeless, vicious buffoon, and the audience of equally hopeless and vicious buffoons who laughed and cheered when he made sport of a woman whose lasting memory of the trauma she suffered is the laughter of the perpetrators. Now he comes, a man swathed in scandal, with no interest beyond what he can put in his pocket and what he can put over on a universe of suckers, and he does something like this while occupying an office that we gave him, and while endowed with a public trust that he dishonors every day he wakes up in the White House.

"The scion of a multigenerational criminal enterprise, the parameters of which we are only now beginning to comprehend. A vessel for all the worst elements of the American condition. And a cheap, soulless bully besides. We never have had such a cheap counterfeit of a president* as currently occupies the office. We never have had a president* so completely deserving of scorn and yet so small in the office that it almost seems a waste of time and energy to summon up the requisite contempt.

"Watch how a republic dies in the empty eyes of an empty man who feels nothing but his own imaginary greatness, and who cannot find in himself the decency simply to shut up even when it is in his best interest to do so. Presidents don't have to be heroes to be good presidents. They just have to realize that their humanity is our common humanity, and that their political commonwealth is our political commonwealth, too.

Watch him behind the seal of the President of the United States. Isn't he a funny man? Isn't what happened to that lady hilarious? Watch the assembled morons cheer. This is the only story now."

- Charles Pierce 

Friday Semi-Warm Lucy Park Backwoods Jungle Hike

With one week left in this first month of 2025, it was to Lucy Park I again ventured for some Friday nature communing with the temperature a relatively balmy 23 degrees above freezing.

I hiked the leaf-free Lucy Park backwoods jungle today. A few strong wind gusts had a brief chilling effect, but, other than that, the outdoors was perfectly pleasant.

Looking at the current long range forecast, if the forecast is forecasting accurately, it looks like we may escape Winter without a deep freeze, or an Ice Storm. There are a few days with rain and thunderstorms predicted. But, nothing slippery.

A Little Snow With Extreme Cold Chilling Wichita Falls

A zoomed view from my kitchen window, about an hour after the sun arrived to do its daily illumination and heating duty, on the third Tuesday of the new year of 2025.

So far the sun isn't doing well with its heating duty today. Currently we are freezing way under 32 degrees this morning, at 15 degrees.

The temperature did not get above freezing yesterday. The same is predicted for today.

The heat pump seems to be working hard to warm up my interior space. 

I do not recollect being tired of Winter in years previous, so soon after the arrival of Winter, as I am currently.

As you can see via the zoomed view, a little snow dropped to Earth overnight. 

I do not think the outer world at my location has been rendered slippery due to that slight amount of snow. I think it will be the temperature which will keep me from any lengthy outdoor walking today...

Cold Saturday Walk To Wichita Falls Dry Falls & Hotel Remains

The predicted cold front blew in last night, with gusts wreaking havoc, once again, with my patio furniture.

Yesterday's balmy 70 degree plus day had me in t-shirt and shorts. Today's Saturday venture to Lucy Park, with a strong wind blowing and the temperature a few degrees above freezing, had me in fully insulated winter attire.

Today I fast walked on the Circle Trail, from Lucy Park to the currently dry falls of Wichita Falls. That is what you are seeing in the photo documentation, from a vantage point halfway to the top of the dry falls, looking across the Wichita River at the demolished remains of a long-abandoned hotel, of which only that pile of gray rubble remains.

Apparently for some reason Wichita Falls allowed a large hotel to be built on a known flood plain, as in, an area known to be prone to flooding. This hotel was built late in the previous century. At some point in time, in the current century, a disastrous flood damaged the hotel beyond being able to be repaired.

After a few years of haggling over ownership and who is responsible for the hotel, the City of Wichita Falls hired a demolition company to take down and remove the derelict hotel. The area will now be turned into parkland. Of what sort? I have not heard.

As for the dry falls of Wichita Falls. That I find perplexing. Wichita Falls is so named after a waterfall which was located slightly north of downtown Wichita Falls. This was not much of a waterfall, only falling a couple feet. A flood, way back in the late 1800s, turned the falls into what looks now like minor river rapids.

At some point in time, in the previous century, the Wichita Falls townsfolk tired of tourists asking where the Wichita Falls waterfall was located.

And so, an artificial Wichita Falls waterfall was created. This artificial waterfall flows from a cemetery, which one sees when hiking the trail to the top of the falls. Periodically the artificial Wichita Falls waterfall is turned off, turning it into the Wichita Falls Dry Falls.

One would think the design of this solution to the longstanding problem of not having a waterfall in Wichita Falls would have been such that the waterfall was always in waterfall mode, never in Dry Falls mode.

I came upon multiple fellow trail walkers today on the way, to and from Wichita Falls Dry Falls. I do not know if any of them were visiting tourists following the signage pointing them to the Wichita Falls waterfall, currently in Dry Falls mode...

One Semi-HOT Texas Day Before Way Below Freezing

Today's temperature in Wichita Falls, Texas, is currently forecast to reach a high of 73 degrees. Living in my old home zone of Western Washington, 73 degrees was considered to be a warm Summer day, borderline HOT.

I never experienced extreme temperature changes, happening fast, til I moved to Texas. 

I arrived in the Lone Star State late in the previous century, in the month of December. I arrived at my new abode in a drenching downpour, with the temperature seeming balmy, in the upper 70s.

About a week after my Texas arrival I ventured to the Fort Worth Stockyards, around noon, for lunch at the now long gone Riscky Rita's. My first experience with an all you can eat Mexican buffet. I was wearing shorts and a t-shirt on that visit to the Stockyards, because the temperature seemed HOT to me.

At that point in time I was not yet paying attention to the Texas weather forecast, so, I did not know that a cold front was predicted to blow in, that day. The big blow began whilst I was pigging out at Riscky Rita's.

Upon exiting Riscky Rita's I was shocked to be struck by a strong wind, with the air chilled to what felt below freezing.

I made a run for my vehicle and high tailed it back to my abode in Haslet, a little burg at the far north end of Fort Worth.

That night an Ice Storm struck. My first time experiencing this type weather phenomenon. By morning the outer world was coated with a thick covering of ice, making any form of mobility, walking, biking, driving, difficult.

We did not know what to do, water system-wise, with the temperature nearing zero. We did not know how to shut off the water to the barn, or the pool, figuring such should be done to prevent freezing pipes. Eventually, with the help of the next door neighbor, we figured it out.

No ice is predicted to arrive with the incoming cold front. The rain predicted for this morning has not materialized.

Winter is only a couple weeks old and I am already ready for it to end and segue into Spring...
 

Mary Kelleher for Fort Worth City Council 5

Yesterday a Facebook notification showed up notifying me that something had changed...

A Page you follow, Elect Mary Kelleher, changed its name to Mary Kelleher for FW City Council 5

This was new news to me. I am assuming Mary Kelleher's current term on the Tarrant Regional Water District Board is coming to an end, and thus, now, Mary Kelleher is running to become a Fort Worth city councilwoman.

Ironically, well, maybe it is not ironic, more coincidental, but the same day I learned Mary is likely going to become a councilwoman, a Microsoft OneDrive Memory showed up which also reminded me of Mary Kelleher.

That is me you see above, on my way to D/FW International Airport, picking up an ostrich egg from Mary Kelleher's mailbox, on the way.

Switching from ostrich eggs back to the previous subject.

If my memory is serving me correctly, I first learned of Mary Kelleher, decades ago, via an article in Fort Worth Weekly, about Mary's issues regarding the Trinity River regularly flooding in her area of Fort Worth.

Prior to that, the entity who goes by the name Layla Caraway, who some know as Elsie Hotpepper, had been in the news---local, state and national, due to her home in Haltom City teetering precariously above a flooding creek.

Fort Worth's Congresswoman, Kay Granger, visited the site of Elsie Hotpepper's teetering home, causing Elsie to have some hope that maybe that local politician might be of some help. A hope history would prove to be erroneous.

This was all happening early on during the first decade of what has become an embarrassing Boondoggle, which has been Boondoggling along now for three decades, with little to show for what was purported to be a vitally needed flood control and economic development scheme.

The fact that no attention was being paid to actual vitally needed flood control, both in the flooding creeks in Haltom City, and the Trinity River in East Fort Worth, motivated both Elsie Hotpepper and Mary Kelleher to become what are known as political activists.

After reading about Mary's flood woes in that FW Weekly article, Elsie Hotpepper met with Mary, and convinced her to run for the TRWD Board.

I remember I was on a bike ride on the Trinity Trail when I got a call from Elsie Hotpepper, telling me about the meeting with Mary, and the hope Mary would run and win.

Mary did so, she ran and won. By a landslide.

I recollect my first time meeting Mary was when I went to vote at the Handley/Ederville polling location, where Mary was outside the polling location, greeting voters. I introduced myself.

It is sort of hard to believe this was such a long time ago, and, all these years later, the Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District Vision has yet to come to any sort of useful visible fruition. That and nothing much has been done to mitigate flooding in Tarrant County areas actually prone to deadly, serious flooding.

If I remember correctly, and sometimes I do, the last time I saw Mary and Elsie, in person*, was back in early 2016. Mary took Elsie and me out to lunch at an Outback Steakhouse, I think that was the location. 

And then after lunch we drove to Mary's farm where I met a large collection of animals, including an ostrich, one of whose eggs ended up getting picked up by me out of Mary's mailbox, a few days later.

Methinks it will greatly benefit Fort Worth having Mary Kelleher on the city council. And then, eventually, Fort Worth Mayor. Or Kay Granger's position. As a congresswoman...

*I was erroneous regarding Outback Steakhouse being the last time I have seen Elsie Hotpepper. I forgot about a year before COVID struck, I pedaled my bike to Sikes Lake to meet up with Elsie at a Sikes Lake gazebo.

Second New Year Tuesday With Clear Blue Cool Sky

Another clear blue-sky day, this second Tuesday of the New Year of 2024. It was back to Sikes Lake I ventured this morning, as you can clearly see via the view of the Blue Lagoon of Sikes Lake, located at the west end of the lake, viewed from the middle of the bridge across the Lagoon.

The temperature was in the mid 40s, with no wind, making for pleasant conditions.

Such will remain the case for a few days, eventually getting to a daytime high in the low 70s, before another cold blow arrives, dropping the temperature low into the mid-teens.

I prefer my temperatures to be in the 70s, not the mid-teens...

Snow-Free Sunday Wichita Bluff Hill Hiking

It was back for some snow-free salubrious high-speed hill hiking to the Wichita Bluff Nature Area this second Sunday of 2025, a fact you can intuit via the photo documentation looking east across the Circle Trail, at the picnic pavilion located at the summit of the Bluffs.

There were more than the norm number of fellow hill hikers, today. Methinks this is caused by the New Year Resolution phenomenon. That, and the fact that today is another clear blue-sky day, heated above freezing, being a pleasant change from the recent bout of deep freezing, along with snow.

I am amping up my physical activity in an attempt to melt away the excess poundage gained during the recent holiday season over-eating debauchery...

Blue Sky Saturday Playing Soccer While Hiking At Sikes Lake

On this second Saturday of the New Year of 2024, at my North Texas location, snow clouds have totally left the sky, leaving bright blue behind.

In shady areas, some snow remains, but, for the most part, the snow has melted into oblivion. No further such nonsense is in the near-term forecast, though there are a few days of such, predicted in the not so near-term forecast.

Judging by the number of people I saw today on my hike around Sikes Lake, I would have thought today was the first day of the New Year, with people out making good on their New Year's Resolution to get more exercise.

But, I think today's large number of people was likely due to the relief at the end of being housebound the past couple days. I know that is how I felt.

There was also some sort of soccer tournament going on today on the Sikes Lake soccer field. I saw three Fort Worth school buses which had transported soccer players to Wichita Falls. It seems a long way to go to play soccer on a field with no viewing stands, with soccer match viewers viewing from their perch on folding chairs on the sidelines.

I think of few things sounding more boring than watching a soccer game from field level with the temperature barely above freezing, with a strong wind blowing.

By some means snow had been removed from the soccer field's artificial grass, leaving a short wall of snow all around the perimeter of the field.

Is it considered normal to play soccer in Winter?

The temperature was in the 40s when I visited Sikes Lake today. As you can see via the photo documentation, a steady wind was making waves on the lake. That and making those 40 some degrees feel much colder...

Day Two of Wichita Falls Winter Wonderland

The temperature is currently one degree above freezing this morning of the second Friday of the New Year of 2024, with my North Texas, Wichita Falls location, still sporting a white dominated color scheme, slowly disappearing, as you can see via the view from my kitchen window.

When the sun began its daily illuminating duty this morning, I looked out my bedroom window to find myself surprised to see snowflakes still making their way to the ground.

The snow flaking has since abated, with patches of blue sky now appearing, with less than two hours to go til noon.

I have yet to make it to ground level. I suspect later today I shall do so. 

Ever since two winters ago, when I experienced a surprisingly sudden slip on ice, whilst walking at MSU (Midwestern State University), resulting in a semi-long recovery from a bruised butt and lower back, I have had an aversion to walking in any sort of winter wonderland.

The February of 2021 deep freeze disaster, with most of Texas losing the power of electricity, along with a lot of snow on the ground, making driving way too adventurous, I have had an aversion to driving in such conditions. 

Particularly after having such reinforced by last winter's incident where I found myself with tires spinning, unable to make it up an extremely slight grade connecting Taft Boulevard to Southwest Parkway. That time, other drivers kindly realizing my predicament, backed up far enough to allow me to back up to get a running start at getting up that slight slope. 

I made it to Walmart, that time, and then back to my abode, making that the last time I have driven in wintry conditions...

My Texas Location Has Turned Into A Snow Covered Winter Wonderland

This time the Texas weather predictors predicting snow got the prediction totally on target.

When the sun arrived this second Thursday of the new 2025 year, I looked out to the south, from my bedroom window, and saw big white flakes falling, with the ground painted white, and the usual multi-color landscape turned into a black and which color scheme.

Basically, a snow-covered Winter Wonderland.

We are now coming up on 9 in the morning, with the temperature two degrees below freezing, and snow still copiously falling.

Let's leave my bedroom to take a look to the north from my living room window.

 I do not think I will be leaving my abode this morning.

A doctor's appointment was re-scheduled yesterday due to anticipating this morning's likely travel challenges.

It seems so odd to me to go through my usual morning ritual of checking various online news sources, to get to my old home zone of Washington news sources, to see the temperature up north being way warmer than my currently frigid Southern location.

So far, the Texas power grid has had no problems, at my location, or anywhere else that I have heard of.

My interior space is comfortably toasty, for now...

New Look At Fort Worth's Multi-Decade Trinity River Vision Boondoggle

It has been a while since I have read an article in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram about America's Dumbest Boondoggle, also known as the Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District Vision, or TRV for super short.

A couple days ago I found myself writing a blog post titled New Zealand Family's Seattle Visit Reminds Me Of Fort Worth's Infamous Trinity River Vision Boondoggle, written after seeing the result of a successful public works project completed in a more modern area of America, then finding myself comparing that project to what many simply refer to as The Boondoggle.

And then, ironically, the very day I posted the blog post referencing Fort Worth's embarrassing Trinity River Vision mess, the Star-Telegram publishes an article about the current state of The Boondoggle, in typical Star-Telegram faulty information fashion.

I suspect the reporter writing this article is new to Fort Worth, and the Star-Telegram, and thus does not have a well-developed ear for hearing nonsense.

We are now in the third decade of what has become America's Oldest Boondoggle. Over the years I have written dozens of posts about this subject. Just go to the Durango Texas blog and enter "TNT exploding ceremony" into the search function, or "Kay Granger Boondoggle" and you will come up with many of those posts about this subject.

Now, something I have not made mention of during the many years of writing these blog posts about America's Biggest Boondoggle.

Over the years I have been sent information from persons close to the problem. As in, someone with access inside J.D. Granger's inner Trinity River Vision operation. I referred to this person as Deep Moat. I was told a couple times, by a couple sources, that the TRWD and the TRV were annoyed, a time or two, by things they saw on my blog.

Also, regarding the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, someone working for that newspaper, anonymous to me, has long found my making fun of that newspaper to be amusing. And accurate. It has not happened for a couple years, but yesterday it did. That person, who they are, I do not know, sent me the link to this new article about The Boondoggle, a link I am not blocked from reading. I assume I would always have been able to read the Star-Telegram, if I was a subscriber, but I cancelled the hard copy long ago.

Anyway, I clicked the Fort Worth’s Panther Island riverfront project has seen years of delays. What’s next? and read it. And copied it.

I then messaged Elsie Hotpepper, asking if Elsie had read this latest, because her dear departed friend, Clyde Picht, is quoted. Elsie then asked for the link. I sent it. But, for her, she was blocked. I then sent Elsie the copied article.

Interesting that the Star-Telegram successfully blocks Elsie Hotpepper, but not me.

Anyway, let's now go through some of this article and comment as we read along. Let's begin with the first paragraph...

Government officials and curious citizens left no seats empty in Fort Worth’s city hall chamber on April 5, 2005. That day, then-Mayor Mike Moncrief locked horns with skeptical City Council members over the purpose and price of the “Trinity River Vision,” a grand plan to revamp the river’s flood control system and transform a sliver of the waterway twisting around downtown into a haven of urban leisure and recreation.

2005. Two decades ago. And that is years after The Boondoggle actually began. Flood control system? This project was originally touted as a vitally needed flood control and economic development scheme. So vitally needed, almost three decades later, little has been done. So vitally needed, the public was not asked to support it via a bond issue.

Moving on, the next paragraph...

Fort Worth’s powerful optimists first fleshed out plans for the venture the year before. Moncrief and fellow proponents hailed the undertaking, later rechristened Panther Island, as “the most significant local project since construction of Dallas/Fort Worth airport.” “Everyone feels the synergy of this project,” Moncrief told the audience in city hall, among them Panther Island champion U.S. Rep. Kay Granger. “They realize this will create a new gateway ... a new face for future generations.” Doubters weren’t sold on the mayor’s lofty aspirations. “I think the final cost of the project will be substantially higher” than the original $360 million price tag (around $613 million today), said council member Clyde Picht during the hearing.

The "later rechristened Panther Island" remark is what made me think this reporter is new to The Boondoggle. This pseudo public works project started out being called the Trinity River Vision. Then Uptown was added to the name. Then Central City. Then Panther Island District. I do not believe the project has ever been somehow rechristened as Panther Island. Such is just how some have come to refer to it, even though it is an imaginary island which no sane part of the world would refer to as such.

Moving on to the next paragraph...

The project’s budget ballooned to $1.17 billion around 2017 (a figure still listed in project documents today despite inflationary pressures). The most hopeful Panther Island advocates in the early 2000s expected a pocket of high-rises and tree-lined promenades to take form by the end of the decade. No development has happened since. The Tarrant Regional Water District has yet to acquire 23% of the land within Panther Island’s future boundaries; the body agreed in December to pay a real estate consulting firm $1 million to start thinking up a strategy for selling off land to interested developers.

Just the info contained in the above paragraph, one would think, is enough to make one think maybe it is time to just kill this embarrassing failure. The "no development has happened since" line is so telling. Basically, little real development has happened for almost three decades, not in the way developments happen in parts of the world known to be more, well, developed.

It gets worse. Next paragraph...

Much of the new flood control system has yet to be completed. TRWD and the other bodies tasked with bringing Panther Island’s renditions to life predicted in 2018 that every dam, channel and storage pond would be complete by 2028. The project’s latest completion date, as of June, is 2032.

Much of the flood control system is yet to be completed? Remember? This was originally touted as a vitally needed flood control project, to control floods in a section of the Trinity River which had not flooded for well over a half century due to levees installed in the 1950s. And now the completion date is in the next decade.

The final paragraph...

Past delays foreshadowed current ones. It took the Texas Department of Transportation roughly six years and $126.2 million to complete three bridges designed to funnel traffic to and from the island. Construction for the structures, totaling less than a mile in length, began in November 2015, with tentative completion dates set between 2017 and 2018. “This was a bad deal early on,” Picht said of Panther Island in 2018, a few years before he died. “It’s probably the worst managed public project in the state of Texas, if not the nation.” Where exactly do things stand today?

Why is the Star-Telegram blaming the Texas Department of Transportation for taking so long to build the simple little bridges? Did not the actual fault lie with the incompetent leadership of the TRV? As in, Kay Granger's son, J.D., made Executive Director, to motivate his mother to try and secure federal funds? J.D. Granger insisted the design of the bridges have these totally ordinary V-piers, which J.D. thought would make them Signature Bridges, which was part of the original Trinity River Vision, having Three Signature Bridges, matching the Dallas Trinity River Vision's proposed Three Signature Bridges, which was the actual start of The Boondoggle, Fort Worth once again trying to keep up with Dallas.

And failing.

Dallas did end up building two actual signature bridges, which add a cool looking element to the Dallas skyline.

As for The Boondoggle's employment of Kay Granger's son. Kay never did come up with federal funding. And when a Biden bill, the Infrastructure Bill, passed, sending funding to Fort Worth's un-funded project, Kay voted no. J.D. was then fired, given a $72,000 parting gift, and is now trying to open a restaurant.

Meanwhile, I have another nugget of news, sent to me anonymously, which I have no way of verifying, but which makes sense to me.

I have been told the real reason the Trinity River Vision project has stalled is due to serious engineering complications. When the Army Corps of Engineers was brought in, again, after those three little bridges were built over dry land, with a cement lined ditch to later be dug under them, an obvious issue became apparent.

As in, the cement lined ditch should have been built at the same time as the bridges. To dig under the bridges now presents serious engineering issues, as in without sufficient mitigations, digging under the bridges could cause a bridge collapse.

And so, the project is stalled, with the current funding now in limbo due to the project's ineptness, poor planning and bad design.

And, might I add. I have long predicted that eventually we will get to the point where it is realized the ground in the Panther Island zone is seriously contaminated, due to being a former industrial zone. There have already been some indications of this. I suspect it would take an EPA Superfund cleanup, which will likely never happen.

It is time for Fort Worth to kill this project, clean up the mess it has made, and get around to finally, at least, fixing Heritage Park, the boarded-up eyesore at the north end of downtown, a park celebrating Fort Worth's heritage, which, ironically, overlooks America's Biggest Boondoggle....

New Zealand Family's Seattle Visit Reminds Me Of Fort Worth's Infamous Trinity River Vision Boondoggle

I blogged about that which you see, in the above screencap, on my Washington blog, in a blog post titled Visiting Seattle With The New Zealand Family.

Click the link to read the reason I was visiting Seattle with the New Zealanders. And how I came to know this family of four.

The reason I am making mention of this on my Texas blog is because one part of the video made me think of something in Texas which has bugged me for decades now.

The Trinity River Vision Boondoggle.

Ironically, the very day I posted the blog post about the New Zealanders visiting Seattle, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram had a long article about the current sad status of America's slowest, dumbest, most inept public works project.

I'll blog about this latest piece of distorted Star-Telegram propaganda later.

Back to the above screen cap of the mom and dad New Zealanders. They are walking on the re-built Seattle Waterfront.

This video, which you can see via clicking the above link, is the first time I have seen video of the new Seattle Waterfront. To say I was impressed is to understate. I was super impressed. Gone is the double decker elevated highway, replaced with a wider road and wider promenade, and other features.

That and a new transit tunnel under downtown Seattle, replacing the Alaskan Way Viaduct.

The rebuilding of the Seattle Waterfront was a complex engineering feat, involving removing a highway, digging a tunnel. And other things.

All of which began about a decade after Fort Worth began its pitiful Trinity River Vision, a supposed vitally needed flood control and economic development scheme. So vitally needed the Fort Worth public was never asked to vote to support a bond issue to pay for it. The bizarre vision was touted as being transformative, creating a Fort Worth waterfront, with an imaginary island, connected to the Fort Worth mainland by three little freeway overpass type bridges, which took an astonishing seven years to build.

Over dry land.

If I remember correctly, the Seattle Waterfront project was started around the time Fort Worth had a TNT exploding ceremony to celebrate the start of constructing those bridges, with Seattle's waterfront renovation completed well before the seven years Fort Worth took to build those three little bridges over dry land, with, years later, those bridges still waiting for a cement lined ditch to be dug under them, with Trinity River water diverted into the ditch, creating the imaginary island, with the three bridges connecting that imaginary island to the Fort Worth mainland.

I can't imagine how long it might take Fort Worth to try to do something like dig a transit tunnel under its puny downtown. A half century?

The Polar Vortex Has Arrived Chilling Wichita Falls

Usually the temperature gets warmer as the hours of the day pass by, before going down when the sun dips under the horizon.

But, as you can see, via the screencap, this fifth day of the new year of 2025 is not behaving normally, with the temperature getting colder and colder after the sun's return.

The predicted damaging wind has also arrived, wreaking havoc with my patio furniture.

I will not be doing any extensive salubrious outdoor walking today, what with the windchill making 33 degrees really feel like 18 degrees.

I may do my daily hiking at Walmart....
 

Incoming Polar Vortex Coming In Strong Tomorrow

Snow has now been dropped from the coming, second week of 2024 weather forecast. With the incoming Polar Vortex still coming in Sunday, as previously predicted.

Today's predicted drizzling has yet to drizzle. 

Sunday's predicted damaging winds must be expected to be caused by strong gusts, not mentioned in the NW 22 mph steady wind forecast.

Winter is only a couple weeks old, and I am already tired of it...

Remembering Pawnee Lane, Elsie Hotpepper & Rumors About Being Forced Out of Fort Worth

Last night I found myself scrolling through my email archive, finding myself disturbed a time or two to come upon an email, which had been opened, which I didn't remember reading. These were all from the last year, so not all that long ago.

Age related memory loss is my explanation.

Among the emails I did not remember was one from my Favorite Nephew Jason, aka FNJ.

The house I built before moving to Texas was on the market again. Jason emailed me the listing and the above photo he took of the deck above the carport, with Jason remarking "I always loved your house on Pawnee and the big roof deck."

I can see a screen door has been added. Which looks tacky. When I had control of this roof deck it was covered with plants, hanging baskets, a couple barrels with big blueberry bushes, planters for strawberries and herbs, like basil. I miss having a constant supply of fresh basil.

And a BBQ grill. I did a lot of BBQing. There was also a deck on the other side of the house, out of the kitchen. That deck had multiple levels. The intention was to put a hot tub there, but that never happened.

Another of the emails I found, which I did not remember, was one I would have thought I would have remembered, what with the fact I replied to the sender and forwarded it to the party referenced in the email.

Way back when I lived in the D/FW zone, east Fort Worth to be precise, I was a bit of a rabble rouser. A rabble rousing cohort rabble roused with me, who I came to refer to as Elsie Hotpepper. Elsie Hotpepper started up a blog to have a venue to verbalize about D'FW issues.

Anyway, here is that email, which referenced concern for Elsie Hotpepper's welfare and blog, from April of 2023, with names omitted...

Hi

I am trying to find out what happened to the blogger on the Star Telegraph that has been blogging forever but suddenly disappears in October 2022. I ask because Tarrant County is known for its brutal retaliation towards truth tellers, and I was wondering if you might know if this person is okay. I am scared to death to even be writing this as this county is so corrupt in every sector and I find out more and more each day. Unfortunately, whistleblowers are taken out in Texas. Anyway, thank you for your time….

To which, back in April of 2023, I replied with...

She is fine. She just got less motivated to post on her blog. Just last week she text messaged something she wanted me to put on her long dormant blog. I told her she forgot she had to send me such via email so I could copy and paste. That was days ago. She has not gotten around to emailing me the info. It's about the current TRWD Board election. I often did her postings, at her direction. I was who talked her into doing the blogging thing, years ago. I sure do not miss living in Tarrant County.

And then this more elaborate reply to my reply...

Haha, I was trying to hide my email but that didn’t work. I’m in big trouble. I have found out way too much and I need to walk away because I will lose everything with the way they retaliate here. It’s brutal. I was just trying to be a voice for the voiceless, our wildlife. They literally have nowhere to go as the destruction of habitat in Northwest Tarrant is out of control and zoning commissioner LF has been approving at an unprecedented rate. I can tell you more later how this got started, my curiosity. 

Every safe person I feel is trustworthy ends up not being so, not even the Texas Scorecard. Well, I have my suspicions.

 Anyway, I read somewhere that you were forced out or something along those lines and maybe you were joking, but knowing what is going on here, it wouldn’t surprise me. I have finally, after a year of digging, found what I suspected and have proof but don’t want to go missing, incarcerated or hurt my family who have deep connections here. 

Also, I’ve been following these two, PM and LF, for over a year and you are the only one who commented recently on PM and him running. Is everyone here blind or just scared to say anything? All anyone has to do is look up each and every campaign contribution and you are well on your way. They have no shame; the writing is literally on the wall.

Anyway, hope you doing okay. I know I don’t know you but feel like I do because of your work. Please know, all that contribute to the Telegraph, you are being followed, your blogs are being read, and people want to comment but I truly believe people are scared. Thanks for having no fear as I am envious of that. 

_________________________

Never heard from this lady again. I do not recollect ever feeling too threatened, except for one incident where I blogged I was heading to Gateway Park to photo document what I thought was a fracking violation, sucking water out of the Trinity River. 

I got to the location. As I was taking photos a couple trucks showed up, with several men looking a bit menacing. I headed back to my van, walking around the group of menacing looking men. I got to my van to find more trucks showing up, with one blocking my exit. 

I got in the van, started the engine, and then rolled down the window and made it look like I was calling and talking to someone, acting like I was reading vehicle licenses. Suddenly the boss of the group made a signal, signaling everyone to back off and get out of my way.

UPDATE:
Last night, after being unable to find the one email I had actually been looking for, it being one from FNJ, Jason quickly emailed me back confirming my memory of the information was accurate. In my email to FNJ I made mention of seeing another email from him which I did not remember, the one with the photo of the deck in front of my Mount Vernon house you see at the top.

Jason replied with a detailed bit of verbiage, including...

PS — and your Pawnee home pic is in my front room.  I always thought that deck was really cool — especially when covered with plants.

Jason included a photo of the Pawnee home pic in his front room...

I can tell that is Spencer Jack, at the upper right, standing in front of the Riverside bridge across the Skagit River in downtown Mount Vernon. I do not know what to make of the Row to Alaska pamphlet at the lower left. Are those Jason's aunts, Fancy and Clancy, on the cover?

Snow Predicted to Arrive in Texas Second Week of 2025

 Apparently, the predicted incoming Polar Vortex is not coming in til the second week of the New Year.

As you can see, via the above screen cap of the current forecast for my Wichita Falls location, the first Tuesday of the New Year will be the coldest day so far this year, dipping down to 23 degrees.

With the start of the second week of the New Year of 2025 forecasting some snow during next Wednesday's morning.

Last night my interior climate control device was blowing warmed air almost non-stop, or so it seemed, when I'd wake up for a minute or two or three, during the night, hearing that heating device blowing.

I remember when I was younger, significantly younger, I liked a good Winter storm. But that was when I lived on the West Coast, in Western Washington.

I never experienced an Ice Storm til I moved to Texas, experiencing the first of that type disturbing weather event soon upon my arrival in Texas, in December, near the end of the previous century.

Since that first Texas Ice Storm I have experienced many more.

In Western Washington I never experienced the temperature dropping below zero, like it did at my current location, during February, a couple years ago. With the Texas electric grid collapsing, necessitating finding a motel that still had power.

I do not remember a power outage in Washington ever being so dire...

Happy New Year Chilly Walk Around Sikes Lake

I read this morning that something called a Polar Vortex is heading south, due to arrive soon. Last night the temperature at my North Texas location dipped below freezing. 

Does this mean that predicted Polar Vortex is already here?

As you can see, no clouds arrived with the frigidity. The first day of the New Year is a clear blue sky day in Wichita Falls. A chilly blue sky day.

It was to nearby Sikes Lake I ventured this New Year's Day morning. As you can see, by seeing the waveless blue lake, the air was dead calm whilst I was doing my nature communing.

I thought there would be a lot of nature communers today, something that always seems to happen at the start of a new year, with a lot of people making a New Year's Resolution to get in better shape.