Celebrating Columbus Indigenous People's Day On The Lake Wichita Boardwalk

With this second Monday of the 2024 version of October chilled into the 60-degree range, pre-noon, it was to Lake Wichita I ventured on this clear blue-sky day, to commune with nature, including a walk on the Lake Wichita Boardwalk, which juts out into the lake from atop the Lake Wichita Dam.

I saw only a couple other celebrators on this Columbus Indigenous People's Day. And those celebrators were on bikes, a more sophisticated means of motion than my primitive walking means of motion.

The current Texas weather forecast is for a cold front to arrive on Thursday which will chill the entire state to the chilliest it has been in 6 months, with a low in the 50s and a high in the 70s.

I suspect come Thursday I will require blanket coverage all night long. Last night around three in the morning I felt the chilly need to seek limited blanket coverage via a thin throw blanket.

I have located my thick winter blankets, long underwear and sweatpants.

I am ready for incoming frigidity...

Happy Indigenous People's Day From New York City & Spencer Jack On The Today Show

Text message from Spencer Jack's dad this morning when I woke up my phone....

Good morning. I don't know if you're a Today Show fan, but if you watch the first half hour, your Favorite Nephew Spencer Jack is standing right behind Lester Holt.

Well, I have not watched the Today Show for years. That would seem to indicate I am not a fan of the Today Show.  Well, I guess it sort of does indicate I am not a fan. I assume if I were a fan I would be watching the Today Show.

I am so out of touch with the Today Show that until I read this morning's text message from Spencer Jack's dad, I did not realize that Vice-President Debate moderator, Lester Holt, is on the Today Show.

The two Today Shows photos came via email, not via phone. The photos included no explanatory text.

But, I am assuming in the photo at the top Spencer Jack is at One Rockefeller Plaza, looking in on the Today Show set.

The second photo also appears to be at One Rockefeller Plaza, with the throng that looks through the window at the Today Show in progress.

Maybe I am a Today Show fan, without knowing it, what with knowing what I am looking at in these photos without being told what I am looking at.

Monday, October 10 would make this Indigenous People's Day in much of America. Columbus Day in less enlightened locations in America.

Jogging With Village Creek Indian Ghosts Talking About Columbus Day

Yes, that is the Ghost Mirror in Arlington's Village Creek Natural Historical Area you are looking at here.

Which means I went jogging with the Indian Ghosts today on this record breaking, temperature-wise, October 15 day.

Currently my temperature monitoring device is indicating we are one degree above the record, at 97, so I'm back with the A/C running and ceiling fans spinning.

It's like Summer never left.

Jogging went well today. It no longer feels awkward. I am not yet at the point where I can run and run and run as long as I want. That point may never be reached.

The Village Creek Indian Ghosts were less cranky than my last two visits. They dread Columbus Day each year.

But this year the Indian Spirit World got the news that the well-educated, modern parts of America have figured out that Christopher Columbus is not a historical figure who should be the subject of a national holiday, and so the Indian Ghosts are optimistic that this bizarrely twisted bit of Euro-Centric nonsense is coming to an end.

I told the Indian Ghosts, today, that it may be decades before the South figures it out, that many in the South only recently figured out that displaying Confederate Battle Flags really was not a good idea.

On Facebook, in a totally ludicrous comment thread to a totally ludicrous post about the absurdity of those who disdain Columbus, politically correct liberal fools that they be, a neanderthal, uneducated, clueless miscreant actually said.....

"You people who want to quit honoring Columbus on Columbus Day need to understand that if Columbus had not discovered America, the United States, as we know it, would not exist".

I added punctuation to make the sentence more legible.

Can you count how many levels of stupidity exist in this comment? I know I can't.

How do you educate someone who thinks something like this? I mean, where do you start?

And, thinking that honoring Columbus, with a national holiday, is a bad idea, has nothing to do with political correctness or being liberal. It has to do with the fact that in the modern era we now know the actual history, other than the myth, and the actual history of Columbus, in America, is nothing to celebrate.

To continue to pretend Columbus was something he was not is like those who continued to believe the earth was flat, after most people came to understand the earth was not flat.

Anyway, I'm  glad the Village Creek Indian Ghosts were back being semi-content today....

Today Finding Some Possible Interlochen Indian Ghosts Protesting Columbus Day

After extensive tutoring by renowned selfie photo taker, Elsie Hotpepper, my selfie photo taking has not improved one iota.

My photographer skills also continue to be severely limited.

In this photo, in addition to doing the requisite selfie thing, I was trying to show the long expanse of a narrow greenway which one accesses from near the formerly blue Village Creek Blue Bayou, or from the east, via a dam crossing from Arlington's Interlochen neighborhood.

This morning I woke up feeling real good, for no apparent reason, soon found myself having a mighty fine swim in the increasingly cool pool. Then a few hours later, again for no apparent reason, I developed a rare mild headache.

I figured the rare mild headache would be helped by a not so rare Sunday walk with the Village Creek Natural Historical Area's resident Indian Ghosts.

A few days ago I  found the Indian Ghosts to be in a cranky mood due to tomorrow's most nefarious American holiday.

Columbus Day.

The day we celebrate a murderous genocide purveying, rape condoning, racist, property thieving European who stumbled on some Caribbean islands while looking for India. Hence America's native population being known as Indians.

If I were President, and if it were within my Executive Order powers, I would issue an Executive Order ending Columbus Day, replacing that disgraceful holiday with Indigenous Peoples Day, or Native American Day or some other such thing.

Anyway, today whilst walking along Village Creek I did not sense the usual presence of the Indian Ghosts.

However, when I left the Village Creek Natural Historical  Area, to briefly cross into the Interlochen neighborhood, from whence I quickly re-enter the Natural Historical Area, I saw what may have been some sort of Indian Ghosts Columbus Day Protest around a big tree.

Spooky, don't you think?

Currently the temperature is only 7 degrees shy of 100. When I walked with the Indian Ghosts the temperature was a relatively chilly 80, and windy. We are not yet quite at that needing to wear sweatpants time of the year, but close. I think we are past the needing to be shirtless to survive the heat part of the year.

Soon I will be searching to find where I put my long underwear.

On Facebook this morning I read an incoming COLD warning from esteemed North Texas weatherman, John Basham, that COLD is on the way in a week or so. Seems like just yesterday me and my vehicle slid sideways down the hill to the entry to my abode zone. I believe that was in early March. Or late February.

Please spare us Ice Storms this winter. I am not in the mood for such things....

A Pondering Walk With Cranky Village Creek Indian Ghosts

That jade colored body of water you are looking at here is Village Creek, which would seem to indicate I was at the Village Creek Natural Historical Area today to walk, jog or ride my bike.

Walking was the option today.

Before walking I learned from the tire doctor that the reason my left front tire seemed to be less inflated than it should be was because a screw had inserted itself into the tire.

I really don't like it when that happens.

Walking with the Indian Ghosts was completely uneventful today. I think the Indian Ghosts are being cranky because their most hated holiday of the year is about here.

Columbus Day.

Columbus Day really needs to have a name change. It's embarrassing. Canada doesn't have a Columbus Day. Why do we? Columbus never made it to what we know as the United States. It was on a few islands in the Caribbean that Columbus practiced mass genocide, among other atrocities.

Anyway, in addition to walking with the Indian Ghosts and wondering why there is so much ignorance in so much abundance in America I went to ALDI post Village Creek to get milk among other necessities.

And now the outer world is being dampened with water pellets, also known as rain.

What a day.....

Indigenous People's Day Celebrating The Invasion Of Columbus

This morning I was dealing with an aggravating aggravation that aggravated me so much I forgot today was Indigenous People's Day, formerly known, by most, as Columbus Day.

The day some Americans honor a guy from Italy who sailed the oceans blue, in 1492, finding islands in what we now call the Caribbean, but which Columbus, that intrepid explorer, thought must be India, and so the Indigenous People's Columbus discovered became known to the incoming European invaders as Indians.

Columbus plundered what he could from the Indigenous People, left them with some diseases, to which they were not immune, kidnapped about a dozen of the "Indians", shackled them and floated them back to Spain to show to his benefactors, Isabella and Ferdinand.

The Indigenous People Columbus kidnapped were never returned to their homeland. I don't recollect how the kidnapped IPs died or where they were buried.

The Spanish method of dealing with Indigenous People was to convert them from their heathen ways to being good Christians and if met with resistance to torture and kill the resistors so as to save their mortal souls. Sort of an ISIS of its day.

I think I will continue my Indigenous People's Day celebrating by making an Asian stir fry for lunch.

Swimming In The Rain On Columbus Day In Texas

My swimming in the rain wish came true this second Monday morning of October.

Today is that day that comes around once a year when we celebrate Christopher Columbus arriving in the Americas in 1492 to begin the multi-century takeover of North, Central and South America from those who already called these lands home.

I do not know how I will be celebrating this celebrated holiday today.

I do know there will likely be no outdoor activity of the walking, hiking or biking sort.

Rain is on the menu for today and tomorrow, falling in possible copious amounts, at times, hence flash flood warnings.

On top of the copious amounts of rain falling lightning is also predicted to start striking at some point in time today.

So far today I have not seen a bolt  of lightning, nor heard a boom of thunder.

And the rain, so far, has seemed semi-copious....

A Texas Blue Sky Columbus Day With Prickly Pears & Long Lost Cousin Freddy Found

As you can see via the top part of the picture, blue sky has returned to North Texas, after several days in a row of no sun.

With the return of the sun I returned to the Tandy Hills for the first time in what seems a long time.

I was overdressed when I departed my abode, with a sweatshirt over a t-shirt and a wool cap crowning my cranium.

By the time I got to the top of Mount Tandy it was obvious that the solar radiation was radiating sufficient warmth that the sweatshirt and cap could be doffed. And so they were.

I think I must have had a nightmare about my favorite patch of Tandy Hills prickly pear cactus being missing its prickly pears, because when I came upon the patch of prickly pear cactus you see in the picture I was surprised by the horde of prickly pears. This particular prickly pear cactus patch is the only one I make note of whilst hiking the Tandy Hills. So, it can't be some other patch of cactus that I saw missing its prickly pears, it had to be a nightmare related confusion.

I would have harvested this horde of prickly pears to make prickly pear jam, except for a couple reasons. One being I have no idea how to make any sort of jam. With the other reason being that one should not harvest anything from a natural area like the Tandy Hills Natural Area.

Unless you are Don Young and need a Christmas tree.

Changing the subject from prickly pears to something else.

My mom called me late last night to tell me my long lost cousin Freddy (aka Kurt) called. Mom said it was real good to hear from Freddy and, for me, it was real good to hear from mom that she'd heard from Freddy.

Apparently cousin Freddy's wife's parental units also live in Arizona, with cousin Freddy and his family visiting once a year, usually in March. So, my mom wants me to fly to Phoenix in March for a Cousin Reunion at my sister's house. I'm onboard. Sounds fun.

I have not seen cousin Freddy in decades. Freddy grew up in Alaska. The last time I saw cousin Freddy he was visiting Washington when he was, I think, around 8 years old. I recollect cousin Freddy and his mom, my Aunt Mike, being out on Samish Island, and me driving cousin Freddy to McDonald's in Mount Vernon in my classic 65 Fastback Mustang.

Trouble with that memory is my sister, she being the sister whose husband runs a McDonald's empire, told me McDonald's had not arrived in Mount Vernon, yet, at that point in time.

Maybe I drove cousin Freddy to the Kow Korner and my damned age-related memory woes have confused me. Again.

I did not realize til this afternoon that today was Columbus Day, that being the day a European discovered America, even though America was not un-discovered and was populated by people at the time. Columbus did some pillaging and kidnapped some of the natives to take them back to Europe as exhibits, where they died.

Knowing what we now know, in our more enlightened times, I really don't think we should be having an annual Columbus Day.

A Columbus Day Walk With The Indian Ghosts & My Arizona Sister In Village Creek Natural Historical Area

Today, with it being Columbus Day, that being the day we Americans celebrate Christopher Columbus landing in the year 1492 in what we now know as the Bahamas, I decided to walk among the Indian Ghosts of Village Creek in the Village Creek Natural Historical Area in Arlington.

Little did the Village Creek area Indians know that in that year of 1492 someone from another continent had landed on their side of the Atlantic, in search of the East Indies, which caused the natives found to be called "Indios," the Spanish name for Indians.

Columbus had convinced the Spanish crown to finance his expedition to find a more expeditious route to the lucrative Asian spice market. Columbus never claimed to have discovered a previously unknown continent. I guess he thought he'd found some really far East Indies.

Columbus made 3 more voyages to the Americas, never reaching the part of the New World now known as America. He did visit the part of South America now known as Venezuela.

On his voyage of 1492 Columbus kidnapped a couple dozen "Indians" to take back to Spain to show to the Spanish Royal Court. Most of the "Indians" did not make it to Spain alive.

Columbus was not the first European explorer to find the Americas. But the voyages of Columbus were what began the flood of Europeans on to the American continents, beginning the process of colonization and confiscation of native lands. Not to mention the genocide of the native population, with the worst invaders in that regard being the brutal Spanish with their fervor to convert the heathen savages to Catholicism, even if it meant murdering them to save their souls.

Three centuries after 1492, give or take a decade or two, the world change set in motion by Columbus had changed the world of one of the biggest Indian Villages in America, that being the huge village that existed for miles along the shores of Village Creek in what became Texas, after the Texans took the land from the Indians and then the Mexicans.

Changing the subject from a holiday I really think America needs to re-think celebrating, to my sister in Arizona. I'd not talked to my sister since her return from her visit to Washington. So, my sister went walking with me when I walked with the Village Creek Indian Ghosts today. It was a relatively interesting talk until my aching elbow could no longer hold the phone.

Columbus Day Texas Thunderstorms On The Menu Today

Looking out my primary viewing portal on the world at some lingering dampness from Sunday's rare deluge on this 2nd Monday of October, day 11.

An inch and a half of rain was measured yesterday at the official rain measuring station at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport.

I would have thought that the rain and wind would have scrubbed the air clear of allergy triggers. But, something in the air got my eyes itching, nasal system dripping and clogged off, with intermittent sneeze impulses in the middle of the night.

I took an antihistamine and sprayed a lot of nasal spray. Eventually the allergic episode abated and I successfully passed out for the remainder of the night.

I'm not going swimming this morning. Yesterday's swimming in the rain was quite pleasant, but I don't have time to do that this morning. That and my arms are aching sore. Real sore.

Basically I'm a mess.

My mom called yesterday afternoon. This was not a gas related call. Mom wanted me to read an obituary whilst mom and dad listened. That was sort of strange.

It is only 59 degrees, currently. Apparently possible thunderstorms remain a possibility. With today's predicted high being a relatively chilly 78. Brrrrr.

Today is Columbus Day. The day we celebrate a European invading the Americas and beginning the process of stealing the native's lands, murdering thousands upon thousands of the original Americans, before the takeover was pretty much complete, in 1890, with the Wounded Knee Massacre.

Up Early Celebrating Columbus Day In Texas By Going Swimming

I am up way too early this morning of October 12.

Was yesterday, with yesterday being Monday, Columbus Day? Even though today, October 12, in 1492, was the day Columbus landed somewhere in the Americas and began spreading European diseases to the natives.

When I went to take a picture of the way before dawn view from the patio, I was spinning the dial on my camera and it went into a mode I'd not seen before. I spun the dial some more and settings appeared I'd not seen before. I chose 'superfine' not knowing what it meant.

When I took the picture off the camera it appeared way sharper than previous ISO setting pictures taken in the dark. I really should read the manual that came with the camera. It will be interesting to see what 'superfine' does to pictures taken with the sun providing illumination.

I think I'll go mountain biking at River Legacy Park today and hunt for bobcats and wild boars. I suspect this is going to be a very long day.

Maybe I will go swimming before the sun arrives. I have not done that in awhile. It is sort of warm out there, at 63 degrees at a quarter before 6.

Happy Columbus Day From Texas Where I Have Been Hacked Again

That is the dreary dewy cold Columbus Day morning view from Miss Puerto Rico's balcony.

Day 5. Or is it 6? Of gray skies, cold temperatures and wet stuff dropping.

I'm in an even more foul mood than usual this morning. This morning I found that every one of the 100s of pages on my Eyes on Texas website has had code added.

In other words I have been hacked again. This time is different. Rather than just a few pages, it is every single one. And this time the hacked in code does not try to load anything, near as I can tell. It just appears to be an awful lot of gibberish script.

I'll copy the code below in the oft chance any of your HTML wizards out there can tell me what this code is all about.

Well, I guess I won't copy the hacking code. The blogging program doesn't allow it. I have a really good feeling this is going to be a really bad day.