The Village Creek Indian Ghosts Led Me To A Selfie Trip Down Memory Lane

Sunday is my regularly scheduled day when I drive to Arlington to walk with the Indian Ghosts who haunt the Village Creek Natural Historical Area.

I talked to some fellow walkers today who were being perplexed by the clear cutting of the underbrush that used  to make the paved trail seem like a walk through a jungle, but is now like a walk through what remains after a hurricane blows through.

Soon after crossing the first dam bridge which crosses Village Creek I came upon that which you see here.

TEACH PEACE.

I wonder if this teach peace message is the work of the Indian Ghosts? They certainly were not left in peace whilst living in their village alongside Village Creek.

This seemed to me to be an odd location to have chalked this message. Writing it big on the bridge would have been a good spot. Or by the formerly blue Blue Bayou which is currently green, hence renamed the Green Bayou.

That is the Green Bayou you see behind me.

Making this the location for today's attempt to take a selfie pic. I think I am about ready to stop with the selfies. I think I must need a better phone to do the selfie thing properly. Someone suggested something called an iPhone.

Years ago, way back in the last century, my first digital camera was a Casio. It is shocking to think of it now, but at the time I paid $599 for that camera. It ate up batteries, could only hold  60 photos, had no controls, no zoom, no focus, no nothing.

Well, there was a timer. And one cool feature, that being the lens could be rotated to point the camera at the picture taker, hence enabling what are now known as selfies.

Just a sec, let me see if I can find a photo or two taken with that antique camera. One of them I am looking at right now, printed, framed and hanging on the wall above me. I'll go find that one and maybe another....

Well, I found the one I have hanging above me, and a lot of others. I took a lot of selfies with that antique camera. It was way easier to do so than with this newfangled supposedly smart phone. We will start this selfie tour down memory lane back before I moved to Texas.....

That is Wanda behind me in the selfie, with that being Delicate Arch behind us. Delicate Arch is in Arches National Park in Utah. I think this was taken in 1997, October of. We'd been houseboating on Lake Powell.

The above selfie was taken on the same trip where the Lake Powell houseboating took place. In this selfie I am at Islands in the Sky in Canyonlands National Park.

That lady on my shoulder is picking blueberries in Schrieber's Meadow by Mount Baker. Wild mountain blueberries are good. Within a year or two, that woman on my shoulder would cause me to move to Texas.

Speaking of the move to Texas. The above selfie was taken somewhere south of Amarillo on Highway 287. I am driving my now dead van, loaded to the max. Behind me, in that yellow Penske truck, are the rest of my belongings. I am a bit appalled that I drove along at freeway speed taking selfie pics with my antique digital camera.

And now we move on to selfies taken in Texas, before my selfie taking camera was replaced by an Olympus camera in 2001.

That would be the blueberry picker on the left and Wanda on the right. This would have been four months after the move to Texas. I know this because for reasons still unfathomable to me, Wanda flew to Texas four months after the move. Her first and only time being here. I think Texas scared Wanda. I can see in this picture that four months in Texas was already putting weight on me. It was all the restaurant feedings that were doing me in. I'd never been to so many restaurants, so often, as I did the first two years in Texas. It was appalling. And many of them were all you can eat buffets. After the move to Texas my hair also got out of control, going through several bizarre iterations. I did not realize this til hunting for selfies.

The above is at Dinosaur Valley State Park, with Big Ed in the selfie behind me. We spent a few hours mountain biking the excellent Dinosaur Valley trails before heading south to a dude ranch where the blueberry picking lady was waiting for us to partake in a barbecue.

Now the above is an example of my hair going  through bizarre iterations after the move to Texas. I have no recollection of using a  huge amount  of gel product to create that mess. I think this was taken at the Fort Worth Nature Preserve, you know, that alligator infested location that occasionally supplies alligators to the tubing location of America's Biggest Boondoggle.

The above selfie has Lake Grapevine behind me. This was my favorite mountain biking location when I lived in Haslet in far north Fort Worth. Rockledge Park is where the trailhead is located. At the time this was the most popular mountain bike trail in the D/FW Metroplex. I do not know if that is still the case.

The last two selfies are pool selfies.

Which would make these skinny dipping selfies.

I do not believe I was purposefully winking in this selfie. I believe the sun was causing me to squint. I am not much of a winker. Or a smiler, but seem to be doing both in this selfie.

Well, now that ends this selfie trip down memory lane. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did....

Climbing Fort Worth's Fosdick Steps Trying To Emulate Elsie Hotpepper

Today when I left air-conditioned comfort to head to Oakland Lake Park for my regularly scheduled Thursday walk around Fosdick Lake I left my old-fashioned digital camera at home, taking with me the new-fangled cell phone for photo taking purposes.

Well, the cell phone photos my cell phone takes do not turn out as well as the photos my old-fashioned digital camera takes.

I have long thought it is time for the selfie fad to fade.

Maybe I think that because my few attempts at taking a selfie of myself always end up being difficult. As in it is awkward, I can't see the screen, clearly, even when in shade.

Which results in that which you see here, basically me glaring at a phone while trying to touch the take a picture button on the screen.

Some people seem quite talented with the taking a selfie thing.

Elsie Hotpepper comes to mind.

Elsie may be the Queen of the Selfies. Of course it helps that she has such photogenic subject matter and is a whiz at new-fangled technology. Like text messaging. Elsie Hotpepper can churn out a mini-novel in seconds via text messaging, while it takes me several minutes to churn out a sentence.

After I gave up on trying to successfully take a selfie photo with the Fosdick Fountain showing up behind me, I switched the phone to the mode that takes pictures in the other direction.

As you can see, via the hazy photo above, a pair of fishermen were angling for dinner in the fertile water of Fosdick Lake.

Catfish? Bass? Trout? Garfish? Bullheads? All I know for sure is it is unlikely any salmon were caught.

With my bike temporarily out of service I needed a new way to get myself a dose of endorphins via aerobic stimulation, so as to put myself in a much better mood. My early morning swimming does not seem to meet my endorphin needs.

So, today I ran up and down the above Fosdick Steps a few dozen times. I was quite pleased with how light on my feet I was being, sort of popping up the stairs pretty much effortlessly. I don't know if the extra spring in my step was due to new hiking shoes. Or the 20 pounds I have lost. Or something else, like my morning deep knee bend addiction of 80 repetitions.

Anyway, tomorrow morning I am going to be at the Fort Worth Stockyards, taking photos and maybe video. I will be using my old-fashioned digital camera to take photos, not this new-fangled phone method.

And no selfies. Well, maybe one attempt with a longhorn.....

Spencer Jack Won't Be Taking His Selfie Stick To Disneyland

A couple days ago I read that a theme park had banned selfie sticks. I don't remember which theme park, whether it was the Six Flags theme parks or Disney theme parks, or maybe it was all theme parks, world-wide.

What I do know is that I did not know what a selfie stick was or why they would be banned.

And now this morning, what do I find in my incoming email? Multiple photos of Spencer Jack taking selflie pics with the help of a selfie stick with the email's subject line being "Spencer's Selfie Stick".

I don't get the whole take a selfie thing. They are like some sort of virus epidemic on Facebook. And elsewhere.

But, now that I have seen a selfie stick I can see why a theme park would not want them in the park. Someone could get hurt with these sticks.

Or weaponize them, with a group armed with selfie sticks getting in a sword-like fight with another group armed with selfie sticks.

Or maybe sneak the selfie stick onto a roller coaster, thinking this would be a great place to take a selfie, with the attempt going all sorts of sideways, with the phone flying off and hitting someone and the stick flying at high speed to the ground where it stabs an innocent bystander.

Anyway, below is one of the selfies Spencer Jack took with his stick...