Canadians In Texas & Avoiding The Fort Worth Gestapo At The Tandy Hills

I had sort of decided not to venture deeper into Fort Worth until Fort Worth's rogue cops are indicted and in jail. Despite there being more calls for that to happen, currently the worst of the Fort Worth Gestapo Thugs are still part of the police force, with desk jobs, til their fate is decided.

I believe part of the International Outrage is due to the way Fort Worth's Ruling Junta has handled this public relations nightmare. A lot of people seem to think it should be fairly easy to find out who ordered the armed invasion of the Rainbow Lounge. And who empowered these cops to be citizen beating thugs. Once those simple facts are ascertained, then fire and arrest the suspects, prior to indictment and trial. Seems rather straightforward.

Sadly, that is not how fascist regimes operate. An external force must intervene, in this case not an allied invasion, instead, a federal investigation into what has gone wrong in Fort Worth.

I'd strongly suggest the federal investigation start with the mayor, looking at his conflicts of interest, that would already have him behind bars in democratic regimes.

So, though I said I would try and avoid driving deeper into Fort Worth, today the Tandy Hills seemed to draw me. But I did not want to park on my regular spot on View Street. The Fort Worth Gestapo regularly patrols that area. And I've learned from my snitch deep inside the Fort Worth Propaganda Bureau that some are not pleased with me portraying Fort Worth as needing to be put on the State Department's list of dangerous cities, best avoided by Americans and Foreigners. Most do that anyway, so there really is no great need for a warning, I suppose. It is more us locals who are in danger.

Today, to enter the Tandy Hills Natural Area I parked by the Tandy Tower, off city streets. It's also a shorter distance from my abode, thus I saved some gas. Though it is 93 right now, 3 hours later, at the time of the hiking it was a semi-chilly 84. With a good wind. Did not really break out much of a sweat.

I made note, today, of the fact that when I do start driving, after hiking, I do drive real slow, it was between 10 and 15 mph. I was driving down Martell Avenue, which runs parallel to Oakland Boulevard. I think they were pecan trees creating a tunnel-like effect. I thought Oakland did this well, but Martell outdoes Oakland. As I was driving slowly along, at a speed that would raise the suspicions of any Gestapo agent who happened to observe me, I saw something I do not recollect seeing in Texas before. A Canadian flag, flying beside an American flag, on the front of a house.

That Canadian flag almost made me homesick. Almost.

Mysterious Fort Worth Rain & Rogue TABC Agents

Unbeknownst to me, it must have rained last night, because, as you can see, my pool is almost overflowing this morning. I was in it last night, about 9, and at that point it was no where near overflowing.

I've never seen it this full, even after a multi-inch downpour that turned my nearest street into a river with rapids.

I figured when I checked the weather reports I would learn it deluged here last night to the tune of many inches. But everywhere I looked I saw zero precipitation recorded.

I was out of here real early to get eggs. I saw a few, small puddles, but mostly everything looks dry. There sure are no signs anywhere else, but the flooded pool that we had a lot of rain last night.

I have not heard from the Haltom City Flood Monitor this morning. This could mean she was up real late monitoring her rising creek. I'm hoping she can solve the mystery of my flooding pool.

In the meantime, it is Saturday, this is a go on a hike day. Usually hiking the Tandy Hills. I don't know if I'm ready to make a foray deeper into the Nazi-controlled area and risk another confrontation with the Fort Worth Gestapo.

Speaking of which, when I was in the grocery store I saw the Dallas paper making mention of the pressure on Fort Worth to do something to address the problem with their rogue SS troops terrorizing innocent citizens. The guy who heads the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission, aka TABC, now says his agents had no business invading the Rainbow Lounge in cahoots with a squad of Fort Worth Gestapo Agents, that there had been no complaints, that there was absolutely no reason for the armed assault on innocent citizens.

More Texas Citizen Abuse, This Time In Arlington, Again

My bizarre run-in with the Fort Worth Gestapo a couple days ago has had me thinking about how bit by bit freedom can erode, and if you let little freedoms erode, the erosion can eventually reach a Grand Canyon depth level. Just consult a German to see how that can happen.

I think I've not been paying close enough attention to how badly freedom has eroded in my zone of Texas.

Yes, I did clearly make note of how appalled I was by the worst case of eminent domain abuse in American history, when thousands of citizens and hundreds of homes and apartments were taken from people against their will, in an extreme violation of that basic American idea that when we are in our homes we should be safe from the government.

Instead, in Arlington, the government took homes and replaced them with a private business in the form of a football stadium. In the famous words of a wise philosopher named Jesus, "What you do to the least among us, you do to me."

And now, this morning, I learned that Arlington is employing a method loved by the old Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. That being, having citizens, in the form of "Code Rangers," spy on their fellow citizens and report serious violations impacting the public well being. Like putting your garbage out a day early. Or parking your car on your lawn. Yes. Your lawn. You own it. But, in Arlington, you can't decide to park your car on your lawn, if you want to. The Code Rangers will get you.

I might find some sense in this if Arlington was some sort of pristine city, with well paved streets, sidewalks everywhere, no eyesores. Instead, just look at the majority of the area around the new Cowboy Stadium. It is Eyesore City, for the most part. Or drive Division or Pioneer Parkway in Arlington and make note of the number of eyesores you see. They must be more difficult to go after and generate easy revenue.

Oh, I forgot to mention, if you put your garbage out one day early in Arlington, you will get a $132 fine, no warning. Within hours of putting out your garbage on the wrong day, a City of Arlington KGB/Gestapo Agent will show up at your door and hand you a ticket.

The civic sense in Arlington is so twisted that they are actually proud of running this KGB/Gestapo inspired program. They even have a city website that sort of brags about the miscreants they have played nanny too, with Violation of the Week "Before" and "After" photos illustrating the wonderful results of this corrective behavior. People in free parts of the World, and America, I'm not making this up, click the link "city website" link above and see for yourself.

A letter to the editor in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, this morning, put me on to this latest bizarre thing in Arlington. I had no idea about this, prior. The KGB/Gestapo victim, in this instance, has decided he has had enough of Arlington and is taking his family and saying bye-bye.

What really gets me is the attitude here, in this extremely repressive part of America, of treating perfectly good citizens as if they are criminals. You put out your garbage on the wrong day and you get a fine? How about being neighborly and simply pointing out to the person that this is not garbage day, and there is this darn city code about not having your garbage out til garbage day.

Or like I said before, if someone is driving real slow in a residential neighborhood, without wearing his seatbelt, for good reason, why not simply stop that person, ask why they were driving slow, tell them they need to put on their seatbelt and send them on their way, once you realize this was not a hardened criminal you stopped.

Instead, in the ham-handed KGB/Gestapo manner in which one simple matter was handled, Arlington is losing one good citizen and his family, and Fort Worth has another citizen having fun expressing his umbrage, in various forms, about the various forms of umbrage-worthy ridiculousness, in this city I live in, that makes the World Green with Envy.

I am almost to the point of leaving myself. I am ready to live in the land of the free again. I hear Austin is quite nice.

Anyway, below is the letter that set me off this morning.....

I’m a concerned citizen who finds he is living among a secret society that the City of Arlington calls its "Code Rangers."

While I was working in South Texas for 60 days, my wife mistakenly put out the trash for pickup on Thursday instead of Friday. Within four hours, she received a ticket. Not a warning — a $132 ticket issued by a code enforcement officer.

My wife, grandson and I have lived here only six months and had no prior incidents. When I brought this to the attention of the local code officer, he said Arlington issues no warnings; it’s an automatic citation. When asked how he found this egregious violation, he said he was not at liberty to discuss how he was notified.

Through research, I found that Arlington trains residents to be "Code Rangers," and it is these fine upstanding residents, sitting in the shadows waiting for flagrant violations to happen, who inform city code officers.

Farewell Arlington, my taxes are going elsewhere.

Robert Reuland, Arlington

Road Constructrion Traffic Woes In Arlington Texas

I have had me another day and it isn't even 5 yet. Today was better than yesterday because I did not go deeper into Fort Worth than my abode, thus I had limited exposure to Fort Worth's Mobile Gestapo. That's a good thing.

Instead I head east and ending up going further east than I'd intended. I was heading to Arlington's Chinatown Hong Kong Market. On the way, like I usually do, I stopped at Veterans Park, intending to have a walkabout. But, last night it rained, thus up went the humidity. I just was not feeling it, did not want to get all wet and sticky, yet one more time. So, I sat on a bench for awhile, like an old man in a park, which I guess I am, then I continued on.

I forgot to mention, I got gas soon after I left here. The price has fallen to $2.12. So, I had to call my mom and tell her I got gas and how much it cost. And the temperature. She was being a bit hotter in her Phoenix zone, than I am here in HOT HUMID Texas.

After getting what I wanted in Hong Kong I continued on to the Dallas Cowboys Wal-Mart Supercenter. Leaving Wal-Mart I headed west on Randol Mill, taking a right on Collins Street. I knew the Collins Street bridge had been removed last week. But, I figured there must be an alternative route to get on the freeway heading west. There was, but it took me 45 minutes.

The sign said "I-30" pointing right, with no mention of W or E. Going right eventually led, without choice, to getting on the freeway, heading east towards Dallas. I was not pleased. After going by Six Flags I exited at the Six Flags exit, looped around to the I-30 overpass that leads to 360. I stayed on the option to get off at Lamar, due to that road heads back west, and a freeway entry, if it had not been destroyed. It hadn't. Sort of.

I followed the freeway entry signs. This began a complicated multi-mile maze of eventually getting past Collins Street, where the trouble had begun, all the way to the new Center Street bridge, which is now totally open, and would have been the easy solution, had I known, and then, finally, on the freeway, heading west, back here within 10 minutes.

At one point, prior to getting back to Collins Street, there was an, at least, 15 minute holdup, where all came to a stop, that backup must have gone miles. Lucky for me, I was near the front.

The picture on the left is looking west, sitting and waiting. That is the new Collins Street bridge in the slight distance. The picture at the top is looking west towards the 360 overpass, with Six Flags on the other side.

Now, what I don't get, expert road designer that I am, at the point where northbound Collins Street comes to an end, due to the missing bridge and you only have an option to go east, why not turn the frontage road between Center Street and Collins Street into a 2-way? I think, could I have taken a left, rather than a right, I would have been back westbound on I-30 in a couple minutes, rather than a half hour or more.

It's very perplexing. Luckily Six Flags gets very few out of state visitors, so there likely will be few out of state reports about what a mess this is. Can't be good for the local tourism, though.

The Heart Attack Grill Is Not In Texas

One of my sister's lives in Chandler, Arizona. My mom and dad live nearby in Sun Lake. My slightly overweight brother lives 30 miles south in Maricopa.

My brother-in-law runs several McDonald's in the Phoenix zone. When I fly up north I try and arrange a layover in Phoenix, on the way back, for at least a couple hours.

The longest layover was 11 hours. That time I got picked up and brought to one of my brother-in-law's McDonald's for All You Can Eat. It was breakfast. I didn't eat much.

Then we went back to the airport to pick up my other incoming sister. Then it was back to McDonald's again. This time breakfast was over. So, I got a salad of some sort, a fish burger, a couple double cheeseburgers, I forget what else. At one point I was two-fisting food, as in holding one burger in one hand, while the other hand held something else. I'd been up since before 5am and had not slept well. I was hungry.

There was more food when we got to my sister's place. Then she gave us a tour of the area, while we ate more food. Then we went to some place, the name of which I do not remember, for Happy Hour and even more food. After that it was my one and only visit to an In & Out burger joint. I had two In & Out burgers. At that point in time it seemed to me to be the best burger I'd ever had.

By the time they got me to the plane, I was so uncomfortably stuffed that takeoff felt like it might cause me to explode. Luckily I had a row to myself and could lay down. I got back here to learn I'd gained over 15 pounds during this trip.

This morning I was shocked, well, maybe not shocked, let's say surprised, to learn that, in my sister's town of Chandler, there is this place called the Heart Attack Grill, where everything they serve is bad for you. No diet Cokes, only the full sugar kind. No trans-fat free frying. Only lard is used. And if you weigh over 350 pounds you eat free.

Faux Medical staff, in the form of a doctor and scantily clad nurses, are in attendance to monitor your condition as you consume the Heart Attack Grill's food.

What I don't get is why have my burger loving relatives not mentioned this place to me. The last time I was in Phoenix they took me to a Ruby Tuesday's. I would have greatly preferred the Heart Attack Grill had I known of its existence.

Why is the Heart Attack Grill in relatively lean Arizona, and not here in relatively not lean Texas? It's perplexing. Below is an amusing YouTube video showing you the deliciousness of the Heart Attack Grill.

Star-Telegraph: One Of Fort Worth's Best Watchdogs

By this morning Fort Worth bloggers were blogging about last night's Fort Worth city council which was packed, for once, with angry Fort Worth citizens, demanding action regarding the Rainbow Lounge Scandal, where a group of Fort Worth police, acting like Gestapo thugs, beat up bar patrons, handcuffed over 20, forcing them to lay, facedown on a parking lot, while one was so severely beaten he had to be hospitalized.

When the police version was released there were howls of protests from citizens who were actually there, including newspaper reporters and others of good reputation, who quickly let it be known that the police version was a BIG LIE. Soon large protests and world wide condemnation of the Fascist State of Fort Worth, led Fort Worth's morally bankrupt, ethically challenged mayor, Mike Moncrief, after a week, to call for a Federal investigation of the crimes that took place here in Fort Worth.

One very astute Fort Worth blogger, the Fort Worth Star-Telegraph, managed to see the connection between the Rainbow Lounge incident of police judgement gone awry and my incident yesterday, where a Fort Worth policeman, legitimately and responsibly doing his job, stopped me to ask why I was driving so slow. A valid reason to stop someone, I suppose, guarding the neighborhood against something that looks suspicious.

Where it goes awry is, rather than simply ascertaining that I was no threat to the neighborhood, the cop had seen I was not wearing my seatbelt. The explanation of why I was not wearing my seatbelt was of no import to this cop. The fact that I was driving slow while not wearing the seatbelt was of no import, made no difference. As in, I was not violating the spirit of the law, that being to click it when you are driving at as speed and among traffic where a wreck could cause injury.

Might I add that in my long driving career, that surely covers hundreds of thousands of miles, I have not had a single incident where the seat belt was of any use to me. As in, I have never had a wreck. Knock on wood.

So, just like with the Rainbow Lounge, only on a minor scale, I had an incident where the officer could have earned my respect, in that he was diligently doing his duty to look out for the neighborhood he was patrolling. He could have simply said, okay, I get why you were driving slow. And I understand why you didn't want to put your belt on, but you need to. So, get out of here, sorry for stopping you, have a good day.

That cop behavior would have had a totally different outcome. Instead he managed to annoy one of the citizens he is supposed to serve and protect, causing the citizen to besmirch the character of Fort Worth's possibly serious corrupt police department, in a venue that reaches far outside of Fort Worth, adding, just like the Rainbow Lounge incident, but in a more minor way, to the growing image being projected to the outside world, that Fort Worth is not a place you want to visit. You may find yourself getting beaten up by Fort Worth police in a bar. Or get a ticket for driving 15 mph in a residential neighborhood without wearing your seatbelt because you were sweating like a fat pig and didn't want the added discomfort of a seatbelt til you cooled down.

Yup. That is my advice to those not currently in the Fascist State of Fort Worth. Stay away til we have a revolution here and establish a respectable law enforcement agency and city government.

Trinity River Vision Boondoggle Closes In On 1 $Billion While Parts Of The Vision Go Blind

Fort Worth's Trinity River Vision, which started out as simply being an impoundment of the Trinity River, to create a little "Town Lake," then the vision got bigger when an unneeded flood diversion channel was added, so as to get Federal money, then canals were added, then 3 signature bridges, then restoring a wetlands and enhancing Gateway Park.

In one of the worst cases of nepotism I've ever been witness to, Fort Worth Congresswoman, Kay Granger's son, J.D Granger, he with absolutely no experience overseeing such a development, was put in charge of it.

There really was no significant protestation of this case of nepotism from the citizens of Fort Worth. They are so totally used to the Fort Worth way of doing things. The majority of Fort Worth's citizens also don't see any problem with the fact they've not been allowed to vote on this hazy vision that would so greatly alter their city. Because, really, in actuality, it is not their city. They just live there.

The price tag, originally for the lake, canals, bridges and flood diversion channel was less than half a $billion. Yesterday, it was announced that the decision had been made to drop the 3 signatures bridges designed by Vancouver architect, Bing Thom. Mr. Thom was also the architect who designed Fort Worth's most recent boondoggle, that being the aborted Tarrant County College campus, being built into the bluff above the Trinity River.

Mr. Thom's college campus had the potential to give Fort Worth its first iconic structure, recognizable to other people in the world as being Fort Worth. Mr. Thom's signature bridges also had the potential to give Fort Worth its first iconic structural images. I guess Fort Worth is destined to have only one iconic image identified with it, that being the Fort Worth Stockyards sign, which really only clues people to it being Fort Worth, due to the name being part of the iconic image.

A town without an identifiable iconic structural image really has not managed, as yet, to put itself on the world map. Seattle managed it with a thing called the Space Needle. Dallas did it with a thing called Reunion Tower. San Antonio has an Alamo. New York City has a big statue, among other things. Chicago has a tower or two that people recognize as Chicago.

It takes someone with a vision to give a city an iconic image. Unfortunately Fort Worth has had the benefit of the vision of someone named Ed Bass, he being the member of the good ol' boy network most responsible for stopping the construction of the new Tarrant County Community College, and also responsible for some of downtown Fort Worth's worst architectural missteps, due to his obvious unrefined taste in such matters.

In addition to dropping the signature bridges, the canals are also being dropped, leaving the Trinity River Vision only seeing the original Town Lake, the unneeded flood diversion channel, that was added later, and the Gateway Park development, which was also added later.

Now, at what point in time do we call this project what it is, as in a massive, ridiculous, poorly managed, embarrassing boondoggle?

Also the completion date of this boondoggle, which is very unlikely to ever see fruition, any more than Tarrant County Community College's boondoggle was ever likely to be completed, has now been pushed off til 2021. So, we've got a lot of years to go before the unneeded flood diversion channel starts doing its protection job.

Meanwhile, how much money is being spent fixing the chronic flooding problems in Haltom City? No one has died or lost their home in flooding in the area of Fort Worth's cloudy River Vision. The same can not be said for Haltom City.

I tell you, the priorities of some of the people who live in this zone really perplex me. Perplex me an awful lot.

Ant Invasion, Stabbing, Body Part Lost To Garbage Disposal, Dizzy Hiking & Run-In With Texas Law

That's the Tandy Hills Natural Area view, sometime between noon and one. It was HOT. Right on the edge of too HOT.

But I was in serious need of a distraction and being on the edge of too HOT seemed like a good idea at the time.

My bad day started late last night. I was ready to call it a night, when I turned on the lights in the kitchen to see I'd been invaded by sugar ants. Those little ants are being very busy due to it being real HOT.

So, I had to initiate an ant holocaust, followed by getting rid of all the ant corpses. Very unpleasant.

The first hour this morning was without incident. Nothing more had happened in the kitchen overnight. My morning swim was pleasant.

I was running a bit late, I needed to make breakfast. Quickly. I turned on the garbage disposal to dispose of some garbage. That's what it's for. But something was in there that made a sound I did not like. So, I turned the disposal off and proceeded to reach inside. Before the blades stopped moving.

My right hand index finger, that being the one vulgar sorts use to make obscene gestures, got hit. Part of the fingernail got disposed of, along with the garbage.

A few minutes later I was trying to open a package with a sharp knife. Knives and me have long not gotten along well. This morning was no exception. The knife burst through the plastic and into the tip of my right hand pointing finger, that being the one that is used to point, not make obscene gestures. I did not lose too much blood before I got it under control.

So, by noon it was time to get out of here. The National Weather Service had not issued a Heat Advisory at the point in time when I got out of here. They have now.

I was enjoying the HEAT, for the most part. Big Ed was along on this hike. Just like he did the last time I mentioned him hiking, he wandered off and got lost again. He'd forgotten his cell phone and was getting panicky, but then found his way out. As for me, climbing the steepest climb in the Tandy Hills had me a bit dizzy by the time I reached the top. I suspect this was caused as much by this morning's blood loss and it was the HEAT.

Getting invaded by ants, chopped up by my garbage disposal, stabbed by a knife and dizzy on a hill is not the worst of my day. The worst is what happened next. I'll save that for the next blogging. I've had me a run-in with the law!

The Greenest Green I've Ever Seen Is In Seattle, Also Austin & Dallas

An entity called the Natural Resources Defense Council surveyed 655 cities with a population over 250,000, trying to determine various cities' level of greenness and sustainability.

Categories evaluated were air quality, green building, green space, energy production, conservation, recycling, transportation and water quality.

The Emerald City of the Evergreen State came in #1 in air quality, energy production and conservation. Seattle fell to 5th in transportation. Which surprises me. It would seem it would be way lower. As in it is so easy to drive around this D/FW Metroplex, where I'm currently being held hostage, compared to driving around Seattle. Then again, it is easy to get around Seattle on mass transit, unlike here, except in Dallas, which has excellent mass transit

When it was all tallied Seattle came in #1 as the Greenest City in America. Two Texas towns were in the Top 15. Austin at #6 and quite surprisingly, Dallas at #14. I have no idea where Fort Worth is on the 655 rankings. I suspect, with it being the only large city in America to allow urban drilling all over its town, that there's a chance Fort Worth came in #655.

When Fort Worth was named on a short list by a Washington, D.C. lobbying group, something to do with Best Urban Villages, Fort Worth had a city-wide celebration for this extremely prestigious honor, an honor which other towns, that got the same "honor," recognized as a self-serving bogus deal meant to promote the lobbying group. An "honor" that the mouthpiece of Fort Worth's Ruling Junta, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram opined would make other cities, far and wide, green with envy.

Seattle is not having a city wide celebration for this most recent thing for which has been ranked #1. I wonder what sort of celebration Fort Worth would have if were ever ranked #1 for something good? The mind boggles. Well, we do have the #1 Dog Park in America, according to Dog Fancy Magazine. I've long thought a city-wide celebration was in order for that.

Anyway, here's the Top 15 Greenest Cities in America. #1 Seattle, #2 San Francisco, #3 Portland, Oregon, #4 Oakland, California, #5 San Jose, California, #6 Austin, #7 Sacramento, #8 Boston, #9 Denver, #10 Chicago, #11 San Diego, #12 New York City, #13 Los Angeles, #14 Dallas, #15 Columbus, Ohio.

Oakland Lake Park At 101 & Town Talk Provolone

This is Wednesday. Anyone who has paid any attention might think that today I went up to Southlake and Sprouts Farmers Market.

They would be wrong.

I did not escape this HOT HELL I am living til after 4 this afternoon. I could not take another minute of looking at a computer monitor. So, even though it was 101, I went to Oakland Lake and walked around the park.

The humidity has gone way down, so it was perfectly pleasant. Only when I quit walking and got back in my vehicle did I turn into a dripping wet mess, that soon dried out.

Yesterday I went to Town Talk and got Provolone cheese that turned out to be about the tastiest cheese I can remember ever having. Since Town Talk is fairly close to Oakland Lake Park, after I was done walking I went back to Town Talk and got a lot more cheese.

Today I was a blogging and webpage making maniac. I'd grown tired of my Roadtripping Blog, due to it taking too much time and seeing too few results. But, today I went back to Death Valley. I had not been there in awhile. Yesterday I went to Lava Beds National Monument in California.

I have no idea where I may be going tomorrow.