A few days ago I learned of a brutal murder way out in West Texas in the town of Blink.
On New Year's Day, 2010, longtime Blink resident, Granny, was given a pair of baby cats, also known as kittens. One of the kittens was white, the other amber-colored.
So, Granny named the kittens Milk & Honey.
Milk looked to some like a little Polar Bear. During his short time in Blink, Milk became quite well known, with Blinkers dropping by just to get a look at the little white Polar Bear Cat.
Also in Granny's menagerie is a Pit Bull named Juicy. Juicy is a girl Pit Bull. Milk often played with Juicy in Granny's backyard. Sometimes Honey would join in. But Honey was shy compared to Milk.
On Monday of this week, Milk was in the backyard playing with Juicy, when Juicy brutally attacked the Polar Bear Kitty. Killing him.
Honey went into shock.
Granny's keeper, Foely, covered up the murder, telling Granny that Milk had run away to join the circus.
There was some talk of bringing Juicy to justice for the murder of Milk, but, ever since Judge Roy Bean died, there has been no law West of the Pecos, so I don't know if justice will be done in this case.
The National Weather Service, up in Norman, Oklahoma, has issued a Tornado Watch for Central and North Texas. We are supposed to be on the lookout for Tornadoes until 9pm.
Along with Tornadoes, the National Weather Service is predicting Gusts to 70 mph and Hail 4 inches in diameter. Along with Dangerous Lightning.
In National Weather Service-speak a Tornado Watch means conditions are favorable for Tornadoes and Severe Thunderstorms and persons in the Watch areas should be on the lookout for threatening weather conditions.
Right now, at 3 in the afternoon, I am looking at a few clouds and some blue sky, at my location in far East Fort Worth.
I strongly suspect that no matter how eagle-eyed a lookout I keep I will not be seeing any 4 inch hail today. Or hear the Tornado sirens.
Yes, it is a bit stormy today, here, in my current location in Texas. Yesterday, during lunch at the Mexican Inn, I must have made the Tandy Hills sound like a good thing, because Miss Tex-Mex, Delores de Loca, decided she wanted to hike the prairie with me today.
But, a BIG STORM popped up this morning, up in Euless, where Miss Tex-Mex is located. I was unable to make a convincing case that the Tandy Hills would be dry, and so de Loca bailed.
I did get hit with a few big drops of wet stuff when I first started hiking. It felt good. What with it being rather warm and humid, 86 with a Heat Index of 90.
I have heard from Zelda del West, letting me know that she is not the Queen of Wink. Zelda del West is from the Pacific Northwest. I don't know how she ended up in the Wild Zone of West Texas. I have learned we share being appalled at the incredible amount of litter we see Messing With Texas.
Well, it is time for lunch, I just heard the rice cooker buzzer. I made Egg Foo Yung and Vietnamese Spring Rolls, with Pineapple Sweet & Sour. Just typing that made me hungrier.
My one longtime blog reader may recognize the man in the pipe, he being Carter Avenue's Steve Doeung.
Carter Avenue, and the battle to save the homes on Carter Avenue, seems to have faded into memory.
A month or so ago announcements were made that TxDOT had approved an alternative route for the Chesapeake Energy Carter Avenue pipeline, running non-odorized, high pressure natural gas along Interstate 30, rather than under Fort Worth citizen's homes.
However, I have seen no mention of this made in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. Maybe I missed it.
I also have not read the Star-Telegram editorially opine that, with an alternative pipeline route approved, that it is time to end the abuse of eminent domain that has victimized the Citizens of Carter Avenue.
Steve Doeung still has not met the mysterious attorney, Ed Fitzgerald, who somehow mysteriously represented Mr. Doeung without his approval or knowledge.
Steve Doeung recently had another woe added to his Chesapeake Energy woes and his battle against Lyme Disease. Steve's vehicle was rammed from behind, with the "accident" leaving Steve with a concussion/brain trauma.
Even though Steve is in recovery mode, he seems to be firing on all cylinders. You can't keep a Cambodian-American down for long.
You are looking at an angry Texas sky, late Wednesday afternoon, looking west from Mount Tandy, at the stunning skyline of beautiful downtown Fort Worth.
The forecast is for SEVERE STORMS. Possible TORNADOES. And HAIL the size of baseballs.
The biggest hail I've seen in Texas was golfball size. I can't imagine baseball sized hail. That would have to hurt real bad. And wreak havoc with roofs. Both of buildings and vehicles.
I was late on the Tandy Hills today because I got myself into a lunch situation in Euless. I think it was Euless. Maybe it was Hurst. All those little towns, all clustered in their Mid-Cities' configuration, are confusing. Maybe I was in Bedford. I'm sure I was not in Watauga.
I do know I was in a Mexican Inn. The supposedly famous puffy chips are really annoying to me. Were they the inspiration for Fritos? Who wants to dip a Fritos type chip into salsa? Not me.
I did have something very fortuitous, maybe even omen-like, happen today. Maybe it's a sign that my decades of really really bad luck are finally at an end.
I don't know.
What I do know is today, I was hiking along on my beloved Tandy Hills, waving my walking stick and singing to myself, when I looked down and what do I see?
The sunglasses I lost on Easter! Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition. It is a miracle.
I do not know how I did not see them before. They were laying right off the trail, right by where I thought I'd left them.
My sunglasses seemed to be unaffected by being left out in the elements. No bugs had decided to make them their home. The rain seemed to have washed them clean. The heat had not melted any part of them.
So. This has been a good day. This should give you a good indication of the extremely low threshold for qualifying as a good day in my world.
Lost sunglasses found? I am a very happy boy. Little things make me happy.
This morning I saw that the Queen of Wink had freshly blogged on her blog. The last paragraph of the Queen's latest blogging said...
"Strength and courage of mind and heart bottled into a course of action that flows freely like a river, just like the oil that flows freely beneath the life spring of waters in the Gulf of Mexico. I'm not quite sure where my course of action will take me, but be certain...my river will flow and you will soon know."
Now, the Queen's realm is Wink. Wink is in West Texas. During the course of getting to know the Queen of Wink I've learned, over time, that she is quite a complex example of Royalty. Not a simple girl like the Queen of England, Elizabeth.
In the past couple months it's become apparent that the Queen of Wink creates, or assumes different personas, sort of like Madonna. Or Cher. Or Hillary Clinton.
For example, currently the Queen of Wink has been attending events with a very young man, I'm not sure if the young man is a teenager or older. This has caused the term "Cougar" to be bandied about. I have been unable to confirm it, but I've been told that "Wink Is Not Cougar Town" was spray painted on the side of the Queen of Wink's barn door.
I did not know the Queen of Wink had a barn.
Lately, reports have gotten back to me that the Queen has gone through a sort of groupie phase, in a persona she calls the Texan Vixen, following a band, the name of which I think is Hot Flash, with the main groupie attention being on the lead singer, who goes by the monicker, I think, of Men'l Pause.
And, then, yesterday, I hear from someone going by the names of Zelda Del West and Lulu Lopez. Zelda and Lulu seem to be rather creative. A book seems to be involved.
Now, what sort of creeps me out is I used to have social intercourse with a heavily medicated psychotic who went by the name of Lulu. Medicated psychotics can be amusing in small doses. Lulu the Psychotic had a friend who's nickname is Zelda.
I'm fairly certain I have never mentioned Zelda to the Queen of Wink, though Zelda does show up in remote areas of my Eyes on Texas website.
I have noticed of late that the Queen of Wink is in a very restless frame of mind, hence that quote above about her unleashing her flooding river. Now I'm wondering, what with the Queen being in West Texas, if it is she who is Zelda Del West and Lulu Lopez?
It is very perplexing. I'll likely now hear from Zelda Del West and Lulu Lopez denying that they are the Queen of Wink. And from the Queen of Wink denying that she is Zelda Del West and Lulu Lopez. Maybe I need to send my investigator, Elsie Hotpepper, to West Texas to investigate.
I am having myself a melancholy day today. Not quite sure why. I have been known to have bouts of insomnia. The past couple weeks I've been having bouts of whatever the opposite of insomnia is. Definitely different for me.
I already mentioned on this blog and at least one of my other blogs, that today is the 30th Anniversary of the eruption of Mt. St. Helens.
That means it is also the 30th Anniversary of the Death of Harry Truman. Harry captured the imagination of the people of the Northwest with his stubborn refusual to leave his Lodge on Spirit Lake, way too close to the stewing Mt. St. Helens.
Harry Truman was born in 1896. Which would have made him 84 or 85 when his mountain blew up. I wonder if the same type event occurred today, if Mount Rainier or Mount Baker or any of the other Washington volcanoes decided to wake up, if the current powers that be would let a current day Harry Truman live out his life the way he wanted? Or would FEMA show up to haul him off?
I don't think FEMA existed back when Mt. St. Helens blew up. I don't recollect any huge federal help response, though the disaster was HUGE. I do recollect Jimmy Carter showing up.
Below is a video tribute to Harry Truman (I put this on my Washington Blog, liked it so much I decided to put it on my Texas blog, too), that hit me right on my melancholy mood, with the soundtrack being the #1 hit, way back when, titled "Your Spirit Lives On...."
I had not been to my regular Salubrious Sanatorium, the Tandy Hills, since last Thursday, due to Friday's rain, and followup rain, likely turning prairie dirt to mud.
Even though it did rain a little yesterday I figured the Tandy Hills would be dry enough, today, to be walked on without accumulating mud.
I was mostly correct in that assumption.
I parked at the top of Mount Tandy, near the tower known, by some, as the Fort Worth Needle. It was immediately clear to me, via the ruts you see in the picture, that a vehicle had accessed the Tandy Hills from this location. I figured it had to be the Fort Worth Water Boys.
When I reached the first fork in the trail I went north, then I took the newly graded Tandy Dirt Highway and headed south. This quickly became an obvious bad choice, due to mud. I slogged on through the mud. I did not gain too many height inches due to the sticking mud.
I came to the first of the dirt fill bridges that the Fort Worth Water Boys made across Tandy Hills Creeks about a month ago.
Applying my novice forensic ability it appeared that a heavy truck had crossed the dirt dam bridge you see in the picture and sunk down in the mud, tipping to the west.
I wondered if the heavy truck got stuck and that is why a vehicle came in from the top of Tandy Mountain, in order to yank a stuck truck out of the mud.
The second dirt bridge, this one with the culvert installed after initially being a solid dirt dam, was damaged too, with the top of the bridge squished almost down to the culvert.
It's a mess. And here I was almost not minding what the Fort Worth Water Boys had done to the sacred Tandy Hills Sanatorium Natural Area.
The current prediction is for SEVERE STORMS for tomorrow, with possible tornadoes. I am almost certain I will not be hiking the Tandy Hills tomorrow.
You are looking at Mount St. Helens in the State of Washington in October of 1998, about 2 months before I began my exile in the Great State of Texas.
Right now, at 10:36 am, Central Time, in Texas, it is almost precisely 30 years, to the minute, since I was peacefully soaking my aching back in a hot tub of water when I heard 5 successive loud booms. May 18, 1980.
About 15 minutes later I learned the loud booms were due to Mount Saint Helens, after weeks of having the Pacific Northwest on edge with incessant rumbling, exploding in one of the biggest volcanic explosions in history.
Trust me, it was an interesting time to live in the Northwest. Things like "ash masks" become a necessary accoutrement.
About 4 months after the Big Bang I made my first attempt to see Mt. St. Helens in its post blow-up mode. Access was very restricted. If I remember right you could not get closer than 50 miles. That attempt, it was cloudy. I did not see the mountain.
It would be years later, in 1990 or 91 that I finally saw Mt. St. Helens up close. A logging road, from the north, had been expanded into the blast zone, with rudimentary visitor services. I went with a small group of 4, loaded with a big picnic.
You exited the main highway, on to a logging road, which twisted and turned through an old growth forest of big trees. And then, suddenly, a turn in the road brought the BLAST ZONE into view. I'd never seen anything like it. Trees blown down like matchsticks. Utter devastation. At that point in time Mother Nature had yet to go, much, into recovery mode.
The access at that time ended at an overlook where you could see into the volcano and look down on the remnants of Spirit Lake, that being where Harry Truman was last seen.
That is the view of Spirit Lake we are looking at in the picture.
It would be about 8 more years before I saw Mt. St. Helens, again, up close. By then the area had been turned into a National Monument. A feat of highway engineering had built a road in from the west side. 5 very well done Visitor's Centers had been built, along with a lot of other amenities. Mt. St. Helens had become a major tourist attraction.
The final Visitor's Center is at the location where David Johnston radioed, "Vancouver, this is it," from his location on Coldwater Ridge. This is the best of the Visitor's Centers, designed to blend into the landscape. It is very close to the volcano.
Mt. St. Helens was the deadliest, most economically destructive volcanic event in American history. 57 people were killed, 47 bridges, 250 homes, 185 miles of highway and 15 miles of railway were destroyed.
A couple days ago I blogged on my Washington Blog about how it seemed impossible that it could be 30 years since Mt. St. Helens blew her top. On that day had you told me that 30 years later I would be doing this thing called blogging about that day, and doing so from Texas, I would not have been able to imagine what could cause such a scenario.
Below is a YouTube video of Dan Rather and CBS news covering the Mt. St. Helens disaster a few days after the eruption. Looking at how dated this video is, it makes 30 years easier to believe....
The past couple days I've been a little tired of feeling tired. Maybe I should not get up so early.
At the current time, coming up on 5 in the afternoon, I have been hearing thunder rolling in the distance for an hour, or so. The view out my window is a bit dark and foreboding. I hear birds chirping, but they don't sound happy. It sounds more as if they are sounding an urgent alarm.
It was in the 80s by noon. Extremely humid. I decided I wanted to take a walk with the Spirit World, so I went to Village Creek Natural Historic Area at noon.
This Area should be called Keechi Village Natural Historic Area. But it's not. I don't know how many Indians were murdered in this location, with this location being, at its heyday, the biggest Indian Village in America.
Nearby there was battle between the Native Americans, who owned this land, and the Illegal Aliens, who had invaded. Among those in the battle were two noteworthy Illegal Aliens, one being General Edward H. Tarrant, the other being Captain John B. Denton, both of whom would see their names used to name counties in Texas, well, in the case of Denton, a county and a town. Captain Denton died in the attack on what was called Keechi Village. I believe General Tarrant was wounded, not fatally, in the 1841 attack on Keechi Village People, known as the Battle of Village Creek.
Today I sat on a bench and looked out at what I call the Indian Village Bayou. That's the view in the picture at the top. It can be an eerie spot. I have seen more snakes at this location than any other in Texas.
Above, on the right is a picture of a plaque installed near the western entry to Village Creek Natural Historic Area. If you click it you will see a big version that does a good job of telling the story of the significance of this location.
I think I may have accidentally brought an Indian Spirit home with me today. They are attracted to melancholy souls. Or so my Spirit Guide told me.
Some names in this sad story have been changed.
