104 At My Texas Location With 3 Days Til The Start Of Summer

My computer temperature monitoring device is indicating we have hit a new high for the year.

104.

(UPDATE: 2 hours later we hit 105)

We are 3 days from the start of summer and the longest day of the year.

I fear this is going to be one long hot summer in Texas.

Meanwhile in the town I lived in before moving to Texas, Mount Vernon, Washington, it is currently a chilly 57 degrees and cloudy with rain in the forecast.

Next Saturday, at about the time shown on the Mount Vernon temperature graphic, I am supposed to be about 10 miles north of Mount Vernon at a ranch in an unheated, I assume, barn.

I am having a little trouble convincing myself this is something I want to do.

Note the humidity in Mount Vernon is 93%. Currently in Fort Worth the humidity is 22%.

The Tandy Hills Guerrilla Art Installation Has Been Removed As Seismic Testing Spreads All Over East Fort Worth

Does my one longtime blog reader notice what is missing in the picture?

Yes, you are correct, the Tandy Hills Guerrilla Art Installation, called Orange Flags in Feces, has been completely removed, including the orange ribbon that was tied to the adjacent bush.

Was the removal of this Art Installation an act of counter eco-terrorism?

I do not know if the orange flags are associated with the Barnett Shale Natural Gas Seismic Testing that seems to be spreading all over East Fort Worth.

It is very odd. Every day I seem to see cable in new locations. But I have yet to see anyone laying the cable. One would think I would, since it is quite an effort the cable layers go through.

Duct tape secures the cable across driveways, more elaborate cable covers are used where the cable crosses a street. And then there are the prong things that get stuck in the ground and the above ground testing devices.

I know the gas drillers own the mineral rights below the ground, but how is permission granted for this above ground activity? It seems like the property owners should be able to charge the gas drillers a fee for using their ground.

It's very perplexing.

Fort Worth Wins The 2011 All-America City Award

A couple minutes ago I saw an incoming email come in from Anonymous.

I finished what I was doing and then clicked on the Anonymous email....

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "The Saturday Morning Of June 18 Dawns Windy & Warm...":

You are now a resident of a 2011 All-America City. Congrats Fort Worthians! Seattle will be green with envy when they hear the news!

Can this possibly be true, I wondered? I think the All-America City Award is a legit, respected type award, unlike the Most Livable City Award Fort Worth got a few years ago from a D.C. lobbying group.

That bogus Most Livable City Award set off city-wide celebrations and much boasting about Fort Worth causing cities and towns far and wide to be Green with Envy.

I Googled "2011 All-America City" to quickly learn that Fort Worth was one of the 2011 winners. By what criteria I can not imagine. The city-wide celebration is likely to be HUGE.

From the All-America City website.....

The National Civic League announced the ten winners of the All-America City Award tonight in Kansas City, Mo. They are (in alphabetical order by state):

Kenai, Alaska
Dublin, California
Lakewood, Colorado
Belleville, Illinois
South Bend, Indiana
Scott City, Kansas
Tupelo, Mississippi
Fayetteville, North Carolina
Eden, North Carolina
Fort Worth, Texas

These communities give us hope and new ideas about what can be accomplished when ordinary people work together to address the difficult challenges that lay ahead,” said National Civic League President Gloria Rubio-Cortés. “Year after year, I never fail to be inspired by their outstanding stories of positive civic change.”

Fort Worth gives us hope and new ideas? About what can be accomplished when ordinary people address difficult challenges?

What new ideas? Inner tubing in the polluted Trinity River? Taking down perfectly performing flood preventing levees? Closing community swimming pools? Cutting back public library hours?

Is it the Fort Worth Independent School District that helped make Fort Worth an All-America City?

Is one of the new ideas being the first big city to allow natural gas drillers to poke holes and lay pipe all over town, except in wealthy neighborhoods?

Is an example of an ordinary person addressing a difficult challenge something like Fort Worth's Steve Doeung fighting Chesapeake Energy and Fort Worth to stop a non-odorized natural gas pipeline from being run under his property?

Is an example of Fort Worth giving the rest of the country hope the way the community rallied to the defense of Paradise Center when it was attacked by a Tarrant County agency, MHMR-TC?

Yes, now that I have put some thought into it I can clearly see why Fort Worth would be chosen as an All-America City.....

The Saturday Morning Of June 18 Dawns Windy & Warm In Texas

You are looking at what I look at when I look up when I step outside to retrieve my swimming suit.

You can't quite tell it from the picture but it is very windy this morning of the 18th of June.

Very windy and a chilly 79 degrees, heading to a predicted Saturday high of 102.

Up north, at my old home location, it is currently only 22 degrees above freezing, heading to a balmy high of 62. With rain.

No rain is on the menu in my current location. I believe we are currently in drought mode.

I am fairly certain the drought has not drained my swimming pool. I think I will go check on that right now.

Questions About Bobby & Marie's Ordeal With MHMR-TC's Institutional Incompetence

On Wednesday Paradise Center sent me a video of an incident that happened the day before, on Tuesday, June 14.

I then blogged the Tale of Bobby & Marie's Ordeal With MHMR-TC on the Paradise Center Scandal Blog.

The aforementioned video is getting a lot of attention. With a lot of people asking a lot of questions.

Like this question....

Who is/are the elected officials who are responsible for this type of reprehensible behavior on their watch? I would certainly like to know who to help ease out of office during the next election cycle.

The above question was asked by Big Ed. Then County Veteran answered Big Ed's question in detail. You can read that answer and the other comments about the Tale of Bobby & Marie's Ordeal With MHMR-TC on the Paradise Center Scandal Blog.

You can view the video that has amped up the Paradise Center Scandal below...

Hitting The Texas Streets Paved With Bricks At 103 Degrees

We've hit a new high for the year at my location in the Texas oven, as measured by my computer temperature monitoring device.

103.

Meanwhile, up in Washington, in the town I grew up in, Burlington, it is 63 degrees.

Changing the subject from the all important temperature to streets paved with brick.

I get a lot of email feedback from my Eyes on Texas website. There are 100s of pages on that website, some made as long as 10 years ago.

So, sometimes I'll get an email from Eyes on Texas and have no clue why someone is saying what they are saying.

Like this morning. Donald W. Williams sent two emails saying the same thing...

Viewing your page a few minutes ago, I read your note about streets paved with brick. Such streets are the pride and joy of residents of Merkel, Texas (between Abilene & Sweetwater).

I think I was in the pool when the light bulb came on. Fort Worth has a road called Camp Bowie Boulevard. Camp Bowie Boulevard, for the most part, is paved in bricks.

When I first drove on Camp Bowie Boulevard it was in really bad shape, a really rough ride. I could not imagine why a big city would have such a road.

I think Mr. Williams must have been on my webpage about the Ennis National Polka Festival.

Apparently I saw a street paved in brick, in Ennis, and wrote the following...

Above note the brick paved street the boy and his dog are walking on. In Fort Worth there is a brick paved street called Camp Bowie Boulevard. It is rather rough in places, although it is gradually being renovated, block by block. In articles in Fort Worth's Star-Telegram about the ailing Camp Bowie bricks reporters have actually written that it is so hard to fix because brick paved streets just don't exist anymore and so the skills to repair them are hard to come by. When asked why such a rundown street is allowed to exist, the ears of Eyes on Texas have actually heard native Fort Worthers say that Camp Bowie Boulevard is unique and such things don't exist elsewhere. A stunned look occurs when the native is told by the non-native Texan that many small towns in Texas have brick paved squares and streets. Pike Place and Pioneer Square in Seattle have brick paved streets, albeit always in good condition, so in that way they are different than Fort Worth's Camp Bowie Boulevard. Maybe all the skilled paved brick workers moved to the west coast. Or to Ennis.

I've told people, who have commented on my alleged snarkiness on my blog, that it used to be worse and that I've toned it way down. The above paragraph is sort of proof of that. And the fact that I've learned to make use of commas. And much shorter sentences.

There Is A Hot Wind Blowing Purple Wildflowers On The Tandy Hills Today With Eco-Terrorism

A couple minutes ago I got back from the HOT Tandy Hills. 94 degrees right now, with the humidity making it feel like 97. A steady wind of about 20 mph is blowing, without which I suspect the Heat Index would be higher.

Blowing in the wind today was the field of purple wildflowers you see in the picture.

During this Super Heated time of the year when I stop moving to take a picture I'm instantly drenched, like in a steambath.

The Tandy Hills latest Guerrilla Art Installation called Two Orange Flags in Feces had not grown anymore flags since yesterday.

CatsPaw has speculated that the Two Flags in Feces Art Installation may be some sort of low level eco-terrorism.

I am not totally certain, but I believe eco-terrorism is not allowed in Texas.

The HOT Morning Of The 17th Day Of June In Texas

I am looking skyward through the bars of my patio prison cell at yet one more blue morning in Texas on the 17th of June.

We have phased into day after day over 100 degrees. With high humidity making the HOT air feel HOTTER.

I wish I had a good reason to escape this steambath sauna and go seek weather relief in the Pacific Northwest zone.

But, I don't.

I think I'll go swimming now and possibly cool off.

Tandy Hills Monkey Wrenching With Spencer Jack's Dad's Fidalgo Drive-In

I did not go to the Tandy Hills yesterday, due to needing to avoid anything that might further wrench my aching back, which is now totally ache-free.

Today I found that the latest Tandy Hills Guerrilla Art Installation has had another orange flag added to it.

I am beginning to wonder if this is not the work of the Tandy Hills Guerrilla Artist, but, instead, is the work of the Tandy Hills Monkey Wrencher who is taking orange flags that are stuck on top of Mount Tandy, aka Broadcast Hill, then re-sticking the flags in the ground deep in the heart of the Tandy Hills Natural Area.

If the Barnett Shale Seismic Testing that currently is taking place on Broadcast Hill and the surrounding neighborhood results in a Chesapeake Gas Drilling Rig showing up, well, I wonder what the Tandy Hills Monkey Wrencher will do then?

Changing the Monkey Wrencher subject to that cute little monkey known as Spencer Jack.

This morning Spencer's aunt, my sister, emailed me some pictures of Spencer's uncles, my nephews, clam digging on Samish Island and BBQing at Bay View State Park.

Spencer's dad had a shirt on that had the name of his restaurant. I have not been to this restaurant, even though it did exist the last time I was in Washington, in 2008. I was in error as to what the name was. I thought it was Spencer's Dad's Grub. Instead it is Fidalgo Drive-In. Fidalgo is the name of the island on which the town of Anacortes is located in the far west end of the Skagit Valley.

I soon found that the Fidalgo Drive-In has a very nice website. Looking at the website I soon came upon a picture of Spencer Jack eyeing a root beer float.

I have not seen Spencer Jack's dad since April of 2006 when I went to his wedding to Spencer's mom. Soon after I was back in Texas, Spencer's dad called me to ask if I'd make a website for his restaurant in Mount Vernon called Eaglemont Pavilion.

I think Spencer Jack's dad opened the Fidalgo Drive-In and was running both restaurants for awhile and then sold Eaglemont Pavilion. I only learned of that when the new owners contacted me wanting to make changes to the website. They didn't seem to realize they'd need to pay me to do that. I never heard from them again.

Clearly I am not nearly as in touch with my nephews as I used to be.

Changing the subject again.

My back back being good has had me being Mr. Perky ever since the pain went away. I used to regularly have real bad back woes where my lower back would go out and sometimes take months to get better. This has only happened once in Texas. I was mowing the lawn at my previous residence. It was a riding lawnmower. I reached forward to pull a lever and my back went out. That time took months to recover.

So, yesterday when I woke up to find my lower back extremely stressed I was worried it was going to go totally out, which has been the pattern in the past. When it goes totally out I can not stand up straight, the pelvis bone is tilted. It's awful.

When the pain lifted soon after I got to Village Creek Natural Historic Area I was very relieved.

This morning I was back in the pool again, swimming like a maniac.

I forgot to mention, after I saw Spencer Jack on the Fidalgo Drive-In website I blogged about the Fidalgo Drive-In on my Washington blog.

Up Early Thursday Morning After Rioting Last Night In Vancouver & A Victory Parade Today In Dallas

Looking closely through the bars of my patio prison cell on the morning of the 16th day of June the pool is looking very inviting.

It is not yet 7 and I'm already ready to turn on the A/C.

The predicted high today is currently 103.

103 degrees should make it very comfortable for the quarter million Dallas Mavericks fans on the streets of Dallas today to watch a Victory Parade.

I hope the heat does not drive the Dallas fans to riot.

Last night, up north in Canada, in Vancouver to be more precise, the Canucks lost the 7th game of the Stanley Cup Hockey Tournament. This caused a lot of ill-tempered Canadians to go into street riot mode. Setting cars on fire, breaking in to stores and looting.

In the Seattle P-I this morning I saw an odd headline.

Hey Houston! It's only a naked bike ride if you're naked.

The short article went on to say...

"Naked bikers in Houston could learn something from Seattle. First of all, it’s not a naked ride if you’re wearing underwear. Or shorts. Or a sundress."

And then had about 30 pictures of Houstonites in their underwear thinking they were naked.

I really don't understand why anyone would want to ride a bike whilst wearing no clothes. Hiking with no clothes, that I get.

Or swimming with no clothes, that seems totally natural. I think I'll go do that right now. And then later maybe some clothesless hiking on the Tandy Hills Natural Area.