The Locals Are Taking J.D. Granger To The Woodshed For A Well Deserved Spanking

J.D. Granger Covering His Rear On The Way
To A Spanking In The Woodshed

The picture is a figurative representation of the Fort Worth public taking J.D. Granger to the Woodshed.

A big brouhaha is brewing over the sweetheart deal J.D. Granger gave Tim Love.

That sweetheart deal being a new restaurant called The Woodshed that has area restaurateurs crying foul. Complaining that the Trinity River Vision went through no competitive bidding process for the sweet lease deal that Tim Love was gifted with.

The article in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram about this latest Trinity River Vision nefariousness sort of manages to raise more questions than it answers.

Apparently the Freedom of Information Act does not apply to a governmental body like the Trinity River Vision. So, there is no transparency. J.D. Granger claims he approached other restaurateurs about the sweetheart deal, but was turned down.

But, J.D. refuses to say who these other mystery restaurateurs were.

And, apparently neither J.D. Granger or Tim Love remembers who approached whom first about this sweetheart deal. Does it not seem like one would remember such a thing? Apparently the Star-Telegram reporter, Barry Shlachter, was not curious enough to push harder for answers.

The Star-Telegram's best reporter, Bud Kennedy, mentioned The Woodshed Scandal on his Facebook page a couple days ago, which resulted in oodles of comments indicating there are a lot of people not happy with what they are seeing with the Trinity River Vision.

The Star-Telegram article titled "Restaurant owners irked by no-bid deal with celebrity chef Tim Love" has also generated a lot of comments, 70 in total, as of right now. Likely to increase.

I particularly liked the most recent comment, it being #70, from someone calling him or herself FoodCourtJester...

Seems everything Mr. Love touches turns to gold except his sorry food. Did I see he baked a roasted jalapeño granny smith apple pie for the Cowboys game? He thinks he's inventing new food if you read the recent paid advertisement, I mean article, in Ft Worth magazine. A bunch of clueless locals so eager to latch onto anything a celebrity chef does because Ft Worth has a major inferiority complex is to blame. That same inferiority complex brought us the TRV. Austin has town lake and SA the riverwalk. Oh, and the comment in this article that Love mentioned Woodshed on national TV. Yippee. Sounds like Baby Granger, Lane, et al should be taken to the woodshed.

Another comment suggested that the FBI would soon be raiding the offices of the TRV. Apparently that comment maker was not aware that Fort Worth is under a protective bubble where its corruption is immune from federal scrutiny.

But, if there was an FBI investigation, or even if someone was able to invoke the Freedom of Information Act, I think the public would be fascinated to learn how much of their money is spent on the liquor supply at TRV headquarters. How much has been spent on junkets to other towns? How much has been spent at expensive restaurants? How much has been put on a TRV credit cards for a room or two in an expensive Dallas hotel?

Why doe the Star-Telegram not politely ask J.D. Granger for a look at the Trinity River Vision's books? If it is all on the up and up and totally justifiable, J.D. Granger should have no objection to total transparency.

Regarding FoodCourtJester saying that Tim Love makes sorry food. All Tim Love has ever cooked for me is a Dirty Love Burger at the Love Shack in the Fort Worth Stockyards. After reading all the hype about the Love Shack burgers I was a bit disappointed to find I found nothing all that great about it. And the fries were cold.

The Last Monday Of November Freezing & Earthquake Free In Texas

On this last Monday of the next to last month of 2011 I am looking through the bars of my patio prison cell at a swimming pool that could have ice floating in it, if the circulating pump did not stop that from happening.

Because it is below freezing this morning in the outer world at my location on this parched part of the planet.

I have turned on my interior heating device for the first time since last winter. I do not like having to run my interior heating device.

I did not feel any of the 6 earthquakes that have rattled Oklahoma in the past 4 days.

Hyper sensitive to having the earth move, Elsie Hotpepper, usually feels any ground movement within a 200 mile radius.. But I've not heard if Elsie felt any shaking the past 4 days.

I will not be going swimming again this morning. My health is rapidly deteriorating due to this decrease in activity.

My Regular Sunday Walk With The Village Creek Indian Ghosts Was Blowing Below Freezing Today

The Sunny Sunday View Of The Village Creek Blue Bayou

With it being Sunday and creature of habit that I be, today in the noon time frame I drove to Arlington to the Village Creek Natural Historical Area to walk with the chilled Ghosts of the Indians who used to live here in one of the biggest Indian Villages in North America, til the Natives were run out of their town by incoming Texans and their primitive use of an early version of eminent domain.

We are having another gusty day in North Texas. So gusty that the wind chill factor had the 41 degrees feeling like 4 degrees below freezing when I entered the outer world.

As seems to be the pattern there were a number of other people enjoying the brisk wind blowing over Village Creek today.

Due to the big trees that line the walkway that you pass under as you commune with nature in this location, when it is windy, you must keep an eye out for flying branches and other airborne debris.

I had no flying branch incidents today.

As you can see via the screencap I made of the weather conditions prior to taking off to visit the Indians it is going to be cold for the next 5 days.

It appears that there will be no 24 hour periods where the temperature averages 50 degrees or above. This means I will not be swimming into the foreseeable future.

Without my salubrious morning swim my health is likely to quickly deteriorate. And I will get very very cranky. A substitute must be found.

A Happy Thanksgiving From A Pair Of Poodles Has Me Homesick For Washington

Ruby, Theo & David With Kristin
Getting Ready To Ski

This morning I saw that Tacoma's best known Adventure Poodles, Blue & Max, had written their annual Happy Thanksgiving blogging.

Apparently, on or about Thanksgiving, Blue & Max sent my nephews, David and Theo and niece, Ruby, up somewhere in the Cascade Mountains with their secondary caretakers, Michele & Kristin, for some fun in the snow.

It looks like the snow location may be the Snoqualmie Pass summit zone. There are several ski areas in this location. The Snoqualmie Pass summit zone is a fairly short distance east of Seattle and Tacoma, on Interstate 90.

Among the things I miss about Washington, that I don't have in Texas, is the extremely varied topography within very short distances.

In my current location the topography is pretty much the same in any direction for 100s of miles. There are no snow covered mountains in this parched part of the planet.

Where I lived in Washington, in the Skagit Valley town of Mount Vernon, I could drive about 10 miles to the east and be up in the mountains. Or go 10 miles to the west and be on a Puget Sound beach. Or in the tourist town of La Conner.

In Washington I could get up on a Saturday morning in November and choose to go cross country skiing, or go have a weenie roast picnic on a beach, or hop a ferry 20 miles from my abode, in Anacortes, and head out to the San Juan Islands, which is in the rain shadow of the Olympic Mountains, and thus is a reliable escape from rain, if you feel in need of escaping the gray dripping.

View From My Bedroom Window Of My
Van & Car Covered By Snow

The Puget Sound lowlands do not get a lot of snow. Some winters pass with no snow. There was one snow storm in the 1990s that was the deepest snow I ever saw in the Puget Sound lowland zone. I was pretty much trapped in my house for a week. I could not drive anywhere, but I could cross country ski to the grocery store.

When the thaw finally came I had all sorts of problems. Water was backing up on the flat roofs. Two drain pipes broke off. It was a mess.

Go here to visit me in Washington. Scroll down and you will come to more photos of the most snow I ever saw piled up in my location in Mount Vernon.

In Western Washington when you want a really major change of scenery you can drive one of the passes over the Cascade Mountains to a starkly different type of topography than the evergreen western side of the mountains. East of the mountains the hills have no trees growing on them, except for the 1000s of acres of fruit orchards.

In Eastern Washington you have a climate much more like Texas. Very HOT in the summer.

There is a big river than runs through Eastern Washington, called the Columbia, with several big dams, like Grand Coulee. Because of the big river and the reservoirs behind the dams, much of the desert of Eastern Washington has been turned into land upon which all sorts of things grow. One of the side benefits of Grand Coulee Dam was the appearance of lakes in various coulees (Washington Indian-speak for canyons), like Sun Lake. Sun Lake State Park was one of my favorite places to go in summer in my younger years.

Dry Falls, by Sun Lake, is the location of what at one point in time was the biggest waterfall the world has ever known. The melting of the last Ice Age and its massive flooding is what made the coulees of Eastern Washington.

Can you tell I'm feeling a bit homesick for Washington? It has been over 3 years since I've been back. That is the longest I've been away from Washington in my long life. I'm thinking I will likely be going to Arizona and Washington soon.

The Last Sunday Of November Of 2011 Has Dawned Wind Free & Cold In Texas

Looking out my primary viewing portal on the outer world this last Sunday of the next to last month of 2011 we can intuit that the temperature differential between my inner world and the outer world is significant enough to cause window condensation.

It is currently 37 degrees on the other side of the wet window.

It was windy pretty much all day yesterday and into the night. I assumed some massive weather system was blowing in.

However, this morning, near as I can see, there is nary a cloud in the sky.

I will not be going swimming this morning.

According To The Trinity River Vision Boondoggle Update No Other Town In North America Has As Much Downtown Waterfront As Fort Worth Texas

Roundabout With The Trinity River Vision

On Tuesday I blogged about the TRINITY RIVER VISION UPDATE VOLUME VI - ISSUE 3 - WINTER 2011 that DP had emailed me in PDF format, in a blogging titled "The Trinity River Vision Boondoggle's Bridges To Nowhere Built In Slow Motion."

Today the hard copy TRV Update showed up in my mailbox. The hard copy was identical to the PDF version.

Except.

An extra page had been inserted. That extra page has a few jaw dropping gems on it.

In a section of that extra page titled "Fort Worth Finally Embraces Trinity River" we are told....

Periodic devastating floods, including one in 1949 that flooded downtown, led the Corps to build high levees to protect the city. As leaders today acknowledge, it also protected the city's residents from using and enjoying the river. J.D. Granger, executive director of the Trinity River Vision Authority, joked that the only people making use of the river were skinny sweaty people, i.e. joggers who ran along the green spaces protected by the levees.

Despite the levees, the Trinity River still posed a flood danger during extreme rain events. The solution that eventually emerged was to dig a new channel to connect two sides of an oxbow that wound through the city. The channel, which would mostly cut through abandoned industrial properties, would turn part of downtown into two islands with a small bay between them, and provide miles of river-walks similar to the famous one in San Antonio that has become a mainstay of that city's tourism industry.

First off, a lot of people, besides the skinny sweaty people Mr. Granger mentions, use the Trinity Trails. Bikers, walkers, moms pushing strollers. Has Mr. Granger never been to Trinity Park? There are usually a lot of people in Trinity Park. Some of them are fishing.

Second off, despite the fact that there has been no repeat of the 1949 flood since the levees were built, the Trinity River still posed a danger if it rains real hard? I've seen some rather extreme flooding since I've been here. I have never seen the river get near going over the levees. I have seen other areas of Tarrant County that have turned deadly during extreme rain events. Haltom City, for example. But the Army Corps of Engineers does not care about Haltom City's flood woes.

Third off, the Town Lake has now been reduced to a small bay between two islands? How does that work?

Fourth off, this is the first I've heard that the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle now includes miles of river-walk like the one in San Antonio. That's an impressive plan, copying the famous tourist attraction of another town in your state. That is just kind of sad.

In another section of the propaganda, titled "Trinity River Vision remains focused, on schedule," we are told...

For what developers call the Trinity Uptown component of the Trinity River Vision project, residents can expect an 800-acre mixed use development connecting downtown, the Cultural District and the near North Side. Remaining project components are the Gateway Park master plan and what's dubbed the Trinity River Vision Experience, providing greater river access over 88 miles of river and tributaries.

And then this gem from Fort Worth's director of Planning and Development Department, Randle Harwood.

"We are in a unique position that no other city in North America can claim," Harwood said, citing the amount of waterfront access near downtown as unique to Fort Worth. "I just think that it gives us an economically competitive advantage. You can't create that, although we are creating additional riverfront by using the bypass channel."

No other city in North America has the amount of waterfront access near downtown as Fort Worth does? Who is writing this stuff? Someone borrowed from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram? I've not read such ridiculous propaganda in a long time. The Star-Telegram's bizarre claims about the long defunct Santa Fe Rail Market being the first public market in Texas, that it was modeled after Seattle's Pike Place and European public markets, comes to mind.

The Star-Telegram apparently did not know about the Dallas Farmers Market when it propagandized about the Santa Fe Rail Market. And the Trinity River Vision must not realize that the Trinity River also flows by the downtown of Dallas. And that the Dallas Trinity River Vision will see an actual big lake with a lot of waterfront.

Fort Worth's waterfront puts this town in a unique position no other city in North America can claim?

Apparently New York City, Miami, Chicago, Portland, Seattle, San Francisco, Vancouver and other towns I'm likely forgetting are not in the same North America that Fort Worth is in.

Besides Dallas I can think of other towns within a day's drive of Fort Worth with a lot of waterfront.

Like Tulsa, Oklahoma.

The Tulsa Port of Catoosa, at the head of the McClellan-Kerr Arkansas River Navigation System, is the most inland river port in the U.S. with access to international waterways. Yes, the Arkansas River is a real river, a real wide river as it passes through Tulsa.

The Trinity River as it passes through Fort Worth is more of a glorified ditch than a river.

Shreveport, Louisiana, with the Red River, also navigable, providing a lot of waterfront, is also a short drive from Fort Worth.

Waco has some nice waterfront on the north side of its downtown, provided by the very scenic Brazos River, which also is a real river, not a glorified ditch, as it passes through Waco.

If the goofball assertions made in the Trinity River Vision Update are indicative of the thought processing going into this project, I fear we will be seeing a way bigger boondoggle than any of us dreamed possible.

The Wind Doth Blow Across The Texas Prairie Today With Fosdic Ducks & Solar Panels

Birds Of Various Feathers
 Flocking Together On Lake Fosdic

The weather predictors were predicting accurately this morning when they predicted it would be windy today.

At ground level the gusts seem to be coming from the west. At sky level the clouds seem to be coming from the south. The temperature has dropped to 52 in the early afternoon, after starting the day in the 60s.

On my way to Town Talk today I stopped for a very brisk walk in the very brisk wind that is blowing around Fosdic Lake in Oakland Lake Park.

It was so windy I thought there should be waves making whitecaps. But there weren't.

Birds of various feathers were sticking together in the wind, with a bunch of ducks seeming to be being guarded by some big white birds. The quacking was a cacophony.

What Is This Mysterious Device?

A month or so ago there appeared something perplexing by the spillway of Lake Fosdic Dam.

A post cemented into the ground with an antenna at the top and what looks to be some sort of solar panel. A cable runs underground to a pipe that runs to the spillway.

Is this to measure the water flow over the dam? Something that does not happen too often lately on this parched part of the planet.

A little dribble was dripping over the spillway today, thanks to last night's little amount of rain.

There must be some really good explanation why the City of Fort Worth, with its budget woes, spent money on this particular waiting to be vandalized device.

Yet one more thing to be perplexed about. Like the latest mailing from the Trinity River Vision, which arrived in my mailbox today. More on that later.

Getting Whacked Like A Mole Because Of My Constant Weather Reports On The Last Saturday Of November

Blue appears to be the dominant color that I see from my secondary viewing portal on the outer world this last Saturday of the next to last month of 2011.

The outer world is currently being heated to 60 degrees.

But.

If the weather predictors are to be believed that temperature is heading to a freezing temperature of 32 at some point in the next 24 hours.

We are also advised by those same weather predictors that it will be windy today.

Speaking of the weather, which is something I seem to frequently speak of, someone named Park Lover commented on my weather reports this morning....

Park Lover has left a new comment on your post "The Fort Worth Nature Center & Refuge Made A Whopping $39,885 In Admission Fees Last Year From 45,000 Visitors": 

I usually play Whack-A-Mole when commenting to you in the past. Bad manners not to wish you a happy holiday and that despite my frustrations with you at times, your blog is highly entertaining (minus the weather reports) and makes me laugh. 

Why would anyone be frustrated with me at times I can not help but wonder? And what is Whack-A-Mole? Am I a mole being whacked without realizing it?

Speaking of blog comments and other comments. I get a lot of them. I have 5 blogs. The one you are reading right now gets the most comments because it has had the most posts. An appalling 4,085 blog posts. Any one of which gets comments. Most of which are spam. As of this morning I have hit the publish button on 5,331 comments on the Durango Texas blog.

But, it is not the blogs that generate the most feedback. It's my Eyes on Texas website that is the major feedback generator. And most of that feedback is asking me a question. Which I always feel obligated to answer.

Right now I feel obligated to go swimming before it gets cold in the outer world.

The Fort Worth Nature Center & Refuge Made A Whopping $39,885 In Admission Fees Last Year From 45,000 Visitors

Watch Out For Alligators

The Fort Worth Nature Center & Refuge and the Tandy Hills Natural Area are both gems of wilderness of the sort which few large towns in the world are blessed.

The Fort Worth Nature Center & Refuge covers 3,621 acres, with over 20 miles of trails and wooden walkways over bayou-like waterways

Waterways where, as you see on the CAUTION sign, you may come upon an alligator. Or two.

When I first moved to Texas I lived closer to the FWNC & R than I do now. Back then I fairly frequently frequented the FWNC & R. And I've visited quite a few times since I moved further away from the FWNC & R.

But.

I have not been to the Fort Worth Nature Center & Refuge since April of 2006.

Why?

Because the City of Fort Worth started charging an entry free. This I thought was an asinine thing for a city with pretensions of being the Envy of the World, to be doing.

I had been to the FWNC & R many times where I saw moms and dads with little kids, having fun looking at the Prairie Dogs and the Buffalo. These often seemed like families with finances which likely did not allow mom and dad to take the kids on fun trips to Yellowstone or Disneyland or Grand Canyon.

Having park amenities in your town, freely available to everyone, is part of what makes a great city GREAT.

And then yesterday, I read the following in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram....

The center has an operating budget of $664,776. It netted $39,885 from charging a fee at the park entrance and saw more than 45,000 visitors enter the park last year.

The city started charging the fee in 2006.

How much does it cost for admission you may be wondering?

From the FWNC & R website....

$5 Adults (13-64)

$2 Children (3-12;under 3 FREE)

$3 Seniors (65+)

$1 Discount per person (with Military ID)

So, mom and dad and 3 kids in the 3 -12 range can get to see the alligators for $16.

When I first learned that an entry fee was to be charged I wondered how much the cost of the ticket booth would be and how much it would cost to pay someone to take the money.

From the Star-Telegram article we learn the Center has an operating budget of $664,776. That is money that has been collected from you Fort Worth taxpayers. Taxes paid so the city has money to pay for things, like parks, for the benefit of the tax paying citizens.

Charging the entry fee netted only $39,885 last year. I'm assuming that net is after factoring in the cost of collecting the money.

There were more than 45,000 entry fee paying visitors. Let's say the average entry fee paid was $3. A $3 average would bring in $135,000. That is rather heavy overhead to end up netting only $39,885.

Let's take the operating budget of $664,776 and divide that number by the 45,000 visitors. That gives us a total cost per visitor of $14.77.

So, the City of Fort Worth is paying $14.77 per visit to the Fort Worth Nature Center & Refuge.

How many visited annually prior to a fee being charged?

Why not remove the entry fee, since it costs such a ridiculous amount to make that puny net of $39,885 and make money by other means?

Popcorn for a buck a bag at the Visitor's Center? Rental canoes? Maybe special events like the Concerts in the Garden that take place in the Fort Worth Botanic Garden. Surely some means could be found to easily raise $39,885 a year other than charging a ridiculous entry fee.

I had not discovered the Tandy Hills, which is only 4 miles from my abode, back when I still semi-regularly drove to the Fort Worth Nature Center & Refuge.

I wonder why the City of Fort Worth isn't charging an entry fee to the Tandy Hills. I think there easily could be a total of at least a 1,000 people who hike the hills annually. Some of those would be multiple visits from the same person, though.

I'd need to get a season's pass.

Being A Fat Blimp On The Tandy Hills Thinking About Stealing Elsie Hotpepper's Fence Posts

The Dark Brooding Black Friday Skyline of
Beautiful Downtown Fort Worth

You are looking west, on Black Friday, from the top of Mount Tandy at the stunning skyline of beautiful downtown Fort Worth.

As you can see we are being a bit overcast and hazy today. Or maybe it is smog that is blurring the Fort Worth skyline.

I'd not been on the Tandy Hills for several days.

Yesterday, on Thanksgiving, I got an email from Don Young in which he suggested I was a blimp in need of working off my fat. But, it is because off all that fat I am sufficiently insulated so I can stay in the pool for a long time, like I did this morning.

Anyway, here is part of what Don Young had to say about blimps and fat....

Feeling like a blimp after all that fun food? Fly over to Tandy Hills Natural Area and work off your fatties and have a good time, too. Need a reason? Here's 10:

1. Perfect weather today and tomorrow
2. 160 acres of Autumn scenery
3. Deep woods and open prairie
4. Water in the creeks
5. Quiet solitude just 5 minutes from downtown FW
6. Great place to bring the dogs and the kids
7. You might see and smell a Nodding Ladies Tresses Orchid in bloom
8. You might see a rabbit or a fox or a hawk or all three
9. Walking in nature is good for your mind, body and soul
10. Free and open to the public. You own it, enjoy it!

I saw no Nodding Ladies Tresses on the Tandy Hills today, that I know of.

I did hear, via email, from the Nodding Lady who calls herself Elsie Hotpepper, upon my return from the hills. In the first email Elsie Hotpepper accused me of stealing one of her fence posts. And then in the next email she tells me she has stolen the fence post back.

Tandy Tires Growing Closer

First off, I did not know Elsie Hotpepper had a fence. Second off, why would I steal one of Elsie's fence posts if she did have a fence?

I tell you sometimes I have an awful lot of trouble understanding what Elsie Hotpepper is talking about.

Changing the subject from stolen fence posts back to the Tandy Hills.

The number of mysteriously appearing Tandy Tires remains at three, still sitting on the Tandy Highway. But, Tire #3 has now moved much closer to Tire #2, as you can see in the picture.

It is time for some leftover turkey now. I must replace the fat I lost on the Tandy Hills today.