Happy 63rd Wedding Anniversary To My Favorite Mom & Dad

Dad & Mom With Uncle Mooch

UPDATE: Oops. My mom and dad called to day to wish me a Happy Birthday and to tell me this year was their 62nd Anniversary, not 63rd. Have I mentioned before that simple math confuses me?

Today is my mom and dad's 63rd Wedding Anniversary.

Today is also the 69th Anniversary of the first time an atom bomb was used as a weapon of mass destruction, with the destruction of Hiroshima helping finally bring an end to World War II.

I am not totally certain, but I believe when my mom and dad got married my dad had already joined, or had been drafted, into the army.

This was during the Korean War.

Dad did not get sent to Korea. He was sent to Europe.

France specifically.

I have never heard dad say much about his time in France. Except for not wanting to return. And that the French public restrooms were not of American quality.

When dad returned stateside, mom met him in New York City. I do not know how mom got to New York City. Bus or train? I know she did not fly, because my mom does not like to get in an airplane.

I know mom and dad wandered around New York City, seeing the sights. At one point they were wanting to see the Empire State Building and take the elevator to the top. They could not find the building. Finally they got up the courage to ask where the Empire State Building was. And were a little embarrassed to learn that it was the building they'd been standing under, as they walked around the block looking for it.

I do not know if my mom and dad bought it in New York City, but somewhere on the east coast a car was purchased. It was in that car my mom and dad took their first tour of America, making a long return to the far northwest corner of the Pacific Northwest, to the town of Lynden, from whence they came.

If I remember correctly, when mom and dad left New York City they headed south, down the eastern seaboard, to Florida, then west across the South.

I do not know if they passed through Texas at that point in time. I suspect not, as they gave no indication of having been here before, way back then, when they visited me here, in October of 2001. Mom and dad did pass through Texas during their post-retirement RV trip across America in 1995.

Another thing I do remember being told about mom and dad's 1950s trip across America was their journey into California's Death Valley. They'd heard one needed to bring plenty to drink. In their youthful innocence, mom and dad thought that meant they needed to bring beer to Death Valley. Mom and dad have never been alcohol consumers, not then, not now, never.

But, mom and dad bought beer as their form of the needed Death Valley hydration. When they got to the HOT part of Death Valley their vehicle started overheating. Nowadays one is advised to turn off a vehicle's A/C when entering Death Valley's heat, so as not to overheat the engine. Back then, vehicular A/C had not yet been invented.

As I remember the story, when mom and dad overheated they opened bottles of beer, with both spitting out the vile liquid, due to its disgusting taste.

I do not know, and have never asked, if it was beer mom and dad poured into their vehicle's overheated cooling system.

Mom and dad got married on August 6. Their eldest was born on August 11.

Years later.

Happy Anniversary Mom & Dad!

Leaving Mountain-Free Texas To Hike With Maxine In The Noisy-Diobsud Wilderness

In the picture you are in the Noisy-Diobsud Wilderness in the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest on the west slope of the North Cascades, a few miles northeast of my old home zone in Mount Vernon, Washington.

Very specifically, you are looking at Watson and Anderson Lakes, with one lake up close and one in the distance.

Maxine sent me this picture today. Maxine hiked to this location over the weekend. Maxine has visited me at my location in Texas. Maxine knows how scenery deprived my location in Texas is.

I don't think Maxine sent me this picture to make me homesick, but that has been the result.

In 6 days it will be exactly 5 years since I have hiked in an actual mountain zone. That mountain would be Mount Rainier.

One of the very first times I hiked in the Cascade Mountains was with Maxine.

Me, Maxine and Miss Mac.

That hike was up the south slope of Mount Baker. Mount Baker is one of Washington's 5 active volcanoes.

I don't know how many active volcanoes there are in Texas. Most likely none. Seems like there'd be some, what with all the underground explosive material in the form of oil and shale.

I Came Upon A Mutant Neon Petunia Today On My Walking Tour Of My Favorite Industrial Wasteland

Today, with the Heat Index approaching 100, before noon, I opted out of driving anywhere for my daily walking, hiking or biking powered salubrious endorphin inducing aerobic stimulation and instead decided this was a good day to take a walking tour of the Industrial Wasteland that is the place I call home.

If I were typing this in Microsoft's Word, rather than Google's Blogger, I would be being informed that the above paragraph is one monster of a run-on sentence.

I do have a great affection for run-on sentences.

As I walked through my favorite Industrial Wasteland I came upon the un-naturally colored wildflower you see above. The picture does not do justice to how brightly neon this flower looked. Is this some sort of mutant petunia wildflower? I've not seen  this particular bloom before, not that I can recall.

Speaking of getting aerobic stimulation. I have increased my morning pool time to around an hour. I hit the water soon after the sun arrives.

The extra aerobic stimulation seems to help with my ability to concentrate on altering webpages without HTML code getting on my nerves, too much.

To take a break from the hours of webpage altering I've made two new blogs in the past 24 hours. I don't know if anything will come of them. One is called Durango World. Very clever title. The other one is called Durango Tech No.

The theme of Durango Tech No, put real simply, is my phone is not smart, my only tablet is made of paper, I used to be an early technology adopter, but now I lag way behind.

As for Durango World. Well, there are times there are subjects that I feel like commenting on, but which don't seem to fit any of my existing blogs.

Like it crossed my mind the other day that Vladimir Putin exhibits an extreme case of Little Man Syndrome, a trait he shares with one of his predecessors, Joe Stalin.

And then there's that whole royal baby thing that irritates me.

And closing dozens of embassies, basically giving the terrorists a victory without firing a shot.

What is really irritating me right now is I am hungry. That irritation will be alleviated by lunch. Which today is BBQ chicken on Poblano Betard bread. With cole slaw.

Today I Decided To Bike Through Viridian Rather Than The Trinity River Vision Boondoggle

I don't remember when it was I was last at Arlington's River Legacy Park, but I am fairly certain today was the first time I've been at this location this summer.

Due to it currently being the HOT time of the year the snake warning signs are up. Along with a new sign I've not seen before, as in "ATTENTION: We share the park with bobcats and other wildlife. Please use caution while in the park."

It has been years since I've had a bobcat encounter in River Legacy Park. I have had a bobcat encounter this summer in Arlington's Village Creek Natural Historical Area.

This morning I read that Tarrant County and the D/FW  Metroplex zone has been experiencing a home buying boom, with there being more people wanting to buy than the supply of homes available to buy.

The Formerly Blocked Trail To Viridian

Reading about the home buying boom caused me to wonder how much the Viridian development adjacent to River Legacy Park was booming. I last saw the Viridian development after reading that homes were now being built on the long stalled project. That was, maybe, 6 months ago, maybe longer, that I pedaled to check on Viridian.

Several years ago a paved trail was installed (and blocked) that led from the Gateway Park trail to Viridian. Today I was pleased to find that this trail is no longer blocked and one can now bike the trail to Viridian.

The paved trail entry to Viridian is quite welcoming. The entry is well landscaped. The completed parts of the Viridian development are all well landscaped.

A Viridian art installation overlooking one of the Viridian development's lakes. Is the above lake Lake Viridian? I have no idea. I do know that years ago, before the 2008 economic collapse that brought the Viridian development to a stall, I talked to a guy who was surveying the border with River Legacy Park and he told me the lake you see above was going to be developed into a public use swimming lake with a beach.

Today I saw no signs of a beach being installed around "Lake Viridian" but I did see plenty of landscaping around the lake. In the above photo my handlebars are on a bridge overlooking the lake.

Looking at "Lake Viridian" had me wondering how this lake compares in size to the shrinking proposed Pond Granger that is part of the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle? In the middle of "Lake Viridian" there is a small island. Unlike the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle imaginary island, Viridian could actually name an actual island, Panther Island. Then put a pavilion on it and call it Panther Island Pavilion and Viridian would have created something that the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle only pretends to have created.

Above is another view of "Lake Viridian" and the paved trails one can use to bike the lake. Or if one is walking there are plenty of benches on which to have oneself a sit down.

Unlike the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle, Viridian is a private development. When first announced, sometime around the time the Dallas Cowboy stadium started getting constructed, the plans were quite elaborate, including restaurants, retail and an island with very expensive homes. Prior to the 2008 financial meltdown a lot of infrastructure work had been done. And then, after the meltdown, work on the Viridian project slowed to a crawl.

The Viridian crawl now seems to be sped way up.

Now, what I'm thinking is how interesting it is that something like the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle has been limping along for well over a decade, with Fort Worth still waiting for that much needed flood control project to start protecting Fort Worth, with the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle really not having all that much to show for itself after all this time.

Not much to show, unless one is impressed with the TRVB's creation of the world's premiere urban wakeboard lake, the world's first drive-in movie theater of the 21st century, the world's first inner tube happy hour floats in a polluted river and the world's premiere island-free polluted waterfront music venue.

Oh, and abusing eminent domain to steal, I mean, buy a lot of people's property. No eminent domain abuse has occurred to create Viridian. No businesses were destroyed. No lives were left in chaos.

Where the paved trail exits Viridian I was surprised to see what looked like a small mountain, of the sort of brown, grass covered hills one sees in Eastern Washington. I have no clue whether nor not this mountain is part of the Viridian development.

If such a mountain appeared in the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle zone I would expect to be reading breathless reports about the mountain becoming the world's premiere year round ski resort with the world's biggest artificial snow maker and the world's fastest open air ski lift, with a Tim Love restaurant at the summit, commanding a view of the Panther Island Pavilion music venue and those world famous Rockin' the River Happy Hour Inner Tube Floats, along with the stunning skyline of beautiful downtown Fort Worth....

Who Is Covering Up Who Stayed In The TRWD Hunting Preserve's Cabin?

This morning I found an extremely interesting tidbit of info in a Fort Worth Star-Telegram article posted Friday, Aug. 02, 2013 titled Tarrant water district’s use of private camp on public land draws questions.

First the last 5 paragraphs from the article and then I'll tell you what I found so interesting....

Kelleher, the challenger who received more votes than anyone on the ballot, said she will continue to press for the board to be more transparent about its money and its property.

Giving the public a closeup view of the hunting camp, she said, is a start.

“I just want it to be acknowledged that a deer hunting camp does exist,” said Kelleher, who proposed that the land use be reviewed periodically.

For example, Kelleher said she was glad to know that visitors are required to sign in and out of the cabin on a log book, which was placed on the dining table during the Star-Telegram’s visit last week.

On that day, however, the book contained only blank sheets.

Mull that last sentence, above, over.

"On that day, however, the book contained only blank sheets."

The log book being referenced can be seen in the picture at the top, sitting on a table inside the TRWD Hunting Preserve's cabin.

Enlarging the image of the logbook I can make out some of the words on the cover, as in "EVERYONE MUST SIGN IN AND OUT ANY SEASON."

On the cover "EVERYONE" is surrounded by quotation marks, signifying, it would seem, the significance of everyone signing in.

And yet all the pages in the log book are blank.

Now, let's think about why this TRWD Hunting Preserve is controversial. The assertion has been that the TRWD Board Members have used this public land as their private preserve.

But, the veteran TRWD  Board Members claim they have never used the TRWD Hunting Preserve, claiming it is a perk for the benefit of TRWD's employees. With those employees being who paid for the TRWD Hunting Preserve's various features, with no public funds spent on public land that the public is forbidden to use.

So, why are there no log-ins in the TRWD Hunting Preserve log book, which insists "EVERYONE" must sign in?

Could it be that a check of some of the names which were in that now blank log book would quickly be found out not to be TRWD employees or other approved users of the TRWD Hunting Preserve?

For example, did the guys and gals in Marty Leonard's Sensible Shoe Society Club spend a weekend hunting deer whilst staying in the cabin?

Did a group of Jim Lane's cronies have themselves a mighty fine time staying in the TRWD Hunting Preserve cabin?

Did Jim Oliver let some friends and family use the TRWD Hunting Preserve cabin?

What names were in that log book that necessitated it being wiped clean? Who turned all the log book pages blank? When did this page blanking occur?

Is there a record at TRWD Headquarters of who has used the TRWD Hunting Preserve cabin?

Who, besides the TRWD board members and Jim Oliver, would have any cover up interest in removing the list of names of who had used the TRWD Hunting Preserve cabin?

Like I already said, extremely interesting.

8/2/2013 HostGator Has Been Down For Hours But Is Back Up For Now

It has been 4 years since I had web host nightmares with something called IX Webhosting.

Nightmares which caused me to move my websites to a Houston based web host called HostGator.

During the 4 years my websites have been on HostGator I have not been aware of any server downtime.

Til last week when HostGator went down for a short time, as in well less than an hour of downtime.

But now, today, HostGator went kaput again.

Starting sometime around 10 this morning I found email not working, followed by finding the websites not working.

HostGator's Twitter feed informed followers that their Provo server bank was having a network connectivity problem that was affecting their entire system. That being a system with 100s of thousands of customers with millions of domains.

Coming up on 3 in the afternoon HostGator is back working for me. I realized it was back working when I saw email incoming without a connection error. I then checked my Eyes on Texas website to see my Six Flags Over Texas webpage was back up.

And running a HostGator ad.

Further irony. I now see this very blog you are reading right now is running HostGator ads.

So, at the same time HostGator cost me money by being down, HostGator is paying me money by buying ad space on my blogs and websites.

I am hoping this has been a HostGator fluke that will quickly fade from memory and that I don't find myself having to go through the annoying process of moving websites to a new host again.

Asking For Whom The Bell Tolls While It Is Not Tolling For Me

Ask not for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee.

Hardly a month goes by, or so it seems, without me hearing the bell toll. Or get the news that the bell will be tolling soon for someone.

It seems the main cause of the bells tolling is cancer in one of that dread disease's many forms.

Last month it was Solrun for whom the bell tolled.

I think it was my Junior year in high school that Solrun showed up. From Iceland. Barely speaking English. Solrun was a year younger, which would have made her a Sophomore.

Solrun's nickname was Lilla. I never called her Solrun.

I think I spent a lot of my time in high school in some sort of a state of traumatic shock. Because I don't remember a lot of it.

For instance.

I remember Betty Jo Bouvier and Honey Lulu conspiring to get me to go with Lilla to some prom/ball/dance thing that required going out for dinner before or after the dancing. I agreed to the conspiracy. I remember Honey Lulu's "date" did the driving, with me and Lilla in the back seat.

I have no memory of being at the prom/ball/dance. I do remember the dinner. Til corrected I thought the dinner took place at the Lighthouse Inn in La Conner.

It was what happened at the dinner that I totally remember. One of us ordered something that was of the flambe sort that the waiter set to fire upon delivering the plate to the table. When the plate went to flames Lilla did not know what was happening and proceeded to douse the fire with her glass of water. I believe we were asked to leave, but I am not sure of that. I do remember being totally mortified.

So, after I learned that Lilla had died I exchanged messages with Honey Lulu. Honey Lulu informed me that the food on fire incident took place at the Hope Island Inn, not the Lighthouse Inn. Honey Lulu said this took place after the prom/ball/dance that I don't remember dancing at. I don't remember dancing and I don't remember ever being at the Hope Island Inn.

And then Honey Lulu informed me of a bit of information that had been kept from me for decades. As in Betty Jo Bouvier and Honey Lulu had to pay Lilla an undisclosed amount of cash to get her to agree to go to this event with me.

I was shocked, shocked, I tell you. Like I already said, my high school years were traumatic for me....

In His Latest Blog Post We Learn Gar The Texan Wants To Get Buttered Like A Biscuit

In the picture you are looking at the logo that sits atop the blog known as Gar's World. I am guessing the image represents Gar the Texan being on top of the world taking some sort of untoward liberty with Pakistan.

Gar the Texan is a self confessed ardent aficionado of cliches. For instance, Gar applies the cliche "less is more" to just about everything he does.

For instance, believing that less is more, Gar the Texan limits himself to one blog post a month. This scarcity causes the Gar the Texan monthly blog posts to be eagerly anticipated by everyone who eagerly anticipates them.

This month's Gar the Texan Gar's World blog post is titled Practice Makes Perfect.

In Practice Makes Perfect I learned several things about myself, such as I am a fine professional writer and grammar police chief, as detailed in the following paragraphs lifted from Gar the Texan's blog...

Mostly it helps because the Grammar Police Chief (Durango), is usually kind enough to point out all my mistakes. And, to be honest, Durango is a mighty fine writer. He writes more than I read every day.

At the end of each post I'll link you to my favorite current post by Durango so you can read something written by a professional writer and hopefully ease the pain. Don't skip to the end though. That wouldn't be fair.

I think it was Durango who accused me of using too many cliche's. Instead of trying to fix the problem I just have accepted it and made it my own.

Well butter my butt and call me a biscuit! Here's Durango discussing the language of Southern Belles. The video is worth watching as well. I like the one who is demanding some sugar. She makes me happy.

Butter my butt and call me a biscuit? That sounds original to me, not a cliche.

The Queen of Wink asked me last week if I was going to attend Gar the Texan's latest wedding with her. That wedding is currently scheduled to take place later this month. Neither the Queen of Wink or myself managed to RSVP in time to secure a spot on the Gar the Texan wedding attendee list.

A Person With Any Common Sense Would Not Be HOT Hill Hiking Today In Texas

This morning when I found Don Young's Prairie Notes #80 in my inbox I realized it has been weeks since I have been on the Tandy Hills.

So, with today scheduled to be HOT enough to have a good sauna steam bath I decided to drive to the summit of Mount Tandy and have myself a HOT walk.

As you can see, looking west, across the wagon train trail that leads towards the stunning skyline of beautiful downtown Fort Worth, the air does not appear to be all that smoggy, despite the air quality alerts.

It did not take me long walking to realize maybe I should pay heed to all the warnings I hear advising the elderly to stay inside during these troubling HOT times.

When I began to be blinded by the copious amount of moisture leaking from me I cut short the hiking, down to only 3 hills from the usual 5.

In addition to being HOT I had to contend with getting around the trail block you see in the picture below.

Just north of the currently dry Tandy Falls, where one takes a left to a shady trail up to the View Street Trail, a big tree has fallen across the trail.

I do not know what the policy is regarding windfalls in the Tandy Hills Natural Area. Is it like a national park, where the tree remains where it fell, unless it is blocking a highway or causing a hazard?

I am thinking for the duration of this 100 degree plus HOT time of the year, my mode of getting aerobic stimulation will be my morning swim, shady walks and bike riding, saving the Tandy Hills for the cooler time of the year.

This current plan is subject to change.

Bum Puzzled By Things Southern Belles Like Elsie Hotpepper Sometimes Say

Last night Elsie Hotpepper said something to me along the line of "I gotta hankerin' to be fixin' to get myself a free Koozie."

I did not know what a Koozie was or how one would get a Koozie for free. Getting a free Koozie sounded borderline nefarious to me. So, I asked Elsie Hotpepper what a Koozie was. And what dire deed she had to do to get a Koozie for free.

Elsie said something along the line of "Well bless your heart. A Koozie is what you stick a can of beer in to keep it cold."

"Koozie is Southern Slang for refrigerator?" asked I.

Elsie then said something along the line of "Aren't you just precious."

After suggesting I was precious, in that charming dripping with honey Elsie Hotpepper patented Texas accent, Elsie emailed me a picture that alleviated me of my Koozie ignorance. I then blogged about the Koozie because the way one got one for free was interesting to me.

Elsie also emailed the link to the YouTube video above which has a bevy of Elsie Hotpepper's fellow Southern Belles spouting their special lingo....