Talking To My Mom Pondering A Fort Worth Weekly String Of Pearls Disaster In Waiting

Today being Wednesday, this is the day I sometimes remember to walk to Albertsons to get this week's Fort Worth Weekly, which I did remember to do today.

I was going to sit outside at my picnic table and read this week's FW Weekly, but I called my mom first. That call went long enough for the shade to disappear. I decided to postpone reading this week's FW Weekly.

Last week's Fort Worth Weekly's cover article was a bit bizarre, with it being a propaganda puff piece titled "String of Pearls" with a sub-title of "Fort Worth's award-winning Trinity bridges connect trails, neighborhoods and history".

Anyone at all familiar with the topography of Fort Worth knows there are no great chasms requiring great feats of bridge engineering to span the chasms.

The award winning bridge is this little pedestrian bridge that is very pedestrian called the Phyllis J. Tilley Bridge. A blurb from the FW Weekly article about the Tilley bridge and the new 7th Street Bridge.....

Less than a mile to the north, the graceful curve of the 13-month-old Phyllis J. Tilley Bridge is the first long bridge in North America combining a steel arch and stress “ribbon.” In April the Tilley bridge received the Eminent Conceptor Award, the highest honor for engineering excellence bestowed by the Texas branch of the American Council of Engineering Companies. The bridge also received a gold medal in the group’s structural systems category.

Another few hundred yards down-stream, the newly opened $23 million Seventh Street Bridge is the world’s first precast-concrete network arch bridge. It’s noteworthy both for being Texas-designed and completed on budget and a month early.

I was surprised when I first crossed the Tilley Bridge. Surprised by what looked to be shoddy construction. The photo of this bridge in the FW Weekly was taken at night, with the shoddiness still visible in the dark. Or are crooked handrails part of the design? That is the FW Weekly Tilley Bridge photo below. Does this look like an award winning bridge to you?

You may be wondering about the blue color of this bridge. Below is FW Weekly's explanation...

After dark, LED lights illuminate the underside of the bridge casting a soothing blue glow across the understory and the water surface. It’s an eye-pleaser both day and night.

Eye-pleaser? Soothing?

Someone named Tony made what seemed to me to be an accurate comment about this particular FW Weekly cover article....

Tony October 16, 2013 at 3:18 pm
With the exception of the historic bridge in the park, who is giving these bridges awards? None of them are even remotely spectacular. They look like just what they are...plain ole bridges.

Did the Fort Worth Star-Telegram somehow takeover Fort Worth Weekly the week this Chamber of Commerce propaganda puffery was published?

This week Fort Worth Weekly appears to be back doing what it usually does, investigative journalism, as you can see by looking at this week's FW Weekly's cover with the cover article titled "DISASTER IN WAITING" with a sub-title of "Beneath North Texas' water-supply lakes run pipelines full of tarry danger".

Today I Found A Hoodoo Sprouted On Fort Worth's Tandy Hills

No, that is not a hoodoo in Utah's Goblin Valley State Park you are looking at.

What you are looking at is a man made hoodoo in Fort Worth's Tandy Hills Natural Area, located at the point where the View Street Trail junctions with the trail which leads to Tandy Falls.

I may have been lost in my thoughts yesterday when I walked by this location, but I really don't see how I could have missed noticing this.

Seeing this man made hoodoo caused me to think of the recent incident of hoodoo vandalism in the aforementioned Goblin Valley State Park, which had me wondering if those idiot Boy Scout leaders who knocked the rock over had been brought to justice yet.

So, when I got back to a computer I Googled to learn, via the Wikipedia article about Goblin Valley State Park, the following...

"In October 2013 three Boy Scout leaders who had been camping in the area with a Church of Latter Day Saints group decided to intentionally knock over a hoodoo. The Scout leaders recorded the illegal act and posted it on social media. Dave Hall and Glenn Taylor were subsequently dismissed from their leadership roles within the Boy Scouts of America."

Utah's redrock zones are just about my favorite part of the planet that I have visited. Something about redrock just makes me feel good. I remember the first time I saw redrock. I was heading south on Utah Highway 89, turned east on Highway 12 and soon came upon a sign informing me I was heading toward Red Canyon. A few minutes after that I saw why it was called Red Canyon.

Redrock.

Not knowing that I was going to be seeing a lot of redrock  in Bryce Canyon and Zion National Park, I stopped and took a lot of pictures. On film. Digital had not yet been invented.

I wonder how long the Tandy Hills Hoodoo will last before falling victim to a rogue Boy Scout troop. Or the wind?

An October Hike In The Colorfully Lush Tandy Hills Jungle

I had not noticed this particular view you are seeing in the picture on the left, til today, that being a solo skyscraper rising from the Tandy Hills jungle.

Is there any other town in America with a population over a half million with a big chunk of wilderness so close to its downtown?

I  would guess not.

With two thirds of October gone, along with a third of Fall, shouldn't the lush green of the Tandy Hills be turning into Autumn colors?

Additionally perplexing is the volume of wildflowers currently coloring up the Tandy Hills landscape. I do not remember this in Octobers past. And why are the Tandy Hills being so green whilst the Great Texas Drought continues? By the end of the Summer of 2012 the Tandy Hills were showing the effects of the drought, with a lot of foliage in death throes.

But now, in  the Fall of 2013 the hills are alive with color, such as what you see below.

Hundreds of these yellow blooms are busy blooming on the Tandy Hills. These flowers look like the result of a liaison between a sunflower and a dandelion. Perhaps renowned Fort Worth horticulturist, CatsPaw, can identify this yellow flower and the other yellow flowers in the picture below.

The yellow sunflower dandelions share a color scheme, and growing space, with a much smaller yellow flower which is currently carpeting large sections of the Tandy Hills.

The temperature conditions are currently perfect for some hill hiking. Not too hot, not too cold.

I wish I could say the same for my swimming pool.  But the temperature conditions are currently not perfect. As in too cold. But, I managed to have myself a bracing swim this morning of short, but vigorous, duration.

In incoming email I just got a Travelocity fare alert for Phoenix. Roundtrip for only $110. How can that be?

My mom wants me to come to Phoenix in December. Is this fare alert one of those omen things telling me to book a flight? Even though I have a very very strong relative reason not to want to go to Phoenix in December.

The 3rd Sunday Of October Getting Negatively Ionized In Fort Worth

I did not feel like rolling my motorized wheels anywhere this 3rd Sunday of October to get myself some aerobically induced endorphins.

With the temperature now being no where near 100 degrees it once again becomes feasible to go on an extended walk in my mostly shade-free neighborhood.

So, I walked to the scenic wonder which is my neighborhood greenbelt, where there is no shade, but there are tall towers supporting power lines.

I think walking under the buzzing power lines may provide some negative ionizing, along with the internally generated endorphins, both of which had me feeling mighty fine by the time I got to Albertsons to get this week's ink edition of DFW.com and a bunch of cilantro.

Is 'bunch' the word one uses to describe a collection of cilantro sprigs? Sounds right to me. Now I'm wondering about that 'sprigs' word. Suddenly I am filled with doubt. This feeling likely will not last long.

Swimming did not go well this morning. At that point in time the air was chilled to only 8 degrees above freezing. The water did not feel much warmer than the air. I did a couple laps in the pool then retreated to the hot tub, then back in the pool for a couple laps, then back in the hot tub. I think I did this vicious cycle 5 times. It was very refreshing.

Well, enough of that cold talk, it's time for lunch. Scalloped spuds with ham and cheese wraps, well, ham and cheese rolled up in a whole wheat tortilla. Is that a wrap? I know it's not a bunch....

Surprised Today To Find A Mysterious Fountain Spouting On Fort Worth's Fosdick Lake

Today as I rolled my motorized transport into a parking slot in Oakland Lake Park I looked out at Fosdick Lake to see something that totally surprised and bum puzzled me.

A fountain.

I walked around Fosdick Lake on Wednesday. At that point in time there was no sign of a fountain being constructed.

Today walking around Fosdick Lake I saw nothing that indicated any construction project had taken place, which somehow ran a pipeline out into Fosdick Lake, allowing a fountain to spout.

Has the Fosdick Fountain always existed? And for some reason someone somewhere opted to turn on the fountain?

Is this fountain intended to spout enough aerated water that the result is a much cleaner Fosdick Lake?

As you can see below, the Fosdick Fountain spouts from a black ring that is above the Fosdick Lake surface.

The above black ring, which is now spouting water, has not been visible during all the times I have walked around Fosdick Lake, in all my previous walkarounds.

Does anyone have an explanation? Fountains do not just sit dormant for years and then spout to life. They are mechanical devices that require maintenance.

There were a lot of Fosdickers walking around Fosdick Lake today, many of them taking pictures of the mysterious fountain. All I spoke to were as perplexed as I regarding the sudden Fosdick Lake fountain appearance.

I was pleased that yesterday's rain caused me to opt out of my regularly scheduled Gateway Park Saturday visit. For all I know the mysterious Fosdick Fountain only makes an appearance once a decade and today I happened to be there to see it. I will not be shocked to see the Fosdick Fountain no longer spouting by the next time I walk around Fosdick Lake.

Since it is Saturday I did do my regular visit to Town Talk, even though Town Talk was more distant today than when I am at Gateway Park.

I got a lot of rabbit food in the form of lettuce and carrots today. Do rabbits eat tomatoes? I got tomatoes too. And extra sharp cheddar cheese. And bratwurst. And a case of Noosa brand mango yogurt.

That's it, MLK, for your weekly vicarious visit to Town Talk...

On This 3rd Friday Of October A Storm Is Brewing With Fort Worth Suing Chesapeake Energy

In the picture you are looking south, on the secure side of the dire looking security fence that protects me from intruders most of the time.

As you can see, this 3rd Friday of October has some storm potential at my location on the planet.

When I had my early morning swim early this morning the sky was mostly blue, with a few clouds zipping by, blowing in to town from the south.

Speaking of blowing in to town.

A few years ago Chesapeake Energy blew in to Fort Worth, full of hot air, spewing propaganda, making all sorts of deals, promising all sorts of riches to all sorts of people.

Well, the times have changed. Chesapeake Energy is currently being sued by various people and entities. Today I learned the City of Fort Worth has joined the suing Chesapeake Energy crowd. I learned about this when Elsie Hotpepper pointed me to an article in today's Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

The article makes no mention of the role the Star-Telegram has played over the years in acting like a cheerleader in support of all the holes being poked into Fort Worth and all the fracking that went into those holes.

Walking With My Sister & The Village Creek Indian Ghosts While A Bearded Lady Lost Someone

I got gas on my way to walk with the Indian ghosts who haunt Arlington's Village Creek Natural Historical Area, so I called my mom, like I usually do when I get gas.

The phone rang a dozen times til it got to my dad's rhyming message.

This was twice this week my mom and dad have not been home when I called. I figured my mom's recovery from knee surgery had progressed enough that getting out of the house was back being the daily norm.

So, I called my sister who lives a few miles from mom and dad and learned this morning the parental units were at a doctor's appointment.

I had myself a mighty fine walk with my sister, til my phone exploded in my ear due to the battery running out of juice. This seems to happen just about every time I talk to my sister.

In the picture above you are looking at the location I was at when my phone exploded. Sitting on a picnic table top.

After my phone exploded I exited this picnic table area to find myself being approached by a bearded lady with a phone to her ear, asking me if she could ask me something. I indicated she could ask me something, which had her asking me if I'd seen a woman with a shaved head, that they'd just arrived at the parking lot to go on a run, with the woman with the shaved head vanishing.

I told the bearded lady that I'd not seen anyone fitting the description, because I had not. I'd come across a cute older couple holding hands as they walked and a couple other people.

The incident with the bearded lady was very strange. There really is no way someone could quickly vanish at this location.

Wearing Long Pants To Walk Across Fosdick Falls Feeling The Earth Move

Earlier today I heard on the radio that an earthquake shook the ground south of Dallas in the past 24 hours.

When I exited my motorized transport today at Oakland Lake Park I thought I felt the earth move.

I am almost 100% certain that the movement I thought I felt was not an earthquake.

I am also almost 100% certain that the movement I thought I felt was not caused by the water falling over Fosdick Falls.

As you can see, above, it does not appear that there is enough water falling over Fosdick Falls to cause any earth tremors.

Despite the imaginary shaky ground I had myself a mighty fine walk around Fosdick Lake. The temperature was barely in the 50s. I was in long pants.

Wearing long pants makes me feel so grownup....

Starting To Feel SAD Looking Out My Window In Texas

Looking out my computer room window, this morning, the view is a bit foggy due to the extreme temperature differential between the outer world, which is chilled to 54 degrees, and my inner world, which is significantly warmer.

Looking out the window you can see the turquoise of the pool through the fog.

I had myself another swimming in the rain experience this morning.

Two mornings in a row of swimming in the rain has me ready for the return of blue sky.

A few more days of this Pacific Northwest stereotypical winter type gray, drippy weather and I'll start getting SAD, as in Seasonally Affected Disorder.

Speaking of the Pacific Northwest. Yesterday, or the day before, Spencer Jack's grandma sent me a couple photos from the top of a location called Big Rock. Big Rock is located about 2 miles east of where my abode was located in Mount Vernon, Washington.

The little town of Mount Vernon has two rather simply named protuberances. Big Rock and Little Mountain. Little Mountain is taller than Big Rock, as in Little Mountain is tall enough that there is a hang glider launch at the top of Little Mountain.

I have no idea where the nearest hang glider launch is at my current location. Colorado?

Compared to my current location Mount Vernon is way hillier. I did not have to drive anywhere to get in some hill hiking when I lived in Mount Vernon. All I had to do was walk out my front door.

I blogged about Big Rock on my Washington blog in a blogging titled The Skagit Valley's Big Rock With Spencer Jack's Grandma Cindy & The Nookachamp Star Child Falling From The Sky.

I wonder why I never got SAD when I lived in Washington......

Rare Texas Raindrops Dropping On My Windshield On Mount Tandy

Those are rare Texas raindrops you are looking at in the picture.

Those rare Texas raindrops were dropping on my windshield.

The location of those rare Texas raindrops dropping on my windshield is on top of Mount Tandy, looking west at the stunning skyline of beautiful downtown Fort Worth, currently with a very dark cloud hanging over it.

By black cloud I am not being metaphorical, referring to something like the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle, by black cloud I am being literal,  referring to the black cloud you see in the picture, hovering over downtown Fort Worth.

My intention when I left  my abode was to go walk around Fosdick Lake in Oakland Lake Park, with my mom. But, as I headed west the weather became increasingly dire, so I drove to the nearby summit of Mount Tandy for a stormy wet photo op.

I did not feel like bumbershooting around Fosdick Lake, with one hand on the umbrella and one on my phone, because I don't think I am coordinated to do such a thing.

So, I called my mom on my retreat back to my dry abode. No answer.

The incoming storm has dropped the temperature into the mid 60s.  The temperature was in the mid 70s when I had myself a mighty fine swim this morning. The forecasters are currently forecasting that we are heading to lows in the 40s in the coming days.

I miss Global  Warming....