Saturday Hiking In Tandy Hills Bastard Cabbage With Indian Princesses, Fashion Models And A Baby

On this final Saturday of October I was back on the Tandy Hills walking in a field of what Fort Worth's renowned horticulturist, CatsPaw, has identified as Bastard Cabbage.

CatsPaw did not tell me if Bastard Cabbage was suitable for Cole Slaw, so  rather than be experimental I got a couple heads of regular cabbage at my regular Saturday Town Talk Treasure Hunt.

There were more than the norm number of people enjoying the pleasant late October weather, pre the predicted incoming thunderstorm.

The first group I came upon was a mom and dad with two kids, one a baby, being photographed by two photographers who looked like fashion models in hot pants.

Then I came up a pair who looked to be of Indian descent, as in Native American, in what sort of looked like a modern take on native garb, looking like a pair of Indian Princesses.

And then there was a guy who said he was lost. I came upon him in the grove where the Tandy Bamboo Tepee used to stand. The guy asked me if I had a map of the trails. I asked him if he'd seen the trail markers. He had. I told him he was at the heart of the hills and pointed him on the right way back to civilization.

I am very much enjoying being back doing a lot of hill hiking. I've not gotten around to fixing my bike's flat,  so mountain biking at Gateway Park is currently not doable.

For the past couple months I have been on the Elsie Hotpepper Extreme Diet & Fitness Routine. I did not realize the extent to which Elsie Hotpepper regimen had altered me til I discovered I can stride up the Tandy Hills much faster than before I subjected myself to the Elsie Hotpepper Extreme Diet & Fitness Routine.

Going swimming in the morning is not part of the Elsie Hotpepper regimen, but I do so anyway, creature of habit that I be. This morning's swimming went well. The temperature average of the past 24 hours has been well over 50 degrees, which renders the pool about the same temperature as a Western Washington lake in Summer.

Speaking of Western Washington, I almost forgot to add my Saturday Town Talk details for Fort Worth native, MLK, currently suffering an extended exile in Western Washington.

Today, at Town Talk, in addition to the aforementioned cabbage, I got myself my usual rabbit feed in the form of various types of lettuce, plus carrots. I also got a big chunk of jalapeno jack cheese, chorizo, chicken fried steak, big flour tortillas, a case  of Noosa mango yogurt and other stuff I am not remembering right now.

Running A Stop Sign In Richland Hills Texas Will Get You Strip Searched & Jailed

Richland Hills is a town in Texas whose southern boundary is a short distance from my location in East Fort Worth.

Richland Hills is a dry town, while Fort Worth is soaking wet.

Which is the reason why a short distance from my abode there are several liquor stores selling liquids to people from Richland Hills.

This morning I learned something about Richland Hills that totally disgusted me.

Remember how back during the days of the Evil Empire, known as the Soviet Union, we'd hear horror stories about the KGB knocking on someone's door and hauling innocents off to the Gulag? How America would shout about the need for freedom, for liberty, for human rights, for all people?

In Richland Hills, this past August, a woman named Sarah Boaz was ticketed for not stopping at a Richland Hills stop sign. Sarah Boaz did not take care of this ticket in the accelerated timely fashion required in Richland Hills.

Wednesday morning Sarah Boaz was leaving her home to drive to her job when she was met by the Richland Hills City Marshal with a bench warrant for her arrest.

The Richland Hills City Marshal then handcuffed Sarah Boaz and stuck her in the back of his police cruiser to be hauled off to the Richland Hills Gulag, I mean, jail, where Sarah Boaz was ordered, by a female officer, to remove all her clothes, to stand against a wall and to not make any moves that might be interpreted as being aggressive.

So, this is what life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness has come to in some parts of America?

Handcuffed and strip searched because you did not stop at a stop sign and did not make the extortion payment in due time?

A bench warrant?

Doesn't that mean a judge had to sign off on this arrest?

So, how many people with ZERO common sense do we have in positions of authority in Richland Hills, other than the 3 we already know about, but whose names we do not yet know, those being the arresting marshal, the police officer doing the strip search and the judge issuing the arrest warrant?

Could not a case be made, you know, by a lawyer, that Sarah Boaz was the victim of a crime? Strip searched? Handcuffed? For a 60 day old traffic ticket?

Would it not be poetic justice for the judge, marshal and strip searching cop to have warrants issued for their arrests for their crimes against the person of Sarah Boaz,  with that trio handcuffed, hauled to jail and strip searched?

To read more about the Sarah Boaz Richland Hills abuse case go to the DFW CBS website and read their Woman Endures Strip Search & Jail Time For Overdue Ticket article and watch video of their coverage of this outrageous incident.

Hiking On The Tandy Hills Thinking About Rotating On Top Of Fort Worth's Panther Island Tower

That is the Tandy Tower, also known as the Fort Worth Space Needle, soaring hundreds of feet into a clear blue sky on this final Friday of October.

The Tandy Tower sits atop Mount Tandy, due east of the Tandy Hills Natural Area.

No, there is no rotating restaurant atop the Tandy Tower. For that you'll need to drive about 30 miles east, to Dallas, and take an elevator to the top of Reunion Tower.

I have been at the base of Reunion Tower a time or two but never felt an urge to ride to the top. The only other tower of that type I have been to the top of is Seattle's Space Needle.

The elevator ride to the top of the Space Needle is fun. But, I've always thought it did not seem all that high up, at the observation deck level, with all that much better a view than other elevated locations in the Seattle zone.

The observation level of the Seattle Space Needle has an outside walkway which goes all around the Needle. I don't know if there is an outdoor observation area at the top of Reunion Tower.

I wonder, what with its tendency to copy what has been done elsewhere, why the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle has not added a tall tower to that clouded vision?

It could be called Panther Island Tower.

Tim Love could have a rotating restaurant at the top, giving diners a moving 360 degree view of the wonder that is Panther Island, along with the stunning skyline of beautiful downtown Fort Worth, and the un-needed flood diversion channel and signature bridges which cross it, along with equally stunning views of the Trinity River and the throngs of people who have inner tubing happy hours in that river during the hot days of Summer.

A tall tower could give Fort Worth that iconic type image it currently lacks, that when people see a photo of it, they know it is Fort Worth.

I am sure, now that I have suggested it, J.D. Granger will get right on this Panther Island Tower idea.....

Today I Walked With The Village Creek Indian Ghosts & Learned The Bastard Cabbage Hangs Out With The Maximillian Sunflower

In the picture you are looking at a pair of trees in Arlington's Village Creek Natural Historical Area. The last time I was at this location that orange and white traffic cone was sitting where it was still sitting today.

Today a red and white mark has shown up on the tree on the right. This particular tree appears to be dead and is leaning on its friend to the left. I suspect the traffic cone and the red bulls eye have something to do with this dead tree being slated for extraction.

Today's walk with the Village Creek Indian ghosts was rather sedate. I had myself a bout of insomnia last night, waking up before 4 am, hence the feeling sedated.

I was in the pool this morning before the sun arrived to begin its daily lighting duty. It has been a long time since I've had myself a pre-dawn swim.

Yesterday the outer world at my location got itself heated into the 80s, with the low this morning being 56. This made for a pleasant swim this morning without the need for a retreat to the hot tub.

When I got back to my abode and woke up my computer I saw that renowned Fort Worth horticulturist, CatsPaw, had identified some Tandy Hills wildflowers that I made mention of a couple days ago in a blogging titled An October Hike In The Colorfully Lush Tandy Hills Jungle in which I wrote...

"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".

Part of CatsPaw's memorable comments, as to the identity of the wildflowers in question....

The annual Bastard Cabbage often hangs out with the Maximilian Sunflower. Which may raise the question - "Who's your daddy?" 

CatsPaw is a good detective, in addition to being a renowned horticulturist. I've not had the pleasure of CatsPaw's company since she and I visited the Paradise Center.  I wish CatsPaw would use her renowned detective skills to find out what has happened with the Paradise Center.

Boring Bertha Got Me Wondering Again About The Trinity River Vision Boondoggle's Project Schedule Timeline

This morning whilst perusing various news websites I came upon two articles which eventually had me thinking about the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle.

In today's Seattle Post-Intelligencer there is an article titled Seattle Tunneling Machine Digs Out Of Launch Pit.

The tunneling machine has been nicknamed Bertha, after a long ago Seattle mayor. Why? I do not know. Bertha the Mayor was way before my time on the planet. Did Bertha the Mayor like to dig?

In part the article in the P-I said.....

"Bertha," the massive tunnel boring machine, is expected to spend the next 14 months drilling a two-mile tunnel to replace the 60-year-old Alaskan Way Viaduct. The world's largest tunnel boring machine is creating a tunnel nearly 58 feet in diameter as part of the $3.1 billion project to replace the Alaskan Way Viaduct, the double deck highway along the downtown Seattle waterfront.

Reading that it is going to take Bertha 14 months to bore this tunnel had me wondering what the timeline schedule is for the entire project. More on that further  down.

The other article that had me thinking about the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle was in my old hometown of Mount Vernon's online news source called Go Skagit. In part the Go Skagit article said....

MOUNT VERNON — The second phase of the downtown floodwall project, designed to revitalize Mount Vernon’s economy as well as provide better flood protection from the Skagit River, will move along this week with installation of conduit for the lighting system. The parking lot west of Main Street is still being graded, and contractors will pour sidewalk and curbing in the parking lot this week. Floodwall foundation construction will continue for the next few weeks. The project is on schedule to be done by September 2014.

So, Mount Vernon's Skagit River Vision is scheduled to be completed by next September, and is actually a needed flood control project which will result in revitalizing Mount Vernon's economy.

Back to Bertha.

Reading that Bertha had finally bored her way out of her launching pit had me wondering how long it will be before cars are using that new tunnel to get under Seattle. Googling brought me to the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) website where I saw that you can follow the progress of Bertha through multiple  stages til its completion.

At the WSDOT website I also found a Project Schedule section where I read the following and saw the project timeline you see below the text....

Schedule

The Alaskan Way Viaduct Replacement Program is led by WSDOT in partnership with the Federal Highway Administration, King County, the City of Seattle and the Port of Seattle. It includes more than 20 projects that will work together to reshape the SR 99 corridor.

Construction on the first project started in 2008, when crews stabilized four viaduct columns that settled following the 2001 Nisqually Earthquake. Since then, more than a dozen projects have been completed, with several more in progress or set to break ground soon. The below timeline includes major accomplishments along the road to viaduct replacement.

Since 2008 more than a dozen projects have been completed? With more in progress or ready to break ground? And from the above timeline I learn by late 2015 the new tunnel will be open for traffic.

The Trinity River Vision Boondoggle has been boondoggling for well over a decade. Has anyone seen any sort of timeline schedule of the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle of the sort you see above of the Alaskan Way Viaduct Replacement Project?

After well over a decade of the TRV Boondoggle what do we see? The Cowtown Wakepark, the Woodshed Smokehouse, The Coyote Drive-In, an incoming ice rink, happy hour inner tube floating at a venue preposterously called Panther Island Pavilion, a lot of destruction due to eminent domain abuse and no construction of the much needed flood control project that will save Fort Worth from the flood control levees that have done their job for over a half a century.

Boondoggle.

And why is there no project schedule timeline for the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle?

Supposedly 3 bridges to nowhere will soon be being constructed over the yet to be constructed, or funded, un-needed flood diversion channel.

Boondoggle.

Oh, I already said that. Never mind.....

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...