Mother's Day Walking The Rails Around Fort Worth's Fosdick Lake With My Mom, My Sister, Miss Puerto Rico & Elsie Hotpepper

Even though I'd been there the day before, I decided to take my Mother's Day walk today with the turtles who call Fosdick Lake home in Fort Worth's Oakland Lake Park.

One of the mysteries of this particular Fort Worth park, in addition to the mysterious lack of modern facilities of the restroom and running water and in addition to the mysterious sudden appearance, months ago, of a fountain in the middle of Fosdick Lake and in addition to the mystery of why there is no Oakland Lake in Oakland Lake Park there is the mystery of what the purpose is of the railings you see in the picture above.

There is no drop off on either side of the railings, warranting that type protection. The railings exist only at the northwest corner of the paved trails around Fosdick Lake. What possible purpose do these railings serve?

Changing the subject from mysterious railings back to Mother's Day.

I text messaged my only sister who has given birth, to wish her a Happy Mother's Day and ask if she was in Washington or Arizona. She texted back a photo indicating she was in Tacoma. Which is in Washington. A followup text message said she was on her way to Pike Place Market in Seattle.

Pike Place is a very popular public market modeled after Fort Worth's world famous Santa Fe Rail Market.

Clearly I am seeing if I can muster Fort Worth Star-Telegram type ridiculous puffery with the above sentence of misinformation.

I text messaged my mom with a Happy Mother's Day message, adding that I'd call via the voice message method later.

Whilst walking around Fosdick Lake, multiple times I had to sit down to read a  message and then fumble a reply. Elsie Hotpepper's message had something to do with running. After I texted Elsie back asking what she was running from I called my mom.

Mom answered on the 4th ring. Usually mom answers before I hear a ring. Today when I called a distraction had arrived in the form of my little brother and my favorite sister-in-law and her youngest daughter, delivering Mother's Day Brunch to my mom.

I hope everyone is having as happy a Happy Mother's Day as I am....

Happy Mother's Day To All The Mothers Especially My Mom

On the left you are looking at my mom holding her first born baby, me, in the town I was born in, Eugene, Oregon.

Happy Mother's Day to mom, and all the other moms who have mothered me during my years of being mothered.

Looking through my collection of photos I found some pictures of some of my favorite moms, moms like my sister, Jackie, my Aunt Arlene, my Great Grandma Tillie and Grandma Sylvia, but I could not find a picture of my Grandma Vera, my mom's mom.

I know I have pictures of Grandma Vera, but my photo organization method is very haphazard, making locating a specific photo a bit of a time consuming treasure hunt.

Below you are looking at my Great-Grandma Tillie.

On the left that would be me, then my little brother, Jake, and on the far right, that would be my big sister, Clancy. This photo is one of the rare documented occurrences where Clancy is wearing a dress. I found two other photos of Clancy wearing a dress which we will come to later in this Mother's Day blogging.

Great Grandma Tillie and my Great Grandpa John came to America, from Holland, in the l880s. I do not know if they were illegal immigrants. I do know that they moved to various locations in America, never quite liking their location. Then they got word of a location in a place called Washington, near the Canadian border, a place where a lot of Dutch immigrants ended up, with land much like Holland. And so my Great Grandpa John was sent out west to check out this place. He returned with tales of tall trees, ample fertile land, apple trees and berries growing wild. And so the family headed west, yet again, to farm near the Dutch town of Lynden, where my dad's dad, my Grandpa Cornelius, was born in 1902 and  where my Grandpa married my Grandma Sylvia in 1927, which eventually resulted in my dad being born in 1930, and where my mom was born a couple years later, with my mom and dad getting married a couple decades after that.

Enough of the history lesson, back to the Mothers.

No, that is not one of the Clancy-in-a-dress photos below.

That is one of my favorite mom's, my dad's big sister, my Aunt Arlene, sitting next to my dad. My mom has her back to the camera in the next photo.

That would be me on the far left, with my dad standing on the far right. The aforementioned Grandma Sylvia is sitting next to my dad, with my little brother, Jake, next to Grandma.

Two mothers are in the next photo, my grandma and my mom. This photo is sort of a sad one. I'll tell you why.

That is my dad drinking coffee on the right, sitting across from his three brothers. Of my dad's three brothers only one is still living. My Uncle Mooch, on the far left, is currently living in Omaha, Nebraska. Grandma Sylvia is sitting between Uncle Ivan on the left and Uncle Mel on the right, all three no longer with us on this mortal coil.

One more picture of my favorite Mother, my mom, and then we will conclude with a series of pictures of my other favorite mom, my little sister Jackie.

My dad was in the Army when mom and dad decided it was a good day to get married on the 6th Anniversary of the dropping of the Atom Bomb on Hiroshima. Soon after getting married my dad was shipped overseas, to France.

My little sister Jackie, mother of my nephews Christopher and Jeremy, probably does not know it, but it was by being a fun big brother to my new little baby sister that I honed the skills that later had me being such a good uncle to my four nephews.

Above you are looking at me and my siblings on a summer day getting our picture taken whilst standing on the front yard of the house we grew up in in Burlington, Washington. I am holding my new little sister, Jackie, next to me is Clancy, in the first known instance of a photo taken of Clancy in her basic lifelong uniform. Next to Clancy is Jason and Joey's dad and Spencer Jack's grandpa, my little brother Jake.

Baseball was indoctrinated into my siblings at a young age, as you can see below, with Jackie in her first baseball uniform.

I rebelled against the baseball indoctrination. My limited faculties did not allow me to understand what was so fun about swatting at a ball with a stick, catching a ball after being hit by the stick, or throwing the ball after catching the ball after it got hit with a stick.

And now the aforementioned rare additional photos documenting my sister Clancy wearing a dress.

I have absolutely no recollection of being all dapper in a suit and tie at such a young age, but apparently this did happen, because photos did not lie back in the days before photoshopping. That would be me on the left, holding my little sister Jackie's hand, then Clancy being all prettied up in a dress, while it appears my little brother, Jake, forgot his tie. Or is that a bow tie I see below his chin?

Above we have Clancy being all pretty in pink, with me standing next to Clancy, while Jackie appears to be holding either a doll or her kitty Pebbles, while brother Jake stands at military attention.

Below can you guess where my dad, me and Jackie are sitting?

If you guessed San Juan Capistrano, in California, you would have guessed correctly. I would have been either 13 or 14 at the time this picture was taken, which would have made Jackie 6 or 7.

Well, that about ends my Mother's Day look at the past of some of my favorite mothers.

Also among my favorite mothers is Spencer Jack's grandma, Cindy, she being my very favorite ex-sister-in-law. Wee Cheng, my favorite mother in all of Singapore. Also, my favorite mother in all of West Texas, the Queen of Wink. Plus the Reigning Queen of Tonasket, Alice O Della.

I am likely forgetting a mother or two, but you know who you are....

UPDATE: I found another rare photo documentation of sister Clancy in a dress.

That would be Clancy on the right, with me on the left, and little brother, Jake, holding little sister Jackie's hand in the middle. Is that the 1955 Plymouth that was the family car way back then, behind us? One of my all time scariest car danger memories involve that car.

We were on our way to Ocean Shores on the Washington Pacific Coast. Back then there was no freeway type road from Olympia heading west. It was a two lane curvy, hilly road. Our assigned seats whilst traveling were static, never changing, til years later when we got a station wagon. My seat was the right side window, Clancy in the middle, brother Jake on the left.

On a tight turn suddenly my door popped open. This was before seat belts were a mandatory thing. The door opened and pulled me with it. I held on for dear life, literally, while dad quickly braked to a stop. The latch had somehow failed, rendering the door impossible to keep shut. Dad rigged some temporary solution and we were on our way.

This happened before things like recalls had been invented. I don't think suing a car company for a dangerous design flaw had yet been invented either.

I do remember that soon after this incident my mom and dad had seatbelts installed. I think from Sears, if my memory is serving me correctly....

Thursday's Rain Has Created New Islands In Fort Worth's Fosdick Lake

Due to Thursday's drenching downpours I assumed my regular Saturday pre-Town Talk endorphin inducing destinations would not be doable today due to excessive muddiness.

With the Tandy Hills and the Gateway Park mountain bike trails likely still damp my two pre-Town Talk options become either Quanah Parker Park or Oakland Lake Park.

I opted to pick Oakland Lake Park for a pleasant walk around Fosdick Lake, which, as you can see, has had some extra water added, turning the tree you see in the picture into an island.

We have odd criteria here in Fort Worth as to what constitutes an island.

After one lap around the lake I headed  to Town Talk, hoping it was not an overpopulated zoo like it was last Saturday.

Crossing the Beach Street bridge over the Trinity I could tell the river had reached an elevated level from Thursday's rain, due to the fact that the cement structure, which serves double duty as a paved trail river crossing and a river impediment, had driftwood piled atop the entire length of the dam bridge.

When Town Talk came into view I could tell I was not in for a repeat of last week's crowd, because I could see open spaces in the parking lot.

The only new and different thing I got at Town Talk today was a 3.5 pound bag of kale. What am I going to do with all that kale? I can't feed it to my rabbit because I don't have a rabbit.

An Old Man On A Motorbike Riding With The Village Creek Indian Ghosts & Their Paintbrush

I am almost 100% certain that is a field of what are known as Indian Paintbrush wildflowers you are looking at here.

It is appropriate that a wildflower named Indian Paintbrush would dominate the landscape at this location, since they are doing their blooming in Arlington's Village Creek Natural Historical Area, where Indian Ghosts haunt due to what historically took place in this particular Historical Area.

I did not drive to Arlington thinking I was going to be able to do some Ghost walking. I figured Village Creek went into flash flood mode from yesterday's deluge, resulting in the closing of the Natural Historical Area.

Instead of flash flooding, Village Creek did not even rise high enough to flow over the dam bridge which impedes its flow.

I was in the Village Creek zone due to needing to go to ALDI to stock up on supplies. ALDI is in Fort Worth, a short distance from Village Creek, in Arlington.

The oddest thing that happened today, whilst  I was doing my nature communing, was in the distance I heard a motorized thump thump, that was not a natural sound of the sort I am used to hearing at this location.

Soon a motorbike came into view in the distance. Even from a distance I was fairly certain it was not a motorcycle cop. With motorized vehicles of any sort banned from rolling on these paved trails I wondered what sort of notorious scofflaw I was facing.

By the time the motorbike was about 100 feet distant, putting along slower  than I pedal my bike, I could  see it was an old man being a Hell's Angel. By the time we met on the trail  I could tell this was a really old man. We did a mutual howdy upon meeting. He had a very happy smile on his face.

I thought to myself, if I ever get to be a really old man I am going to have myself a mighty fine time doing fun scofflaw stuff....

Is Seattle's Big Bertha Boondoggle Bigger Than Fort Worth's Panther Island Boondoggle?

This morning the Star-Telegram provoked me to blog about Fort Worth's most infamous boondoggle, that being the boondoggle formerly known as the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle, now re-branded as the Panther Island Boondoggle.

Last night I was online, reading that extremely reputable news source known as FOX News, to see that Seattle's current tunnel boring problem has now become a national story with the enviable term "Boondoggle" attached to it.

That had me wondering how long it will be til, if ever, Fort Worth's notorious Trinity River Vision/Panther Island Boondoggle gets on the national radar screen. This may be one of those times when it is a good thing to be a bit of a backwater that the rest of America pays little attention to, thus avoiding laughing stock status, which Seattle appears to be on the verge of enjoying.

FOX News compared the Seattle tunnel woes to Boston's notorious Big Dig Boondoggle, as you can see via the story's headline of "BIG DIG CAUSING BIG  PROBLEMS FOR SEATTLE TAXPAYERS."

Regarding Bertha becoming a Boondoggle, this is what FOX News had to say...

The tunneling machine is the key workhorse in a $3.1 billion tunnel project aimed at replacing the Alaska Way Viaduct, a double-decker elevated highway that was damaged in the 2001 Nisqually earthquake. Bertha's meltdown, though, has put the project in jeopardy of being the West Coast version of the biggest public works boondoggle in U.S. history, Boston's "big dig" -- which cost taxpayers $14.6 billion, nearly four times the original price tag. 

Big difference between this Seattle $3.1 billion project and Fort Worth's less than $1 billion project, Seattle's project is funded, funded with a project completion timeline, now thrown asunder by a stuck tunnel boring machine nicknamed Bertha. This entire HUGE project is, or was, scheduled to be completed well before Fort Worth's Trinity River Vision/Panther Island Boondoggle's three bridges over an imaginary bypass channel are completed.

In case you are wondering, and I am sure you were, Bertha is named after Bertha Knight Landes, she being the first female mayor of a major American city, serving as Seattle's mayor from 1926 til 1928, followed by years of social activism.

In the Wikipedia article about Bertha, in the Legacy section we learn "Today, the largest meeting room at Seattle City Hall is named in her honor. The tunnel boring machine used to construct the Alaskan Way Viaduct replacement tunnel under downtown Seattle was nicknamed "Bertha" after her."

So, the biggest meeting room in Seattle City Hall and the world's biggest tunnel boring machine is named after Bertha.

Even with Seattle's current Bertha woes I am fairly certain vehicles will be traveling through a new transit tunnel under downtown Seattle years before anyone will be finding anything worth seeing in the Trinity River Vision/Panther Island Boondoggle....

Trinity River Vision Boondoggle Authority Votes To Re-Brand Boondoggle As Panther Island Boondoggle

On this morning of May 9, in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, there is a classic example of the Chamber of Commerce type propaganda puffery which has so diminished the Star-Telegram's status as a real newspaper in the eyes of its ever diminishing number of readers.

The propaganda to which I refer you see, in part, on the left, titled Panther Island: Fort Worth project honors city's past.

Let us go through this propaganda piece by piece...

On Wednesday, the Trinity River Vision Authority board voted to change the name of the $910 million Trinity Uptown project to Panther Island.

Many in the community wanted to see the 800-acre project on the near north side renamed to honor the city’s past, said Matt Oliver, a spokesman for the authority.

In a Star-Telegram poll, 63 percent of the readers said they favored the name change. There is already a popular attraction in the area called the Panther Island Pavilion where outdoor concerts and other events are held to allow residents to get more comfortable with coming back to the river.

Many in the community wanted to see the project renamed to honor the city's past?  Really?

And the Star-Telegram knows this how?

Oh, they took a Star-Telegram poll. Was that Gallup the Star-Telegram commissioned to conduct this poll? Or was it an in-house job? 63 percent of the readers said they favored the name change? Really? How many "readers" were polled? How was the supposed poll question framed? Something like "Do you favor changing the name of the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle to the Panther Island Boondoggle??

And then there is this....

TRVA Executive Director J.D. Granger agreed that the public likes the Panther Island name.

“I have asked for input from the community, and the name Panther Island really resonates with them,” he said.

J.D. Granger agreed that the public likes the Panther Island name? And he  knows this how? Oh, he asked for input from the community on this serious subject and learned the name Panther Island really resonates. Did J.D. ask you for your input on this serious issue? Who in the community is it that was giving J.D. this input?

And then there is this gem....

Perhaps a more obvious question about the new Trinity Uptown name is, where’s the island?

There actually will be an island after the Trinity River is redirected to form a northern border for the property and an urban lake is created to form a southern border near the Tarrant County Courthouse edge of downtown.

Now, I have asked this same question ever since the ridiculous Panther Island nomenclature got foisted on the public, before the public knew the name really resonated with them.

At the present time the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle is supposedly about to begin construction on three very ordinary bridges, which the TRVB touts as being signature bridges, with those bridges being built over dry land, with that dry land someday becoming a flood bypass channel, which is currently an imaginary flood bypass channel, an unfunded, un-engineered, imaginary flood bypass channel.

Only if the imaginary unfunded flood bypass channel is built will the area which used to be known as Trinity Uptown actually be an island, well, sort of an island?

Why is any energy being put into all this Panther Island nonsense? How much public money has been spent on the changed signage so far?

Speaking of money. In the screencap above, of this Star-Telegram propaganda, on the upper right you see Kay Bailey Hutchinson and Mike Moncrief in front of an artist's rendering of the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle, I mean Panther Island Boondoggle. Below that photo is a link to an article titled "Trinity Uptown supporters have faith  that funding will come."

Really? So, this public works project the public has never been allowed to vote on is now a faith based initiative...........

Another Stormy May Day In Texas Dodging Raindrops & Roadside Telephone Poles

My Windshield Wiper Slapping Time Today to the Music on the Radio

Well, today's predicted rain arrived as per the prediction, with some large drops dripping as early as my regularly scheduled early morning swim, this 2nd Thursday of May.

I have yet to hear any thunder rolls. Thunderstorms are also on the menu for today.

Today marks the third instance of the infamous Galtex Portugal Weather Jinx.

In the photo you are riding with me to Walmart, looking east towards Dallas, as we drive on John T. White Road.

If you are currently in a more developed part of America, looking at the above photo, do you notice anything you don't see in your part of the world?

Does it strike you, like it strikes me, that it is odd that telephone type poles are stuck in the ground so close to the edge of a road? Do you also notice there is no sidewalk?

What you are looking at is a short distance from John T. White Elementary School, that being a new school built since the Great Recession, a new school with no sidewalks leading to it for the grade schoolers to walk safely on.

Does your part of the world still have overhead wiring strewn on poles? From whence I came such wiring was underground. This made for very few power outages, unlike my current location, where power outages are a frequent occurrence.

Right now raining has abated, no wind is blowing.  Is this the calm before another storm? I don't know. I do know none of my weather monitoring devices are currently in weather drama mode.....

On The Tandy Hills Today With The Galtex Portugal Weather Jinx Dripping On Me & The Tandy Orchids

Yesterday I learned that Mr. and Mrs. Galtex were flying out of Texas this morning, heading to Portugal for the 3rd time this year.

Every time the Galtex's go to Portugal the weather in North Texas does a bad thing.

The last two times this bad thing meant really bad ice storms. I am hoping we are far enough away from winter that an ice storm is not currently possible.

However.

Unpredicted HUGE raindrops pelted me today whilst I was doing some high speed hiking on the Tandy Hills.

The rain was not scheduled to arrive til much later, as in, tomorrow.

Which seems to indicate to me that the Galtex Portugal Weather Jinx remains in play.

Despite the unexpected drippage I had myself a mighty fine time hiking today.

Currently the Tandy Hills are alive with color, including the pinkish, orchid-like bloom you see above, blooming all over the Tandy Hills.

There was one sad note on the Tandy Hills today, which you see photo documented below.

With that sad note being that for the umpteenth time the Tandy Hills Hoodoo at Hoodoo Central has collapsed into a pile of Hoodoo rubble.

Even though the Hoodoo is not towering in its usual lofty splendor, it still presents an impressive rocky monolithic presence.

I suspect by the time of my next visit to the Tandy Hills the Tandy Hills Hoodoo will once again be resurrected.

Today I Had Some Near Gateway Park Misses Before Learning About The 4th Annual Fort Worth Fat Tire Festival Sunday June 8

Today, after I rolled my wheels for miles on Gateway Park's mountain bike trails, I stopped at the Information Sign at the trailhead because I had detected it had changed when I rolled past it on my way to the trailhead.

One of the new bits of information on the Information Sign informed me as to what happened between last Tuesday and last Sunday which had so greatly improved the mountain bike trails.

As in, Saturday there was a Gateway Park Trail Workday, with the trailblazers back in business, due, I assume, to once again getting insured.

I wonder if I aim my phone at that QR phone code on the photo I took of the announcement on the Information Sign, if it will work. I shall try that right now and let you know....

No, that did not work.

Despite the directional signage which, apparently, last Saturday was added to the Gateway Park mountain bike trails I still had myself two near head-on collisions today

Above my handlebars are pointing to one of the aforementioned direction sign posts. This location was no where near where I had two near misses today. The first near miss came soon after I entered the trail  at the trailhead. There really is no excuse for going the wrong direction at that location.

The second near miss came at a section of the trail that has several  points where you confront the possibility of going over a cliff into the Trinity River. This cliff related near miss was three guys coming at me. It really is not their fault they were going the wrong direction. Fresh piles of brush were blocking the trail at the point where they would have started going the wrong direction.

In addition to learning about the Trail Workday I missed last Saturday, on the Information Sign I learned about the upcoming Fort Worth Fat Tire Festival.

Sunday, June 8, 9AM til 3PM the 4th Annual Fort Worth Fat Tire Festival takes place in Gateway Park, with bikes, music, food and singletrack.

Might I add, the word "singletrack" usually means those aforementioned bikes go in one single direction on the singletrack....

Last Saturday Thousands Marched In Fort Worth Advocating Legalizing Marijuana

On Saturday Elsie Hotpepper text messaged me telling me I needed to go to a specific Facebook page to view an incredible video of something I did not think ever happened in Fort Worth, Texas.

I always do what I'm told.

And so after doing a Facebook friend request, which was pretty much immediately confirmed, I watched the long version of the video you see below, a screencap of which you see in the photo.

I had no idea this protest was taking place on Saturday, in Fort Worth, and other towns in Texas, let alone that it was a protest in support of the Legalization of Marijuana, also known as the Decriminalization of Cannabis.

The Dallas/Fort Worth protest marches, as I understand it, were organized by an organizational sparkplug named Shaun McAlister, who is the Executive Director of DFW NORML.

If I remember right NORML stands for National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Law.

Of all the things I can think of that might get Texans worked up enough to attend a protest march for I would not have guessed Legalizing Marijuana would have been a big draw. But it was.

I would hazard to guess that Saturday's protest march in Fort Worth was the biggest such event ever to take place in this town.

And yet no mention of the march, that I have seen, in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

The video below, which shows a small part of Saturday's Fort Worth NORML Protest March, was shot by John Spivey, who emailed it to me this evening from New York City, in yet one more example of the amazing wonders of communication in our modern world...