Did Fort Worth's Mayor Slide The City In An Itsy Betsy Bikini?

A few minutes ago an incoming blog comment from someone named Anonymous led me to soon seeing hundreds upon hundreds of photos of Saturday's Fort Worth Slide the City Panther Fest event which went all the way from disaster with medical emergencies to ending the day having broken a Guinness Book World Record, the nature of which I still have not been able to determine.

Looking at all the photos of so many people seeming to be having themselves a mighty fine time getting ready to slide, or sliding down the 2,000 foot long waterslide, I really did not know what to think.

Is the large throng willing to pay a hefty fee to do such a thing an indicator that there is a great lacking in amusing things to do in the Fort Worth zone?

The comment from Mr. or Ms. Anonymous....

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Saturday's Fort Worth City Slide Went From Disaster To Mysterious Guinness World Record Breaking Event":

Rare J.D. Granger sighting in photo #111. Betsy Price is in photo #173. These pics are from Slide-The-City. Fortunately Dennis Shingleton didn't show up and drop trou.

DFW.com Slide the City Slideshow

____________________________________________

I know I've been told why we should be grateful when Dennis Shingleton keeps his pants on, but I've forgotten the details.

As for Betsy Price being in photo #173, it turned out Betsy was in the photo previous to that one, #172.

As I neared the Betsy number in the slide show I had no small fear that I was about to be scarred for life by an image of Fort Worth's mayor in an Itsy Betsy Bikini.

Turns out I had nothing to be afraid of.

Did Betsy actually slide the slide? And who is the young man in purple, next to Betsy, to whom Betsy is directing her charismatic smile? Is Betsy Price married? I have no idea. Is she single and Fort Worth's version of Madonna? Dating young men a fraction of her age?

I also had some concern that when I got to the J.D. Granger photo I would be subjected to the sight of Kay Granger's baby boy in a speedo getting ready to slide.

Turns out, it appears J.D. Granger has kept intact his record of never getting the polluted Trinity River water on his sensitive skin. Not via the Slide the City thing, or getting in the water during one of those notorious Rockin' the River Happy Hour Inner Tube Floats in the Trinity River.

I have no idea what that is that Mr. Granger is holding. Is it the official document documenting that a Guinness World Record had been set? Is that guy in a suit, next to J.D., the Guinness representative?

It might be useful if DFW.com had some informational text to go along with its endless collection of pictures.

A Green Roll Around My Neighborhood With Leaf Blowers Disturbing The Peace

Today I decided it was sufficiently hot to roll my handlebars around my neighborhood golf course, the Woodhaven Country Club.

As you can see, the golf course is lushly green, benefit of the deluges of May which ended the multi-year Texas drought.

It does not look too big in the photo, but in the middle of the picture there is a big sprinkler irrigating the golf course which only last week had been thoroughly irrigated by Mother Nature.

Now that the drought is over is the TRWD's demented Lawn Whisperer campaign going to be put to rest? Have water restrictions been lifted?

Changing the subject from the Lawn Whisperer to the Lawn Noisemaker.

Right now I can hear landscapers using gas-powered leaf blowers to blow leaves and make an incredible amount of noise. Thrice whilst pedaling today I came upon landscapers making a racket with gas-powered  leaf blowers.

Air polluting, peace and quiet disturbing gas-powered leaf blowers have long been banned in more civilized parts of America. Just like wind chimes. Well, the wind chimes are not banned, but not to be used closer than 300 feet from a neighbor.

However, gas-powered leaf blowers, those have long been banned in most locations on the west coast.

I think they need to be banned in Texas.

A Noble Look At Probable Election Fraud In The Recent TRWD Board Election

Ever since a week or so ago I have been thinking about a blog comment made on the first blogging on the Mary Kelleher blog.


That comment was made by someone noble......

Noble made a comment on the post "Devastated!"

Here's some thoughts about taking on the TRWD:

--I believe most of you challenging the TRWD come from the conservative Tea Party wing of the Republican party. (Correct me if I am wrong, my apologies.) I think you can and should do a much better job of reaching out to liberals/progressives and minorities to join in the cause. I am a life-long leftist and am just as disgusted by TRWD as you are.

--Mail-in ballots are the Achilles heel of the voter ID controversy. I've often wondered why all those who insist that voters present photo IDs say nothing at all about absentee ballots -- the barriers to voting that have been put in place have no effect whatsoever on mail-in ballots. 

--About the election itself. How does the percentage of mail-in ballots compare historically to other elections in Tarrant County? In Texas you can only vote absentee if you will be out of town, are over 65, or are sick or disabled. Can you track down some of the people who voted absentee to verify their status? Did the ballots come from certain precincts? If there really were 10,000 absentee ballots, you should be able to find out if there were some organized effort to get those voters to participate -- out of 10,000 people, someone will talk. Churches, community centers, shopping malls -- somebody got out there and met with large groups and gave them mail-in ballots. (Before the next election, you can reach out to those same groups and convince them why they should support change at TRWD.) And you don't have to 'prove' it in a court of law; if you can put together enough circumstantial evidence you will win in the court of public opinion.

I look forward to updates about fighting the Fort Worth Way on your blog. Good luck!

________________________________________

I don't know if being associated with the Tea Party in Tarrant County is the kiss of death it is in other locations in America, but that is not the part of the Noble comment that caught my attention.

It was what Noble had to say about absentee ballots which interested me.

In the May 9 TRWD Board Election Leonard and Lane each got over 17,000 votes. In the ;previous TRWD Board Election Mary Kelleher was elected with the most votes in TRWD Board Election history, getting something in the 9,000 vote zone.

How can the fact that there were around 10,000 absentee ballots not raise the red flag of likely Election Fraud?

10,000 voters over 65, disabled, or on vacation allegedly went through the bother of requesting an absentee ballot.

Over half the votes cast were absentee ballots.

The TRWD Board Directors, other than Mary Kelleher, and others in the TRWD hierarchy, like Jim Oliver, had a lot to lose if they lost control of the TRWD Board.

Contractors getting sweetheart, no bid contracts. The opening of the public records which the TRWD has now been stonewalling on for years. The likely firing of J.D. Granger followed by an investigation into America's Biggest Boondoggle. The firing of Jim Oliver, whose heavy handed behavior has been the source of a lot of controversy. The removal from TRWD operations of all beneficiaries of nepotism.

A lot of people had a lot to lose if they lost control of the TRWD.

When a low turnout election has something so out of whack as 10,000 absentee ballots, why does this not trigger some sort of automatic election fraud investigation?

The Wikipedia article about Electoral Fraud covers all the ways the TRWD  Board Election could have been stolen.

No one should be so naive as to believe such a thing could not happen in Tarrant County in Texas....

Record Breaking Phoenix Rain Has Spencer Jack's Dad Worried About Flash Flood Danger

What you are looking at here is a phone snapshot of a blurb in my old home zone newspaper, the Skagit Valley Herald.

So odd that Skagit County, population of around 130,000, a fraction of Tarrant County's population, has a real newspaper, while...well, I digress.

Spencer Jack's dad, my Favorite Nephew Jason, aka FNJ, emailed me the blurb, along with a message verbalizing concern regarding the safety of his grandparental units, aka my mom and dad.....

Hot and toasty today in the PNW. Currently 80 degrees in my A/C free home. Has anyone checked your parental units today? Today's  Skagit Valley Herald reports they had record rain yesterday. Would hate for them to be in danger of a flash flood.

Previous to FNJ sending this I'd already heard the news that the Phoenix zone had been hit with record breaking rain on June 5, with one one-hundredth of an inch saturating the desert. Upon hearing this I was not too concerned mom and dad were in any flash flood danger.

And, anyone currently in Texas reading what my FNJ had to say, isn't his weather humble bragging cute? Hot and toasty at 80. With no A/C. Yesterday I was using my A/C to bring the interior temperature down to 80, with the outer world being heated well into the 90s.

I suspect the first 100 degree day of the year will soon be upon us....

Saturday's Fort Worth City Slide Went From Disaster To Mysterious Guinness World Record Breaking Event

Well now, is this not a classic case of turning a lemon into lemonade?

Saturday morning the Slide the City Panther Fest event was deemed a disaster.

And then, later on that disastrous day, the Slide in the City of Fort Worth set a world record in the Guinness Book of Records.

That is a screen cap of this momentous news, from the Star-Telegram, which you see here.

I am unable to read the article explaining how the slipping and sliding in Fort Worth set a world record, due to me not being willing to pay the Star-Telegram their requested reading fee.

Was the record due to a world record number of people sliding on a water slide in an allotted period of time?

Was the record due to a world record amount of money being raised by such an event?

Was the record due to a world record distance slid?

Was the record due to a world record number of people willing to slide on water which came, un-treated, from a polluted river?

Those are my four guesses as to what sort of world record could have been set yesterday in Fort Worth via a long slip and slide....

Fort Worth Panther Fest Slide The City Fails While Boondoggle Patrons Faint From The Heat

What you are looking here is a screen cap from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram's online front page.

I checked the Star-Telegram after getting a text message telling me that the Panther Fest Slide the City operation had malfunctioned. But the beer and music part of the event would carry on.

Then a few minutes later I got an email telling me that Panther Fest is now a Multi-Injury Event, with MedStar deploying its AmBus multi-patient bus to North Main Street to assist with multiple people injured at Slide the City.

A few minutes later another email told me that the injuries are not water slide related, they are heat related. Multiple rehab units have now been deployed to help cool people down.

And just seconds ago another malfunction message, this one via a blog comment...

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "On The Tandy Hills Finding A Hoodoo Towering Above The Fort Worth Skyline": 

SNAFU at the Slide Fest / Pantherfest. Dud Kennedy's Twitter page has the story. 

Film at 11. Belay my last. Film at 10 or not. Probably not. Who knows. 

_____________________________________

I have no idea what "Belay my last." means.

So, this latest Trinity River Central City Panther Island Vision Boondoggle product is one more rousing success.

I don't know why it did not occur to anyone that something might go awry with some out of state alleged charity operation coming to town to quickly set up a 2,000 foot long water slide running down Fort Worth's Main Street over the Paddock Bridge.

I heard yesterday that the slides had sold out. If I remember right sliding cost something like 25 bucks.

Sold out? Would that be a thousand slide tickets sold? Ten thousand?

How do the victims of this latest product of America's Biggest  Boondoggle get a refund?

On The Tandy Hills Finding A Hoodoo Towering Above The Fort Worth Skyline

Currently, early in the afternoon, at my location on the planet, the outer world has been heated to 90 degrees.

The Tandy Hills were not that HOT when I did a little hill hiking in the noon time frame.

Just to the west of Tandy Hills Hoodoo Central, at the north end of the View Street trail, I came upon the Hoodoo you see here, towering above the stunning skyline of beautiful downtown Fort Worth.

There is a town in Utah called Mexican Hat, so named because of a nearby rock formation which looks like a sombrero. I don't know why the town was named Mexican Hat and not Mexican Sombrero.

Anyway, the top of today's Hoodoo looks like the Mexican Hat rock formation.

A much higher than the norm number of hill hikers were on the Tandy Hills today. I came upon seven different groups of sizes ranging from two to five. Most crowded I've ever seen the Tandy Hills other than Prairie Fest, Manly Man Wild Woman and Brush Bashing Days.

On the View Street Trail I came upon the act of vandalism you see below.

Why would some miscreant mark up one of the Tandy Hills trail signposts in this manner?

Today's hill hiking had me wondering how it is I manage this activity when the temperature gets into the 100 degree zone. I suppose the extremely high humidity made today's heat a bit more daunting.

After the hill hiking was done it was off to Town Talk for my regularly scheduled Saturday treasure hunting.

I got 10 pounds of Italian sausage. I got home to find the box did not fit in the freezer. I opened the sausage box to find links strung together. 56 links. It took awhile to get them unlinked and re-packaged. I also got several pounds of carrots, 5 pounds of Gorgonzola. I think I am getting addicted to Gorgonzola. Also got broccoli, tortillas, yogurt, black beans, garbanzos and a watermelon.

It is time for lunch now.

Shocked To Learn Mary Kelleher Is A Naive Democrat Not A Fascist Neanderthal

Last night someone I call Anonymous emailed me something I'll call bizarre.

Yesterday, on her blog, Mary Kelleher blogged Her Story.

Last night Mary Kelleher's Story was causing all sorts of discussion at various locations on Facebook, including something called 9/12 Project Fort Worth.

It was part of the 9/12 Project Fort Worth Mary Kelleher Story discussion that Anonymous sent me.

In that discussion we learn that someone naively believes to be untrue the fact that gas fracking has caused a water faucet or two to spout flammable water.

We also learn, from that same someone, the shocking news that Mary Kelleher is not a Fascist Neanderthal, but is actually a Democrat.

Calling someone a Democrat is a rather slanderous thing to do, labeling a person with the same party label as Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Jimmy Carter, Lyndon B. Johnson, John F. Kennedy, Harry Truman, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Grover Cleveland, Andrew Jackson, James Monroe, James Madison, Thomas Jefferson and others.

Now that Mary Kelleher has been exposed as a Democrat, how can she possibly run again? Shouldn't she just resign in shame?

This same someone who outed Mary Kelleher as  a card carrying Democrat, also pointed out that she is relatively delusional and extremely poorly informed.

How can someone be relatively delusional? Does delusional  come in degrees? Partly delusional? Completely delusional?

When I read someone write something like this, saying someone is delusional and poorly informed, I always figure that person saying such a thing has had those words directed at themselves many a time, particularly when the person is seeming delusional and ill informed at the same time the person is saying such about someone else.

I knew little about the 9/12 group, other than it is held at about the same level of regard as the Tea Party, by those who are not delusional and who are well informed.

Googling 9/12 I quickly learned that this is a Glenn Beck creation.

I know of Glenn Beck. The town from which I moved to Texas, Mount Vernon, Washington, was Glenn Beck's hometown til he moved a few miles north, to Bellingham, during his high school years. I did not know of Glenn Beck when we shared the same town.

However, years later, long after I had moved to Texas, after Glenn Beck had become controversial and a bit of a national embarrassment, I recollect a bit of a scandal erupting in Mount Vernon when the Republican Mayor of Mount Vernon wanted to give Glenn Beck the Key to the City, or some such thing. An uproar ensued. The offer was withdrawn.

After that, if my memory is serving me correctly, Bellingham then offered Glenn Beck some sort of honor. I don't remember if that resulted in another uproar.

Eventually Glenn Beck moved to where his type is more accepted.

Texas.

Westlake, Texas, to be precise, that being a D/FW Metroplex town on the west end of Lake Grapevine.

I have met Mary Kelleher, Mary Kelleher is a friend of mine. Mary Kelleher is not naive or ill informed.

And being a Democrat is a good thing for a public servant to be, in many people's opinion....

UPDATE: I neglected to mention that the 9/12 Fort Worth group has been very helpful to Mary Kelleher and her efforts to bring truth, justice and the American way to the Tarrant Regional Water District Board. The 9/12 Fort Worth group also awarded Mary Kelleher a Badge of Honor after she got censured by the corrupt TRWD Board.

Til Today I Did Not Know The Mary Kelleher Story Included A Dog Swallowing Sinkhole

The longest blogging post in blogging history may have been published today by Mary Kelleher in a blogging titled My Story.

I thought I knew the whole story as to why Mary Kelleher became a local activist taking on local corruption and The Fort Worth Way.

I thought wrong. I only knew a fraction of the full Mary Kelleher story.

I sure did not know a gas driller caused sinkhole had swallowed up Mary's pet doggy.

Some edited blurbs from My Story, which ends with another part of the Mary Kelleher story I did not know...

"In 2003, I purchased a 6 acre tract of land in Fort Worth, Texas.  The property had a couple of small barns, electricity, and water well.  It was the best tasting water ever."

And then the Chesapeake Energy scoundrels enter the story...

"I was a little apprehensive about the drilling next door but it really wasn’t that bad.  It was noisy and there were a lot of lights and trucks but at night, the drilling tower reminded me of the Eiffel Tower and I couldn’t wait for my gas royalty checks!"

And after the drillers moved into Mary's neighborhood what happened to that good tasting water?

"In 2007, my dream home was finally built.  I was so excited! The new refrigerator with water and ice dispenser was connected to my awesome water well. Soon, my house reeked of rotten eggs. The water tasted horrible.  The water foamed white when it first came out of the tap.  The water left a lingering slimy feel and a black, oily substance at the faucets. It still does.  I put a filter on the refrigerator.  It didn’t help.  I ended up disconnecting the water from the refrigerator.  I had no idea what could have happened to my water.  I couldn’t drink it anymore because of the taste and consistency but I still use it to cook, shower, wash clothes, etc."

Well, now, this bad water part of the Mary Kelleher Story, I had no clue about. No wonder after getting no help from any of the governmental entities one would thing would help with such things Mary found herself motivated to get on the Tarrant Regional  Water Board.

Fat lot of good that has done.

So far.

Mary Kelleher needs a couple more actual public servants to join her serving on the TRWD Board...

Something Illegal From Spencer Jack's Dad Showed Up In My Mailbox Today

I opened my mailbox a few minutes ago and found an envelope from Spencer Jack's dad, my Favorite Nephew Jason, also known as FNJ.

A few minutes later I opened the envelope and found that which you see here.

As you can read, FNJ had had himself some mighty fine Skagit strawberries and was wishing he could figure out a way to ship some to his FUD.

A couple days ago Spencer Jack and his dad successfully shipped FUD some FNJ2 (Favorite Nephew Joey) smoked salmon and dungeness crab.

I do not think strawberries would transit as well as smoked salmon. Especially when the temperature is nearing the 100 degree zone.

Back to today's incoming.

So, unable to mail his FUD some strawberries, FNJ decided to send me a different popular Northwest delicacy.

Special chocolates apparently available throughout Skagit County, year round.

Made in Seattle.

I looked at the little packet, read that it contained two 5mg squares, thought to myself this must be really good chocolate. Then I flipped the packet over to find out this is really special chocolate....

This product contains marijuana, SPOT uses cocoa butter fat, oils and/or alcohol to extract cannabinoids for use in our products. Always safe, natural and tested.

This product is infused with marijuana or active components of marijuana. Products containing marijuana can impair concentration and judgement. Do not operate a vehicle or machinery under the influence of this drug. There may be health risks associated with consumption of this product. It should not be used by women that are pregnant or breast feeding. For use only by adults twenty-one and older. Keep out of reach of children.

This product has intoxicating effects and may be habit forming. This product may be unlawful outside of Washington state.

Yikes! What was my nephew thinking? Sending something like this to my mailbox? Doesn't he know Texas is one of the most intolerant states in the union regarding marijuana? Texas does not even allow medicinal marijuana, which is a good indicator of how backwards and behind the times the Lone Star State is on this issue.

I have not ingested a cannabis type product this century. I believe the last time I did so was with Wanda at Seattle's Fremont Solstice Street Fair. A purveyor was purveying hash brownies. If I remember right they cost one buck. A Seattle cop was standing a few feet away, an indication that Washington has been tolerant on this issue for a long time.

I recollect that Wanda and I got a bit goofy and giggly after we ate the brownies. But not excessively goofy and giggly.

After I read the back side of the chocolate packet I looked again at the front side, which you see above and read the following that I'd not noticed upon first perusal...

CAUTION: When eaten or swallowed, the intoxicating effects of this drug may be delayed by two or more hours.

Two or more hours? That would almost be my bedtime. I will need to plan ahead before I try this latest Washington product to arrive at my location....