Sunday Is A Fort Worth Funday Floating In The Trinity River Around Gator Island

I saw that which you see here this morning on Facebook.

Apparently Rockin' the Trinity River on Thursday did not adequately meet the local River Rockin' demand, so a Sunday version of Rockin' the River Happy Hour Inner Tube floating was added.

Called Sunday Funday.

Isn't that clever? Funday rhymes with Sunday.

Sunday Funday is yet one more Trinity River Central City Uptown Gator Island Vision Boondoggle product.

Way back near the start of this month of July, or maybe it was in the latter part of June, I verbalized being appalled regarding the plethora of websites, with custom domain  names, America's Biggest Boondoggle was using to promote its various products.

I recollect listing the various websites, which then had someone telling me of yet one more, that being the special website America's Biggest Boondoggle has had made to promote its Sunday Funday.

I did not remember to check out the Sunday Funday website until reminded to do so by that Facebook posting you see above, which faintly lists the Sunday Funday web address. Below is a screen cap of most of the Sunday Funday website home page.

You will surely want to go to the Sunday Funday website yourself to witness the animation which has multiple inner tubers floating around the imaginary island which used to be known as Panther Island before getting renamed Gator Island.

However, the Sunday Funday website, as you can see, has not been updated with the new name for the imaginary island, still inviting locals to a "Sunday Funday at Panther Island  Pavilion".

Panther Island Pavilion, where there is no island, where there is no pavilion, where no one has seen a panther, but where many have seen an alligator, hence the name change.

Did you notice that the "U" in Funday is a mug full of beer? Why do the Trinity River Central City Uptown Gator Island Vision Boondoggle products all do so much beer consumption promoting? The Boondoggle even turned the old Tandy Subway maintenance building into a beer hall called The Shed.

How much money is America's Biggest Boondoggle spending on all the websites promoting its products? After a decade and a half of boondoggling, with very little to show, but with an astounding amount of propaganda spewed in various media, as in mailed hard copy propaganda pieces, multiple websites, advertisements in local print media, and other places, how is this propaganda expenditure accounted?

When The Boondoggle gets federal money, is that money not intended for a specific use? Like taking down levees, building bridges in slow motion, planting magic flood prevention trees.

Who approves of The Boondoggle spending money on things like Sunday Funday? How much did that website cost? How come the budget of America's Biggest Boondoggle is not an easily accessed, readily available, public document?

If only The People had someone on the TRWD board who could get answers to these type questions....

Why Are Armed Bubbas Guarding Burlington's Army Recruiting Center?

What you see here arrived via email a couple minutes ago.

I thought it was only in Texas armed Bubbas were guarding Army recruiting centers.

Burlington is the town in Washington I lived in from age 5 til 20, give or take a year.

Is the open carrying of firearms now legal in Washington like it is in Texas? Can a Washington Goober now stick a gun in a holster and wander around in public? And guard things the Bubba Goober thinks need guarding?

What is it these volunteer guards are thinking? Is it that the Chattanooga murder of five military men by a mentally ill Muslim is some sort of conspiracy that is threatening to be replicated all over America? Including the little town of Burlington?

You just know if this epidemic of Bubba Goobers guarding military personally keeps spreading that something bad is going to happen.

The Burlington Bubbas should hurry themselves to Texas to help fight the Jade Helm invasion....

Is America's Biggest Boondoggle Stopping Downtown Fort Worth From Being A Boomtown?

In yet one more variant of our popular series of bloggings about things I read in west coast online newspapers, usually the Seattle Times, which I would not likely be reading in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, yesterday I saw that which you see here, an article titled Five takeaways from the downtown Seattle boom.

I have mentioned previously that hardly a week goes by without me reading about some new construction project in downtown Seattle.

For some time now I have known Seattle and Western Washington are booming, but I did not know til yesterday the extent of new project construction in downtown Seattle. The following paragraph is where I learned why I'm constantly reading about new projects...

The Seattle Times Sunday Buzz logged the report in, noting, “Thirty projects were completed in 2014. But, with 24 projects completed in the first six months of 2015 alone, and 36 scheduled for completion by the end of the year, downtown Seattle is on track to see the largest number of completed projects in the last decade…”

Can you imagine reading in the Star-Telegram about 24 projects completed in downtown Fort Worth so far in 2015, with 36 more scheduled for completion by the end of the year? It takes Fort Worth four years to build three simple little bridges over dry land to connect the mainland to an imaginary island.

Another interesting paragraph from the Seattle Times article...

The “back to the city” movement has legs. All over the country, millennials and others want to live in vibrant central cities with walkable neighborhoods, real downtowns and good transit. In Chicago, giant Kraft Heinz is the latest company to abandon suburbia for downtown.

Los Angeles is also seeing a big boom in its downtown as people and corporations return to the city center.

A few days ago in a blogging titled No Sturgeon Dying In Trinity River While Largest Hotel In Texas Is Not Built In Fort Worth I made mention of a comment made by Mr. Spiffy, where Mr. Spiffy opined along the line that America's Biggest Boondoggle boondoggling along in slow motion is the reason nothing of the big project sort is happening in downtown Fort Worth, due to no investor wanting to invest in downtown Fort Worth when there is a chance that the Trinity River Central City Uptown Gator Island Vision Boondoggle might actually become viable, with that being where one would want to invest, not in the existing moribund downtown.

Regarding America's Biggest Boondoggle, I don't know if I have mentioned it before, but I think the actual concept is a good idea. Turning a large area of urban blight into an urban village with water features, restaurants, residential towers, public transit.

It is the way Fort Worth has  gone about actualizing this "vision" that I find objectionable. Hiring the unqualified son of a local politician to run the project. Not having the public vote to approve and fund the project. No project timeline. Over a decade and a half after its inception, very little to show, except  for a slow motion boondoggle sponsoring floating beer parties in a polluted river, which really is just shameful.

Though the locals really do not seem to mind.

Which is baffling.

America's Biggest Boondoggle is basically killing downtown Fort Worth, with the town stuck in neutral while other towns in other areas of America are in boom town mode.

Regarding that "back to the city" movement mentioned in the Seattle Times article, where people are drawn to city centers with real downtowns, walkable neighborhoods and good transit. Fort Worth fails miserably on all three of those draws.

Fort Worth is the biggest town in America without a single department store operating in its downtown. Fort Worth is the biggest town in America without a single grocery store operating in its downtown.

Not enough people visit downtown Fort Worth to support a department store. Not enough people live in downtown Fort Worth to support a grocery store.

These are symptoms of something being not quite right with downtown Fort Worth, despite the downtown cheerleader's constant attempts to pretend otherwise.

How many department stores are in downtown Seattle? Several. Along with several vertical malls. And multiple grocery stores. And a huge public market drawing tourists from all over the world. With good public transit in the form of a transit tunnel running under the downtown zone.

Can you imagine a transit tunnel running under downtown Fort Worth? On the plus side, it would not need to be a very long tunnel...

Euless Doctor Appointment Takes Me To Palm Treed Viridian Beach Volleyball Court

Today was the day of my regularly scheduled monthly doctor appointment in Euless.

The doctor's workshop is near Collins Street. Driving south on Collins Street soon takes one to the north entry to River Legacy Park, which was closed today, and likely for several days, due to the road and parking lot surface being upgraded.

So, I continued south, took a right on Green Oaks Boulevard and continued west til I got to the south entry to River Legacy Park.

Arlington seems to have the highly evolved good habit of constantly improving its parks. If River Legacy Park is not the best park in the entire D/FW Metroplex, I wish someone would point me to the park that is.

Today I rolled my bike wheels back across the Trinity River to the north side of River Legacy Park with the intention to take my handlebars to the Viridian development, if Lake Viridian had receded enough from last month's flooded state, to allow trail access from River Legacy to Viridian.

I think my last roll through Viridian was about two years ago. There were only a couple dozens homes built at that point in time. The development did not seem all that appealing, what with the high expectations of all that was proposed for the Viridian development before the Great Recession grounded the project to a halt.

Well, from what I saw today one would think the Great Recession is ancient history.

The paved trails along the lake have been expanded since my last visit. A school has been built. A sprawling club house, with swimming pools, has been added, part of which you see above, looking over my handlebars at a sandy white beach volleyball court surrounded by palm trees.

The landscaping at Viridian is impressive. I am a fan of a well landscaped landscape.

For quite a distance Collins Street has received the Viridian treatment, creating an aesthetically pleasing landscaped boulevard of the sort one sees in towns like, I don't  know, Phoenix, Tacoma, Mount Vernon, Los Angeles, and others.

Fort Worth should send a task force to Arlington to see what an improvement, aesthetically speaking, a well landscaped road can be, free of weeds and litter.

Check out the I-35 exits to Fort Worth's #1 tourist attraction, the Fort Worth Stockyards, and imagine those exits with the Arlington landscape treatment, rather than their current eyesore state of being a littered, weedy mess....

Once Again Maxine Has Made Me Homesick For Washington & Japanese Fishing Floats

Last Thursday, in a blogging titled A Hot July Day In Texas Thinking About Catching A Llama With Maxine I lamented about a Maxine salmon barbecue that had me thinking, yet again, about moving back to the Wonders of Washington.

Rarely a week goes by, of late, where someone from Washington does not send me something which makes me feel a bit homesick.

Yesterday it happened again, once again via Maxine.

Last Friday Maxine told me over the weekend she was floating the ferry to the Olympic Peninsula to drive to a knitter's convention in a cabin on the beach in Moclips.

Moclips?

The name was totally familiar, but my memory of place names and their location in Washington is fading as the years of exile pile up. I had to look up Moclips on my Street Finder program to restore my memory that Moclips is slightly north of Copalis, which had me further appalled at the sad state of my failing memory.

Copalis, as a kid, was just about my favorite place we would journey to for a weekend of camping, or a week of summer vacation. There was a store in Copalis which had all sorts of fun stuff.  Every trip to Copalis my brother and I would go to that store and spend a lot of time deciding what balsa wood rubber band propelled airplane we would buy and fly.

I was last in Copalis and Moclips the summer of 2004. I remember quite clearly that it was near Copalis I first saw the Tsunami Evacuation Route signs which had been added since the last time I visited Washington's Pacific coast.

With all the brouhaha of late regarding the impending 9.2 long overdue SUPER QUAKE off the Washington/Oregon coast, and its predicted 300 foot Tsunami, I wonder if those evacuation routes have been altered. Getting oneself to high ground above 300 feet would present a challenge along much of the coast.

In the picture above I am fairly certain we are looking at Maxine, standing on the Moclips beach, with the Pacific Ocean and a very bright sunset creating a Maxine halo, even though Maxine told me she took the photos she sent me. I think the above one may be an exception.

You looking at these photos, who have never been to the west coast, does it surprise you that a Pacific beach can be such a big flat space?

Above, that line you see across the horizon under the setting sun, that would be the line of waves crashing in from the Pacific Ocean.

Maxine told me she and her fellow knitters had fun finding sand dollars on the beach. Finding sand dollars constituted a really fine time when I was a kid.

Another big deal when I was a kid, on the beach at Copalis, and other Pacific beaches, was finding Japanese glass fishing floats. These were glass balls of various sizes, some quite large, which Japanese fishing boats used to float their nets.

The floating balls would break free and journey across the Pacific to wash ashore on Washington beaches. I do not know if this still happens. I suspect Japanese fishing fleets no longer use glass balls. I do know that Japanese glass fishing floats are currently valuable collector items.

I do not remember if me and my brother ever found a Japanese fishing float. I do remember we had ourselves a mighty fine time looking for one....

Perplexed Replacing Deplorable Seats In Fort Worth's Doomed Convention Center Arena

I saw that which you see here this morning on the front page of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram online.

I am only allowed to read the Star-Telegram's front page, but that which I was allowed to read was enough to perplex me.

The Convention Center Arena's seats apparently are deplorable eyesores in need of fixing.

The seats are deplorable eyesores? How about the giant flying saucer the seats sit in? Is that structure not widely reviled as a deplorable, outdated eyesore which architecturally looks way out of sync with the look of the rest of the Convention Center? And downtown Fort Worth?

Am I remembering correctly when I remember that a few elections ago voters voted to build a new multi-purpose arena to replace the too small, outdated Convention Center eyesore?

If I recollect correctly voters were asked to approve three financing propositions to provide funds to build the new arena. With those financing propositions approving money making schemes such as charging a buck to rent one of the new arena's livestock stalls.

In the long period of time since the voters approved of the three financing propositions, thus approving of the building of the new arena, did someone figure out that those dollar livestock stall rentals were not going to raise enough money to pay for the new building?

Has anyone seen any sort of project timeline schedule for the new multi-purpose arena the voters voted for? Did J.D. Granger get put in charge of this project? Is that why it seems to be going nowhere?

My memory of long ago events may be shaky at times, but I am fairly certain I remember correctly that this new arena was intended to replace the Convention Center Arena, due to the fact that the Convention Center Arena is not big enough to attract the big acts that the new arena, with its additional couple thousand seats, would be able to attract.

Which really never made any sense to me, but must have made sense to the majority of voters, since they voted for the three silly propositions. Why would a couple thousand more seats be the tipping point that would bring One Direction or Maroon Five to town?

I opined at the time that I did not think it was the size of the arena which kept big acts from playing Fort Worth.  It was the fact that nearby there are much bigger venues. Such as the Dallas Cowboy stadium. And in Dallas, that arena where the Dallas Mavericks play basketball. Both with better transportation access and parking than one finds in Fort Worth's Cultural District location of the new multi-purpose arena.

Anyone out there know when ground will be broken for the new Fort Worth arena? Will there be a big ceremony with TNT explosions such as what was done for the ground breaking ceremony marking the start of the four year construction of America's Biggest Boondoggle's three simple little bridges connecting the mainland to an imaginary island, now known as Gator Island.....

Rolling My Wheels To A New Woodhaven Swimming Hole While Thinking About A Blue Mound Move

It seems as if it has been at least a day since I rolled my wheels around my Woodhaven neighborhood, so with the memory fading of my most recent having done so, today I took my handlebars on a roll around the Woodhaven Country Club Golf Course.

Today I came upon a new view, that being that which you see my handlebars looking at. That pool of blue looked very inviting on this day predicted to hit 101 degrees of HOT.

I saw no "NO SWIMMING" signs. But, I'd already had my early morning swim of the day, so the temptation was not too great.

Changing the subject from the above blue pool to Blue Mound.

This morning on Facebook I was messaged with an odd question, asking me if I was moving to Blue Mound. I replied, saying not that I am aware of, why are you asking this?

In a followup message the messenger explained that someone named Durango Jones had the power to their Blue Mound home turned off this weekend, with the power then turned back on in Durango Jones' name.

I then told the Blue Mounder that this particular Durango Jones was not the culprit, along with verbalizing being perplexed at the idea their is another Durango Jones working this territory. Adding to the oddness is the fact that myself and the Blue Mounder share six Facebook friends in common, but myself and the Blue Mounder are not Facebook friends.

I don't know how the Blue Mounder managed to Facebook message me without us being Facebook friends. I thought that was a Facebook requirement to send someone a Facebook message.

Anyone else out there had any contact with someone purporting to be Durango Jones? I hope not....

Today I Celebrate My 8 Year Happy Google Anniversary

Google has a policy regarding its AdSense product similar to the first rule of Fight Club, as in the first rule of Google AdSense is not to talk about Google AdSense.

I think the talking prohibition has more to do with sharing details of how many AdSense cents one makes, revenue generating-wise, than simply mentioning some non-consequential AdSense aspect.

Such as, this morning when I checked in on the Google account Google informed me of that which you see above, that being today is my 8 year Happy Anniversary with AdSense. So far I have not been notified about any Google party celebrating this momentous occasion.

It is a little hard to believe that it has been 8 years since the Google AdSense account went active. I remember having to jump through hoop after hoop and then getting to the point where I was told  I could add AdSense code to my webpages. That day I added the code to about a quarter of my Eyes on Texas webpages, which at that point in time only numbered around 300.

The next day I logged into the Google account to find the AdSense account providing a strong motivation to add the AdSense code to all my Eyes on Texas webpages. And so I did.

And now, 8 years have gone by. If I remember right the blog you are looking at right now came along about a year later, followed by multiple other blogs, all with AdSense ads.

Doing the Google AdSense thing has become sort of an addiction, like pulling the arm of a slot machine and being pleased by the number that rolls up, or being perplexed by the number that rolls up, while once a month seeing the slot machine tray fill up with coins.

I'd like to break free of this addiction, but I fear it would involve getting some sort of addiction therapy, which seems like way too much bother, all things considered....

My Location In Texas Has Finally Become A HOT 100

The temperature has hit 100 at my location for the first time this year. My phone made its incoming text message noise. After I read the message I checked the temperature to learn it is HOT.

My computer based temperature monitoring device is also being heated to 100.

With the phone I did something I did not know I could do until I did it. As in I emailed myself what I was seeing on the phone, which is that which you see here.

Elsie Hotpepper and Spencer Jack's dad email what appear to me to be screen caps from their phones. Often embarrassing dialogues on Facebook. I figured this must be an i-Phone thing not able to be done on my Korean phone.

As I so often do, I figured wrong.

With the outer world being so HOT I would have thought my air conditioner would be running more frequently than it is to cool down my inner world. I guess it has been so long since it has been HOT that I forget how often the A/C works to keep things cool.

I must go find ice now, and some water to drown the ice in....

One Score And Two Years Ago Is No Way To Start A Wedding Speech

I do some of my best pondering whilst rolling along via my bike wheels.

Today I decided to take my handlebars on a roll around the neighborhood to get me some endorphins and do some pondering on various ponderments.

Apparently "ponderments" is not a word. It has been red flagged. Maybe pondermentable is a word.

Nope.

Also red flagged. Well, both should be words.

Among the things I pondered whilst rolling today was a task I was assigned last night. I was asked to use my highly evolved poetic literary skills to compose a wedding speech, well, actually, wedding reception speech. I got that clarification this morning after opining that I'd never witnessed anyone giving a speech at a wedding, other than the wedding officiator and the pair getting hitched.

As I rolled along I started composing the wedding speech, "One Score and Two Years Ago there Arrived on this Planet...."

And then I realized I was channeling Abraham Lincoln, with the further realization that parodying the Gettysburg Address as a wedding speech, what with that speech dedicating a memorial to thousands of fallen soldiers, would probably be in really bad taste at a wedding celebration type event.

Eventually I gave up on the composing a wedding speech thing and moved on to some other pondering, with equally unsatisfactory results.

I probably should resign from this wedding speech task. What do I know about wedding speeches? Very little. I have attended few weddings. And every one of them has ended in divorce, if I remember right, and I likely do....