Spencer Jack's Hometown Values Gets Him On The Cover Of A Magazine

Who is that holding a big Deluxe Cheese Burger on the cover of something called Hometown Values Savings Magazine?

If you answered "Spencer Jack" you would be correct.

Behind Spencer Jack and his big burger is the Fidalgo Drive-In sign, advertising 2 Deluxe Cheese Burgers for $5.49, which is another clue that that is Spencer Jack you are looking at, what with the Fidalgo Drive-In being Spencer Jack's and his dad's restaurant in Anacortes.

I saw this this morning on Facebook, via Spencer Jack's grandma, my favorite ex-sister-in-law, Cindy.

This morning when I woke up my phone I saw that Spencer Jack's dad, my favorite nephew Jason, had called me last night around 8.

At the 8 o'clock time frame I was disconnected from my phone due to being in the pool zone getting ready for an after dark swim session with the Yonker twins, Millie and Billie.

I suspect Jason was not calling to tell me about Spencer Jack's first magazine cover, but was calling to ask about his grandma, whose cancer bout he likely learned about via reading my blog.

Currently in the Fort Worth zone the Annual Burger War Tournament is underway. I'm banned from  reading the results due to this being a Star-Telegram thing. But I could glean from the front  page that the tournament has now reached the Sweet 16 stage, and that there have been multiple upsets.

I suspect Spencer Jack's Deluxe Cheese Burger would make it to the finals....

Mom Post Successful Surgery At McDonald's With McCafe

For years now it has been an annual tradition for my mom and dad to send me a birthday card, with me calling mom and dad on my birthday to wish them a happy birthday of their eldest son, with mom asking me if I got the card they sent, with me informing them that no card had arrived.

This is then followed by a week or two of asking me if the card has arrived, with the mystery then ended by a phone call telling me the card had arrived back in Arizona. We then figure out what went awry with the address, with the card then getting stuck in another envelope, and then successfully delivered to Texas.

This year the problem came from using the number 403 instead of the correct number of 433.

The card arrived at its final destination last Friday. I then text messaged mom and dad, telling them "Thank you. The card has arrived in my mailbox."

As soon as I sent that text message mom called me back. After going over the details of this year's card journey mom told me the news that she was going in for a surgical procedure today to remove a cancerous tumor of the melanoma sort, I think. Mom did not have many details. But has had such things removed  previously, though this one sounded worse, with some left ear involvement.

So, yesterday I texted my sister while I was not watching a baseball game at Yankee Stadium and asked her to keep me updated like she did a couple months ago when dad got a pacemaker.

That would be part of the update, above, with mom, post-procedure, bandaged, in McDonald's enjoying a McCafe.

Included with the picture of mom in McDonald's was the news that the procedure did not take as long as expected.

I suspect mom is in recovery mode now, being sleepy. I will wait til tomorrow to call to hear how it's going...

Climbing Fort Worth's Fosdick Steps Trying To Emulate Elsie Hotpepper

Today when I left air-conditioned comfort to head to Oakland Lake Park for my regularly scheduled Thursday walk around Fosdick Lake I left my old-fashioned digital camera at home, taking with me the new-fangled cell phone for photo taking purposes.

Well, the cell phone photos my cell phone takes do not turn out as well as the photos my old-fashioned digital camera takes.

I have long thought it is time for the selfie fad to fade.

Maybe I think that because my few attempts at taking a selfie of myself always end up being difficult. As in it is awkward, I can't see the screen, clearly, even when in shade.

Which results in that which you see here, basically me glaring at a phone while trying to touch the take a picture button on the screen.

Some people seem quite talented with the taking a selfie thing.

Elsie Hotpepper comes to mind.

Elsie may be the Queen of the Selfies. Of course it helps that she has such photogenic subject matter and is a whiz at new-fangled technology. Like text messaging. Elsie Hotpepper can churn out a mini-novel in seconds via text messaging, while it takes me several minutes to churn out a sentence.

After I gave up on trying to successfully take a selfie photo with the Fosdick Fountain showing up behind me, I switched the phone to the mode that takes pictures in the other direction.

As you can see, via the hazy photo above, a pair of fishermen were angling for dinner in the fertile water of Fosdick Lake.

Catfish? Bass? Trout? Garfish? Bullheads? All I know for sure is it is unlikely any salmon were caught.

With my bike temporarily out of service I needed a new way to get myself a dose of endorphins via aerobic stimulation, so as to put myself in a much better mood. My early morning swimming does not seem to meet my endorphin needs.

So, today I ran up and down the above Fosdick Steps a few dozen times. I was quite pleased with how light on my feet I was being, sort of popping up the stairs pretty much effortlessly. I don't know if the extra spring in my step was due to new hiking shoes. Or the 20 pounds I have lost. Or something else, like my morning deep knee bend addiction of 80 repetitions.

Anyway, tomorrow morning I am going to be at the Fort Worth Stockyards, taking photos and maybe video. I will be using my old-fashioned digital camera to take photos, not this new-fangled phone method.

And no selfies. Well, maybe one attempt with a longhorn.....

Apparently A Flat Tire Is Like A Bad Attitude

I saw that which you see here this morning on Facebook, expressing a sentiment which is currently somewhat accurate, pertaining to me.

Except I don't have a single flat tire. I have two flat tires.

But it is not accurate to say that due to these two flat tires I can't go anywhere, because all eight tires on my motorized mechanized transport devices are not flat.

It is on my bike I will not be going anywhere til the duo of flat tires is fixed.

My bike's tires had grown a bit threadbare, tread-wise, but I thought it not too big a deal until I flattened out in the rear three miles in on Monday, trying to bike with the Village Creek Indian Ghosts.

The wheel woes began on Saturday, worsened on Sunday, turned catastrophic on Monday, like I just said in the previous paragraph.

So, Amazon is sending me two new tires, 29" x 1.95", and two 29" inch slime filled tubes. This should arrive soon and soon thereafter I should be back rolling my wheels, barring any additional mechanical ineptness on my part....

Swim At Your Own Risk At The PIP Squeak's Public Beach In Fort Worth

A followup from Elsie Hotpepper to yesterday's emailed screen cap of Facebook postings about what living in Fort Worth is really like.

Yesterday's Elsie Hotpepper Facebook screen cap turned into a blogging about America's Biggest Boondoggle's PIP Squeaks Declaring There Is No E.Coli To Worry ABout While Rockin' The Trinity River In Fort Worth.

Tarrant Regional Water District board member Mary Kelleher commented about getting the PIP Squeaks to do daily testing of the water which they are encouraging floaters to float in..

Mary Kelleher I had to fight to get the recreational areas tested weekly. The people have right to know "literally" what they're getting into. I'm going to speak with our environmental section to see what it would take to get that area tested daily.

Way back on February 7 of this year I found myself in the downtown Fort Worth zone, a location I rarely find myself located in.

Since I was in the downtown Fort Worth zone I decided to check out the current state of America's Biggest Boondoggle's products, such as Panther Island Pavilion and the simple little bridges which had begun construction the previous October, scheduled to take four years to build over dry land.

I blogged about that which I saw that day in a blogging titled Taking A Look At The Trinity River Vision Boondoggle's Products.

One of the products I saw that day is what you see below.

Below I copied from the February 7 blogging about the above lifeguard stand and beach....

The Boondoggle is now calling the area where the Rockin' the River Happy Hour Inner Tube Floats take place a beach. For your amazed amusement I'll copy that which is on the sign on the lifeguard's perch below.

PANTHER ISLAND PAVILION

PUBLIC BEACH

CLOSED FROM 10pm - 5am

SWIM AT OWN RISK

NO LITTERING

NO GLASS OR STYROFOAM

NO FISHING FROM BEACH AREA

NO UNAUTHORIZED VEHICLES

NO OPEN FIRES

CLEAN UP AFTER PETS

NO DISORDERLY CONDUCT

A PRODUCT OF THE TRINITY RIVER VISION
____________________________________________________

A public beach? Closes at 10pm, opens at 5am? Swim at own risk?

Is that risk the risk of swimming with too much e.coli? And alligators?

If a city is designating a water feature as a public beach, and encouraging that water to be swam in, doesn't the public have a reasonable right to expect that that water is safe to swim in, tested daily? Particularly when that body of water is known to regularly spike with high levels of e.coli?

I wonder if the PIP Squeak's outhouses that serve the throngs of river floaters could be one of the e.coli sources. Most world class urban waterfront music venues do not include primitive outhouses  among their features....

Maxine Took Me On A Washington Wildfire Fly By To Tonasket

Maxine pointed me to a YouTube video "Northern Washington Fires Fly" which I just watched and has me sort of shocked to learn the wildfires burning up my old home state are much worse than I realized.

I had read this morning that the fires called the Okanogan Complex is now the biggest wildfire in Washington state history.

The Okanogan Complex fire is the one threatening Aunt Alice, she being Tootsie in Tonasket.  I took the screen cap showing Tonasket, you see here from the aforementioned video. I believe the fire line continues to move towards Tonasket.

Watching the video I learned most of the fires are still 0% contained. That is not good. Way too many fires with way too few resources, and people, to fight them all.

Today Aunt Alice is reporting she continues to persevere against the smoky misery.

So far, near as I know, the only major wildfire on the west side of the Cascades is the fire being called the Newhalem Complex.

I remember when I was a little kid, soon after we moved to Mount Vernon from Eugene, Oregon, a huge fire burned on one of the Cascade foothills, known as Cultus Mountain. We would sit outside at night and watch the orange explosive glow. That winter, after the fire had long been extinguished, a huge landslide slid down the area of the fire, leaving what looked like a big scar on the mountain.

Last I looked at that mountain that scar was still there.....

Taking A Look At TRWD Document With Results Of E.Coli PIP Water Testing

Earlier today I blogged about some fresh PIP nonsense from America's Biggest Boondoggle.

After that someone named Anonymous made the following comment...

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "PIP Declares No E.Coli To Worry About While Rockin' The Trinity River In Fort Worth":

Take a look at a TRWD document documenting the results of e.coli testing at the confluence of the West and Clear Forks of the Trinity.

If the boondoggle is going to encourage swimming at PIP, they should be testing every day, just like a public pool. Take a look at the Long-Term Average graph. It's flirting with the "acceptable for swimming" limit. 

Looking at this TRWD chart it would appear that on any given day one might find oneself floating in the Trinity River in the PIP zone with an e.coli level above what TCEQ considers safe. And, like Anonymous suggests, the only way to be certain one is not floating with too much feces would be for the water to be tested daily.

Is the PIP squeak's spokesman still claiming the water the Rockin' the River floaters float in is no different than that which comes out of Fort Worth's taps?

PIP Declares No E.Coli To Worry About While Rockin' The Trinity River In Fort Worth

Incoming from Elsie Hotpepper.

I believe this is an iPhone  screen cap of some Facebook postings, from the Panther Island Pavilion Facebook page.

That would make this a Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island Vision product.

If you are new to Fort Worth and wondering what Panther Island Pavilion is, well, it is sort of hard to explain. Basically it is an imaginary pavilion on an imaginary island where people float in an imaginary pollution-free river while drinking beer and listening to music.

The message from Elsie Hotpepper accompanying the screen cap....

Cut and paste is all they do...and again if that deadly levels of E. coli test was wrong, what about all the tests that said the E. coli was at a safe level? Isn't it more than likely it is those tests that came up with wrong results? Are they actually trying to claim that the Trinity River does not have an E. coli contamination problem?

Well, Elsie, you must remember  the spokesman for the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle also claimed the water the Rockin' the River floaters float in was no different than the drinking water that flows from Fort Worth taps.

Which sounds to me to be a good reason to buy bottled water, if it were true that the water the floaters float in while Rockin' the River is the same quality level as Fort Worth drinking water.

Does it only occur to me that it is a rather sad reflection of the shortage of fun things to do in Fort Worth that so many people think they are having themselves a mighty fine time floating in a polluted river while drinking beer and listening to music coming from an imaginary pavilion on an imaginary island?

Washington's Wildfires Cause Maxine A Smoky Laundry Illusion With Tootsie Tonasket

A couple days ago  I asked Maxine if this year's Washington dire fire situation was the worst she can remember, because that is how it is seeming to me from my vantage point a couple thousand miles distant.

I also asked Maxine for a hiking report, which I enjoy reading due to it causing that homesick feeling I enjoy so much.

Today Maxine emailed in a hiking and fire report, with three photos, including the one you see here. The other two photos show how badly the smoke from the fires has cut visibility.

Maxine's message, including the explanation for that which you see above....

Good Monday, 

Definitely the worst fires in my memory. Saturday was very smoky, I thought the smoke had discolored the white laundry I’d hung out to dry but Mike pointed out that it was just looking thru the air that caused  the illusion of discoloration.  At one point we couldn’t see the hills across the valley from our house.

Sunday we hiked the Skyline Divide trail. We did it a couple of years ago but it was very foggy and we couldn’t see anything. This time we were at the trailhead by 7 a.m ., had to take lots of breaks on the trail because the air quality was so poor.  Once we got out of the trees Mt. Baker was clear and beautiful-we followed the trail up and around until we were standing right in front of the backside of Baker. The smoke was settling in by the time we headed back down the trail and we could barely make out the outline of the mountain even though it was a clear day.

Our house is surrounded by trees. So far there aren’t any fires near us. There is a very small fire behind Whitehorse Mountain and that is the only fire of any significance on this side that I know of.

Maxine

______________________________________________

Maxine's location is about 30 miles, as a crow flies, southwest of the Newhalem fire in North Cascades National Park, which has been in the news the past several days.

Meanwhile, in Eastern Washington, Okanogan County remains on fire at multiple locations. Aunt Alice, aka Tootsie, in Tonasket, is working hard to stay optimistic, while having trouble breathing due to the thick smoke.

It has been an impressive thing to witness to see how the people of Tonasket and Okanogan County are using Facebook to connect people and to let the helpers know who needs help.

Let me see if I can find an example of a person on Facebook connecting the Okanogan County community. Found one. Patrick Plumb, go to Patrick Plumb's Facebook page. I think he may be the mayor of Tonasket or the chief chief of the Tonasket Tribe.

I hope relief in the form of rain comes soon to all the states currently on fire....

A Long Hot Walk With Arlington's Indian Ghosts While Strangling My Handlebars

Why am I gripping the throat of my handlebars you are sitting there wondering?

Well.

Around noon I headed to Arlington to the Village Creek Natural  Historical Area for my regularly scheduled Monday bike ride with the Indian Ghosts.

All was going well as I rolled merrily along.

And then as I was almost at my turn around point, that being the furthest from the motorized vehicle which brought me and my bike to Arlington, as I braked slightly going down the dip that goes under the Green Oaks Boulevard bridge over Village Creek, I knew I was in bike  malfunction mode.

I came to a stop, got off the bike, poked the front tire, no problem, poked the rear tire, big problem.

Flat tire in the making.

So, I began the long walk back to air-conditioned comfort. An almost three mile walk, with about half out in the open, with no shade.

I don't know how many gallons of water I leaked as I walked along, but I was dripping profusely. The bike's water bottle holds 30 ounces, I think. The backup bottle back in my vehicle holds 40 ounces. All gone by the time I got back to a tap water source of hydrating.

I have not yet done a forensic exam on the failed bike tire to determine the cause. I'll likely put that off til tomorrow.

It has been a long time since I had to walk an injured bike a long distance. If I remember correctly the previous incident occurred way back in 2005 or 6. I was at the 6 mile mark on the River Legacy Park paved trail, which put me about 4 miles from the nearest road. It  was extremely HOT. I did not have much water. I called for help, which had a rescue team rescuing me at where the trail intersects Collins Street.

Today I did not feel like calling for help. First off because three miles isn't all that far, even when pushing a broken bike.  And second off, I would have had trouble directing any of the directionally challenged people whom I might call to drive to Interlochen to find me on the Bob Findlay Linear Park trail.

Maybe I need to consider finding a new source of endorphin inducing aerobic stimulation. Returning to roller blading perhaps?