Wichita Falls Prairie Dog Town Survives 5.6 Oklahoma Earthquake

On my way to ALDI today I decided to check in on my neighborhood Prairie Dog Town.

I was concerned that this morning's earthquake might have left the residents of Prairie Dog Town all discombobulated from the unusual shaking.

Upon arrival the Prairie Dogs seemed perfectly happy. Brother and sister, Theo and Ruby, quickly greeted me with their telltale welcoming chirp, soon joined by their big brother, David, who did no chirping.

David is a bit shy. He popped up above ground to see who is siblings were chirping to and then quickly headed back underground, as documented below by my excellent photographic skills.

Then morning's earthquake shook shortly after 7. I was walking toward my kitchen to make coffee when I began to feel a bit wobbly. The wobbly feeling did not last long.

I did not realize I'd been shook by an earthquake til I was informed about such via the news.

A 5.6 shaker which was felt as far north as Nebraska and south into Texas, epicentered near Pawnee, Oklahoma.

I was shaken by many earthquakes during the years I lived on the West Coast. The West Coast earthquakes were extremely LOUD. The first thing that startles one during a West Coast earthquake is the LOUD thundering noise, and then you realize you are shaking and everything around you is moving, trees swaying, windows popping.

Today's earthquake, as experienced in Wichita Falls, was eerily quiet, with the earth moving in total silent mode.

Methinks a frackquake is a different type quake than an earthquake caused when Mother Nature decides to adjust one of her underground fault lines, hence the eerie quiet. If a frackquake is not caused by tectonic plates moving, what causes the frackquakes?

A 5.6 level quake starts to get into the magnitude zone that can cause actual damage. Was this the BIG ONE? Or is a BIGGER ONE coming? What level of earthquake was the new Dallas Cowboys Stadium designed to handle? Or other Texas structures. Like giant highway flyover exchanges, such as Fort Worth's Mixmaster, or the High Five in Dallas.

Walk Around Green Sikes Lake Brings Back Memory Of A Purple Trinity River

Til today it had been a few days since I had myself a walk around Sikes Lake. I'd not been back since the start of the fall quarter at Midwestern State University, which is where Sikes Lake is located.

Since my last Sikes Lake walk around the lake has turned a beautiful shade of green, as you can see.

I first noticed the green whilst walking across the bridge you see above the green.

I don't know if this is a purposefully dying of the lake green, in some sort of celebrating the start of school deal, like when Fort Worth's goofy mayor, Mike Moncrief, tried to dye the Trinity River purple in some sort of tribute to a Fort Worth football team that had won a game or was playing in a bowl game or some other such thing which I have long forgotten.

I could quickly find the answer to why Fort Worth's goofy mayor tried to turn the Trinity River purple by using this blog's search function.

I will be right back with the link to that purple blogging.

Well, apparently I blogged about this serious issue of Fort Worth's goofy mayor trying to dye the Trinity River purple multiple times....

Fort Worth's Mayor Moncrief Changes The Name Of The Trinity River & Orders It Dyed The Color Purple

Fort Worth Mayor Moncrief Fails To Turn Trinity River Purple

The Fort Worth Star-Telegram Sort Of Sees Purple

TCU Purple Froggies Jinxed By Fort Worth Mayor Mike Moncrief

That last one is mostly copying a funny email from Don Young about the serious issue of Fort Worth having a really goofy mayor lacking in basic common sense.

Thunderstorms are on the menu today for the Wichita Falls location. The potential storminess is evident in another photo I took today at Sikes Lake.

Sikes Lake does not appear to be green when viewed from this location, looking through the Arch de Sikes.

The temperature was barely in the 80s when I walked around Sikes Lake. About the temperature to which I air condition my interior space.

I need to find where I put my winter wear....

Does Pickle Juice Have Me Feeling Good On Top Of Mount Wichita?

Yesterday I spent six or seven hours in a seated position behind a steering wheel navigating four wheels at high speed.

An activity such as driving does not provide much endorphin inducing aerobic stimulation.

Except for the occasional excitement caused by a semi-truck trailer swerving and almost tipping over.

Ever since Mr. Spiffy revealed that it was pickle juice which accounted for his puckery ability to bike for hundreds of miles, and Miss Catspaw confirmed the alleged health benefits, I have been drinking copious amounts of pickle juice.

Well, an ounce or two, here and there.

I do not know if it is the pickle juice which has me feeling good and extra energetic, or what.

After yesterday's rolling slothness, today I felt the need for extreme aerobic stimulation.

So, it was to Mount Wichita (also known, for some unfathomable reason, as Murphy Mountain) to get me some much needed endorphins.

Til today my bad photographic skills had not rendered a photo which gives one a good idea how steep the climb is to the summit of Mount Wichita.

I climbed to the Mount Wichita summit at as high a speed rate as I could manage. By the time I reached the top I was in hyperventilating heart pounding mode.

Soon the aforementioned endorphins arrived.

I fear my cerebral blood flow is still being affected by the hyperventilation, that or early onslaught of Alzheimer's is causing me to be making bad typos over and over again. Such as above I originally typed summing when the word I wanted was summit. Typos like that. Typos which are not misspellings are harder to spot, due to not getting the red flag error clue.

I think I need to go drink some more pickle juice now....

Stalled Drive By Arlington's Dallas Cowboy Stadium Waiting For Elsie Hotpepper

This last day of August, was the day of my regularly scheduled return to the Dallas/Fort Worth zone to buy a couple dozens bagels at WinCo, among many other things.

My first stop was at a Doctor in Euless, then it was south on Collin Street, where eventually I found myself stuck in traffic, stuck due to the chronic Arlington, Texas problem of a train rolling through town, stopping the traffic flow til the train has rolled on by.

Is there any other American city the size of Arlington which has itself cut in two by train tracks with only a couple overpasses, or underpasses in the entire town?

I think it'd been over a year since I'd seen the Dallas Cowboy stadium up close, not since I had the extremely exciting experience of watching the USA team play some other country in something called the World Cup.

I'd forgotten what an enormous monstrosity this stadium is. And how out of sync it looks with that which surrounds much of it. I would have thought by now some of the slum aspects would have been replaced by new development. But today I still saw pawn shops and run down looking motels and other eyesores.

Arlington does so much so well, like the town's parks, but in other things Arlington is a bit of a dud, such as in the public transportation realm. And cohesive development around a major development, like a HUMONGOUS football stadium.

I saw that which you see below on the east side of Collin Street on the south side of the stadium.

Still pushing the delusion that the Dallas Cowboys are America's Team, With that delusion apparently based on the Dallas Cowboys having had a few winning seasons at some point way back in the previous century.

Recently I saw, I think on Facebook, a graphic representing some scientific study showing who the majority in each state thought of as "their" football team.

Only one state thought of the Dallas Cowboys as "their" football team.

Texas.

All of the Pacific Northwest, plus, oddly, New  York, thought of the Seattle Seahawks as "their" football team.

I can't remember the favorites of the other states, but if memory is partly serving me right, the Green Bay Packer was consider "their" football team by more state than any other.

Methinks it is time for the Dallas Cowboys to hang up that America's Team nonsense.

After I was done with what I was doing in south Arlington I headed back north, stopping in River Legacy Park, where I called my mom and dad. Bad connection. That call did not last long.

I thought Elsie Hotpepper was going to meet me today, but the Hotpepper failed to show up.

The drive forth and back from D/FW today was extremely pleasant. Noticeable road improvements on I-287.

In Wichita Falls Praying For Revival Hoping Jesus Is The Answer

For a couple weeks I have been seeing that which you see here at the northwest corner of the intersection of Kemp Boulevard and Midwestern Parkway in beautiful Wichita Falls.

Today was the first time the stoplight cooperated enough to allow the taking of a phone photo through the driver's side window.

Today's sign holding group was the smallest I have seen.

Three.

 I think the most I've seen is double that.

Whilst struggling to take a picture I did not have time to read what was on the sign held by the sitting cowboy. The standing cowboy remained with his back turned to me til the light turned green, so I had no chance of reading what was on that sign.

Previous signs have expressed sentiments such as "Pray for Revival" and "Jesus is the Answer".

I have no idea what the question is to which Jesus is the answer, or what is in need of reviving.

I suppose if I really wanted to know I could stop and ask the cowboys....

Over Half Decade Ago Trinity River Vision Pretended To Be Underway

Yesterday after I blogged about Hoping The Lake Wichita Revitalization Project Happens Soon it got me to thinking, anew, about Fort Worth's pitiful Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District Vision, known now as America's Biggest Boondoggle, due to boondoggling along for most of this century, with little to show for the effort.

Currently Fort Worth's clouded vision is being made more murky due to the inability of Fort Worth Congresswoman, Kay Granger, to secure federal pork barrel money to help jump start the stalled project in dire need of a money infusing defibrillator.

Kay Granger's son, J.D., with no experience running any sort of public works project, was hired by America's Biggest Boondoggle to be the Executive Director of what has become America's Biggest Boondoggle.

Hiring J.D. was supposed to help motivate his mama to secure those federal handouts.

That has not quite worked out as planned. Instead, J.D., with a highly honed frat boy mentality, has turned that long ago Trinity River Vision into seeing things like muscial happy hour inner tube floats in the polluted Trinity River.

Yesterday a conversation about how Wichita Falls seems to wisely go about a project, such as revitalizing Lake Wichita, turned into musing about how bizarrely backwards Fort Worth is when trying to do just about anything.

That musing had me thinking back to when I first saw signage claiming that the Trinity River Vision was underway. With that "underway" verbiage referring to the actual moving of dirt, rather than simply propagandizing about moving dirt. The dirt moving propaganda began in 2002. Eight years later the signage appeared announcing that the cloudy vision was underway.

The last day of September, 2010, I rode my bike from Gateway Park, west, towards the Stockyards. A short distance after passing under I-35 I found myself seeing signage such as you see above, informing me, and others, that the long stalled Trinity River Vision was finally underway.

Six years ago.

I blogged about being astonished by the number of Trinity River Vision underway signs, and other ridiculousness in The Trinity River Vision Is Underway With A Lot Of Signs.

Among the things astonishing me that day was an area where the Trinity Trail had been re-routed around what looked like a big excavated area.

When she read that long ago blogging Connie D commented asking if this (a link to a TRV webpage) could be what I saw.

Cowtown Wakepark.

What I saw that day, six years ago, was America's Biggest Boondoggle moving a lot of earth to build a private business a pond. Soon after Cowtown Wakepark opened it went out of business, due to what seemed to me to be a rather obvious bad business model.

That and building such a thing where a predictable flood could do a lot of damage.

Ironic that such an easily flooded entity would be built by a project touted as a much need flood control project.

How much money did The Boondoggle spend to build that pond for the Cowtown Wakepark? Why has the Cowtown Wakepark's failure and The Boondoggle's part in that failure not become an issue with the local media? You know, journalists covering wrongdoing.

J.D. Granger was quoted multiple times touting the viability and wonders of Cowtown Wakepark giving the citizens of Fort Worth the ability to satisfy their imaginary long held desire to participate in the sport of wakeboarding.

Why has J.D. Granger not been held accountable for the failure of Cowtown Wakepark? Or any of the other failures of America's Biggest Boondoggle?

Like that simple little bridge being built over dry land to connect Fort Worth's mainland to an imaginary island. Is that bridge yet back under construction after a half year delay due to supposed design problems, and not due to the rumored lack of funds, due to J.D.'s mama not delivering that federal pork?

Both J.D. and his mama need to be fired....

Hoping The Lake Wichita Revitalization Project Happens Soon

I was back in Lake Wichita Park today, climbing to the summit of Mount Wichita.

I cut the mountain climbing short due to there being way too many skeeters skeetering about.

I'm assuming the recent rain and the drop in temperature has the mosquitoes out and about in bloody bite mode.

When a skeeter skeetered to my left ear lobe I decided to seek skeeter free shelter.

I was not long in Wichita Falls before I learned there was a local effort known as the Lake Wichita Revitalization Project, aimed at returning Lake Wichita to its former glory, well, actually, even more glorious than its former glory days of long ago.

Below is an artist's rendering of one aspect of the proposed Lake Wichita Revitalization.

In the view from the summit, in the photo at the top, we are looking down on the area where hopefully soon the beach you see above will be built.

The Wichita Falls city website is where I gleaned the beach scene, along with a lot of other information about this project.

The Lake Wichita Revitalization Project came into existence a couple years ago. Currently the permitting process is underway, with the project taking 1.5 to 3 years to complete. The lake will be drained and dredged so as to make for a deeper, healthier lake. Water features will be added, such as a canoe/kayak trail which will wind its way around Mount Wichita and a new mountain which will be added near Mount Wichita.

I have not been in Wichita Falls long enough to know if this project is actually going to happen, or if it will end up being like a Fort Worth project, as in dawdle along in slow motion, blustered by a lot of hot air, turning into an embarrassing boondoggle due to corruption, ineptness, poor planning and, well, wanton stupidity.

I suspect, judging by what I have seen so far in Wichita Falls, with so many things, like city parks, done so well, and events, such as the just completed Hotter'N Hell 100, done so well, that the Lake Wichita Revitalization Project is going to happen, and will happen in a timely fashion.

And the end result will be a HUGE boon to Wichita Falls and the entire Texoma region.

I hope the Lake Wichita Revitalization happens much sooner than later. I want another mountain to climb, a lake to swim in and a kayak trail to paddle on....

Is The TRWD-Gate Scandal About To Blow Wide Open?

Last week, on August 24, 2016, to be precise, I blogged about Tarrant Regional Water District Board Election Fraud.

In that blogging I blogged about the rather bizarre fact that nothing had been done about the rather obvious electoral fraud which occurred in the last TRWD Board Election, where Marty Leonard and Jim Lane were re-elected in a HUGE landslide, breaking Mary Kelleher's previous TRWD Board Election record by around 10,000 votes.

10,000 votes in an election which did not attract a large number of voters, and yet this election somehow generated around 10,000 absentee ballots, which, apparently, coincidentally, was about the same number of votes Leonard and Lane landslided to victory with.

Yet I detected no verbalization of outrage in what passes for the Tarrant County press and media. No editorial in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram calling for an investigation. Nary a peep in Fort Worth Weekly, Nothing about the unseemly election results in the Fort Worth Business Press, which had endorsed one of those trying to unseat Leonard and Lane, that being Craig Bickley.

Two days after blogging about me being perplexed by the TRWD electoral fraud I was informed that finally something, supposedly is being done about this miscarriage of electoral justice.

I first learned of this on August 26, 2016 via the Star-Telegraph. Please note that is Star-Telegraph, not Star-Telegram.

Above is a partial screen cap of the Star-Telegraph blog post titled Attorney General’s Office Investigating Voter Fraud in Tarrant County.

An entity about which I know nothing, called Empower Texans, is apparently behind the effort to ferret out the corruption in elections in Tarrant County.

You can read the Empower Texans post about the Tarrant County Electoral Fraud in AG Investigating Voting Abnormalities in Tarrant County Elections.

As you can see, via the screen cap from the Star-Telegraph, the official in charge of the Tarrant County Election Office admits to knowing there were abnormalities related to mail-in ballots.

Now, unless I missed it, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram has not informed its readers that Tarrant County is being investigated for Electoral Fraud. Would one not think that this is news the local population might want to know about?

It's like there is a Watergate type cover up of a worse crime than Watergate, with no local Woodward and Bernstein, journalizing for no local newspaper, following the money to find out how it happened that thousands of absentee ballots came in to play in the last TRWD Board Election.

Who has the most to lose if control of the TRWD Board is lost to the good ol' boy and girl network which runs Fort Worth and its environs in what is known as the Fort Worth Way?

It is all very perplexing.

Hotter'N Hell 100 Finish Line In Wichita Falls With Mr. Spiffy

No, that is not Mr. Spiffy you are looking at here, shortly after crossing the Hotter'N Hell 100 Finish Line.

I did not catch their names, but the announcer announced, to thunderous applause, that this pair of bikers was somewhere in the 90 years old range. I did not catch the exact age, due to the atmosphere being a bit noisy, which you can hear for yourself via the below video taken at the Hotter'N Hell 100 Finish Line.

Not everyone crossing the Finish Line rolled the entire 100 miles. I documented that fact in a blogging previous to this one titled Pickle Juice & Muscle Milk At The Wichita Falls Hotter'N Hell 100.

To qualify to go the full 100 miles riders must make it to what is known as "Hell's Gate" at the 60 mile mark by 12:30pm.

Mr. Spiffy took time out from rolling his wheels to take a picture of making it through Hell's Gate and documenting having done so on Facebook. Just a second, I will go see if I can find that picture. I'm sure Mr. Spiffy won't mind me purloining it.

If one makes it though Hell's Gate in time I believe the 100 mile route then eventually takes riders through Sheppard Air Force base where much cheering takes place.

Somewhere around 14,000 riders ride in the Hotter'N Hell 100. There are distance options shorter than the 100, such as 50 mile and 25 mile options. I think there may even be a shorter option.

What I do know for sure is riders were crossing the Finish Line the entire time I was there. I think I was off looking at something else when the first rider to complete the 100 miles crossed the Finish Line.

Below you can see a couple of race helpers holding orange strings to which Hotter'N Hell 100 race completion medals were attached. Part of the medal giver's job seemed to be to keep the riders moving along to make way for incoming Finish Line crossers.

The Finish Line scene became a bit chaotic at times, which you will also see in the video at the bottom.

As you can see, bikers came in all sizes and ages.

I was at the Hotter'N Hell 100 not too long today before I decided that next year I want to roll wheels at this event. This will require new wheels. A mountain bike would not work.

And now the aforementioned video where I find myself wandering amongst the incoming bikers crossing the Finish Line...

Pickle Juice & Muscle Milk At The Wichita Falls Hotter'N Hell 100

Yesterday I was told by a lifelong Wichita Falls local that the Hotter'N Hell 100 was a really big deal, bringing thousands of people to downtown Wichita Falls.

I thought there might be some exaggerating going on with that thousands of people claim.

Then this morning I was listening to the local radio station which calls itself BOB to find myself being told that there were already thousands of people at the MPEC (Multi-Purpose Events Center).

Yesterday I learned from Hotter'N Hell rider, Mr. Spiffy, that one needs to be at the finish line by 11 to be certain to see the first of the 100 mile riders cross the line.

I arrived in the MPEC zone around ten this morning. I quickly realized that that thousands of people claim was no exaggeration. All the parking lots around the MPEC were full, as were multiple other parking places near the MPEC. I drove towards the heart of downtown and found a place to park near where I parked for the 4th of July parade. It was only a couple block walk to get to the event center.

Via Facebook Mr. Spiffy has been updating his progress on today's 100 mile ride. The only update I saw prior to leaving for the Hotter'N Hell 100 was Mr. Spiffy's update from the first rest stop, where he was in line eagerly awaiting his dose of Pickle Juice.

Pickle Juice? wondered I and others.

One of the first things I saw upon arrival at the Hotter'N Hell 100 was that which you see above. A banner advertising the aforementioned Pickle Juice. I was offered no sample of Pickle Juice, but I was offered, multiple times, something called Muscle Milk. The first time I was asked if I would like some Muscle Milk I took slight umbrage. The question somehow seemed disparaging. In the video below, at the bottom of this blogging, you will see the moment I discovered from whence the Muscle Milk came.

The temperate was a bit warm, in the 80s, as I explored the Hotter'N Hell 100, and humid.

The above person, attired to look like a Holstein cow, asking people to eat more chicken, was miserable just to look at. The sad cow looked so HOT, and a bit feeble from likely heat exhaustion, with that feebleness requiring walking assistance in the form of the lady on the left helping the cow keep upright.

Art Bikes was a new addition to the Hotter'N Hell 100 this year.

There were dozens of cleverly designed bikes. The elephant bike was not the most clever, but it did seem to be the most photogenic.

Below we have some abstract Bike Art.

Near the Finish Line there is a large First Aid Station.

I don't know at what point in the ride the guy above crashed into injury mode. It looked painful. Did he crash near the Finish Line? Or crash miles away, but continue on to the Finish Line where he coasted to the First Aid Station?

At the Hotter'N Hell 100 one can escape the HEAT and find themselves in air-conditioned comfort inside a large exhibition hall where a lot of vendors were exhibiting a lot of bike related goods. As you can see, more people were enjoying the HEAT outdoors, than the indoor conditioned air.

What is all that orange material you see below being guarded by guards in gray t-shirts?

Well, the above is at the finish line where a constant stream of bikers crossed the line to find themselves being given a medal attached to an orange string.

The video below will give you a better idea of what some of the Hotter'N Hell 100 event looked like this morning. I took a lot of pictures, and video. Following this blogging I will blog another one, focused on the Hotter'N Hell Finish Line, where you may, or may not, see Mr. Spiffy.