Big Bad Booboo On Publishing Blog Comments

 Awhile back Google overhauled their Blogger application with which I do the blogging thing. The changes took some getting used to.

One of the changes I had not noticed was the item you can see via the above screen cap. On the left you see a column. There are two items in that column that are orange. The one we are interested in is the second orange item.

Comments

Previously if I clicked "Comments" a sub-menu would open showing the options of "Published", "Awaiting Moderation" and "Spam".

Previously if I clicked "Comments" I would see those sub-menu options, with the "Awaiting Moderation" option telling me the number of comments waiting to be moderated.

So, a couple days ago I clicked "Comments" and saw there was no longer those aforementioned sub-menu options. It took me way too long to figure out I now had to click in another location to see those sub-menu options, only to find myself mortified to see there were dozens of comments awaiting being moderated.

Some of those commenters repeated their comments when they did not see them published. And then followed that with comments asking what does one have to do to make a comment on the Durango blog.

I have now hit the publish button on those comments that had been waiting to be moderated. Well, almost all of them. There were a couple which were examples of why one moderates such things.

Another thing Google did, which helped cause me this mortification, is previously comments were sent by Google to the primary email tab in Gmail. I have now learned Google sends comments to the social email tab.

I had wondered a time or two why comments seemed to have dried up, but did not spend much time wondering about it. I figured I had just grown boring and non-controversial, so no one felt compelled to give me a piece of their mind.

Looking at the stats Google includes in the Blogger Dashboard, I was surprised to see that during the long long time this blog has existed there have been slightly over 7,500 comments.

I would not have guessed the number to be so high. 

Though I do remember a time or two or three when something would cause a comment frenzy.

Such as the time sinkholes near Wink, out in West Texas, caused a comment frenzy of dozens, coming in so fast I lost control of it. As soon as I would publish a comment, two more would come in, all arguing about sink holes, if I remember right.

It may have been more complicated than simply being about sinkholes...

I've Been COVID Vaccinated So Free To Roam The Country

 A little over 24 hours ago I got shot with the Johnson & Johnson COVID vaccine.

If I remember right this was the first time this century I have been shot.

Methinks needle technology has improved since the last time I got stuck with a needle. Because I barely felt the needle go into my arm yesterday.

It was so pain-free I did not realize I had been shot, so about 30 seconds after I thought I felt a little tingle I asked the shot administrator when are you gonna shoot me? 

The shot administrator then said the needle has been in your arm for a half a minute.

I've had zero after effect. No pain at the injection site. Nothing.

This morning I went to both ALDI and across the street from ALDI, to Walmart.

ALDI has added a new sign at the store's entry since I was last at that location a couple days ago. No longer is there a sign saying all who enter must be masked. Now a sign says if you have been vaccinated ALDI is not requiring you to wear a mask.

And then on to Walmart I was surprised to see all the masks required signs have been removed. Most Walmart employees were still masked, but I saw several without.

I wore my mask into both ALDI and Walmart.

It will take me awhile to shake the feeling that I don't want to be mask-less lest people think I'm an idiot Republican right wing nut job Trumper.

The majority of people in both ALDI and Walmart were wearing masks today.

I suspect the number of maskers will be steadily dropping as time marches forward. And soon I will feel free to roam about the country.

Unless something bad happens...

Looking At Panzerschwein In Texas With Nephew Jason

This morning Spencer Jack's paternal parental unit sent the above to my phone.

My Favorite Nephew Jason is as fluent in Deutsch as I am, so I don't think he was sending me this so that I could explain what panzerschwein in English.

Even people who are not fluent in German might easily figure out, sort of, what panzerschwein is.

Panzers were scary German tanks in WWII.

Armored tanks.

Schwein is what many called German in WWII.

Pigs.

So, panzerschwein are armored pigs.

Now, what animal might a German settlers experiencing the wilds of frontier Texas think looked like an armored pig?

If you answered "armadillo" methinks you are likely correct.

I do not remember ever seeing a single armadillo at my current location. When I lived further south, in the D/FW zone, I frequently saw armadillos. Sometimes with baby armadillos, which are extremely cute.

Let me see if I can find a photo of one of my encounters with baby armadillos...

I remember this encounter like it was yesterday, but it was well over a decade ago. At River Legacy Park in Arlington.

I got down low on the paved trail to take the picture. The baby armadillos sensed something was there, they do not see too well when young. The four began moving towards me. I backed off. Their mother did not seem at all concerned.

I wonder if those early German settlers in Texas tried to make bacon out of what they thought were armored pigs?

No Third Kind Close Encounter In Wichita Falls

This morning I was driving a senior citizen to various locations to pick up various prescriptions when at one point, when stopped at a red light, I looked up to see what looked to be a flying saucer landing.

This was not a close encounter of the third kind, because I saw no life forms exiting the flying saucer.

This is looking southwest at the intersection between the Seymour Highway and Brook Avenue, with Arby's directly left, out the driver's side window.

The lower part of the flying saucer landing appeared to be a cloth material, waving in the wind, which you can not see, because this is a photograph, not a video. You also can not see the rain falling, but you can make out a drop or two on the windshield.

There is little interesting, structure wise, in this town. Thus finding this flying saucer/UFO like structure to be interesting, structure wise.

It takes little to be interesting these limiting COVID days. But, such appears to rapidly be getting better.

Tomorrow I get the Johnson & Johnson COVID shot in the arm. And once that vaccination is confirmed I am driving to D/FW to the first time in well over a year.

There is a bridge there I want to drive over...

TRWD Board Violates Texas Open Meetings Law Again

Yesterday Elsie Hotpepper emailed me a link to an article in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram titled Did Tarrant water district directors violate open meetings law when they discussed manager?

This is a long article containing a lot of what seem like obfuscations trying to deny the obvious fact that Texas law regarding open meetings had been violated.

This is not the first time the TRWD Board has been accused of this type thing. Plotting shenanigans behind closed doors with the public and press shut out.

This current instance involves discussing the hiring of a manager to replace the controversial current TRWD general manager, Jim Oliver. 

The controversy stems from doing this before the newly elected TRWD Board member, Mary Kelleher, once again is sworn in as a board member.

The current TRWD board president, who Mary Kelleher defeated in the recent election, Jack Stevens, wants to make the selection of the new general manager before Mary comes on board.

Mary Kelleher tends to asks questions, which make those who like their shenanigans not to be questioned, a bit uncomfortable.

Now those living in parts of America where something like a water board is of no consequence, well, such is not the case in Fort Worth and Tarrant County.

Where water is gold.

Basically the situation is a 21st century version of the early 20th century California Water Wars.

For example, this line from the Wikipedia article about the California Water Wars could be applied to the Tarrant Region Water District (TRWD) Board...

The water rights were acquired through political fighting and, as described by one author, "chicanery, subterfuge ... and a strategy of lies".
 
In the California Water Wars it was the chicanery, subterfuge and lies involved in taking water from the Owens Valley which sparked the war. 

In the TRWD Water Wars it is the chicanery, subterfuge and lies involved in things like building a reservoir east of Dallas, in cooperation with Dallas, along with a pipeline, all costing a lot of money. We are talking a lot of money in the billions type of a lot of money. The deal struck with Dallas regarding this reservoir and pipeline and who gets the water and how and when they get it, is the core of that particular controversy.

And then there is the TRWD's Trinity River Vision Boondoggle, which has been limping along for most of this century, spending money with little to show for the spending. And what one can see are things like unfinished little freeway overpass type bridges, being built over dry land, to connect the Fort Worth mainland to an imaginary island, with that imaginary island made possible only if a cement lined ditch is ever dug under those little bridges, with Trinity River water diverted into the ditch.

A less expensive example of  TRWD TRV chicanery is an item such as the "work of art", at an almost million dollar cost, installed years ago at the center of a roundabout, installed years before that roundabout become functional. Why was money spent on this "work of art" which some have described as an homage to an aluminum trash can, and others as a giant cheese grater? Did the artist have a friend on the TRWD or TRV board who was helping this artist by directing this art project to its almost million dollar beneficiary? Why was there no design competition? Or some sort of open call for ideas of what to install at the center of that roundabout? And why was it installed years before the roundabout was serving its roundabout function?

Another example of this type TRWD chicanery was when the TRWD finagled to buy the property on which Lagrave Field was located. Board member, Jim Lane, railroaded this one, to help his financially beleaguered friend who owned the property. If I remember right something like $21 million was paid by the TRWD for this chunk of land. And then part of that chunk was turned into the world's first drive-in movie theater of the 21st century.

Chicanery, subterfuge and a strategy of lies, yes, that sort of sums of the modus operandi of the TRWD over the years I have watched it in action.

I suspect soon Mary Kelleher will be getting answers to those questions she was blocked from getting her first time around on the TRWD Board.

Maybe we will learn why J.D. Granger has not been fired. And how that homage to an aluminum trash can came to be. And how much has been spent on junkets and other nonsense by J.D. Granger and his merry band of grifting river floaters...

Did Thousands Celebrate Fort Worth's New Bridge With A Walk Across?

Saw that which you see above, on Facebook, yesterday. An aerial view, looking north, across San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge, in 1937, on a day in May when people walked across the new bridge whilst planes flew overhead.

The Golden Gate Bridge is one of the most iconic signature structures in the world. You see a photo of that bridge and you know what and where it is. Like seeing the Statue of Liberty, or the Eiffel Tower.

It took less than four years to build the Golden Gate Bridge, back in the 1930s, during the Great Depression. The bridge was built over deep, fast moving saltwater, with widely varying tidal levels. 

Meanwhile in Fort Worth, Texas.

Way back in October of 2014 Fort Worth had a TNT exploding ceremony to mark the start of construction of three simple little bridges, over dry land, intended to one day connect the Fort Worth mainland to an imaginary island, when water is added under the bridges via a cement lined ditch.

Those three simple little bridges were touted as destined to become iconic signature bridges, recognized world-wide as being in Fort Worth.

The first of the three bridges to be somewhat completed opened to some traffic in March of 2021.

Almost 7 years after that TNT explosion marked the start of construction.

I do not know if San Francisco had a TNT exploding ceremony, or a ceremony of any sort, to mark the start of construction of the Golden Gate Bridge.

I also do not know if Fort Worth had a celebratory day with its new bridge, where people could walk across the short new bridge, whilst airplanes flew overhead. 

I suspect not.

Fort Worth Congresswoman Kay Granger's son, J.D., was given the job of being the Executive Director of what eventually became known as the Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District Vision.

The builders of these bridges.

J.D. was given this job to help motivate his mother to secure federal funds for the project, because Fort Worth was too poor, and did not know how to finance public works projects in the way towns do who wear their Big City Pants.

J.D.'s salary eventually went over $200 K a year, plus lots of perks, such as junkets to other towns. 

Eventually, a few years after it became obvious that Fort Worth had become home to America's Biggest Boondoggle, J.D. was removed as Executive Director of the TRV, with an experienced project manager hired to replace him.

J.D. was given a new title, and no pay cut.

A sane town would long ago have demanded J.D. be fired. Particularly after it became widely known he was engaging in an extra-marital affair with a Trinity River Vision subordinate, creating what is known as a hostile work environment.

A sane town would also long ago have replaced J.D.'s mother with a Representative in Congress who actually represented the people they were supposed to represent.

But, that ain't Fort Worth.

An amusing irony of those three pitiful little bridges being touted as one day being iconic signature structures representing Fort Worth to the world, is that that likely is going to be a reality.

Those three bridges will symbolize a town which has trouble getting much done. From installing sidewalks along streets, to installing modern facilities in the town's parks, allowing the removal of the ubiquitous embarrassing outhouses.

Symbolizing a poorly thought out public works project the public never voted for, claiming to be a vitally needed flood control scheme, where there has been no flooding for well over half a century due to flood control measures already in place which the rest of America already paid for.

The un-needed flood control scheme masked a poorly thought out economic development scheme, which was designed to enrich those who owned property in the area which has become America's Biggest Boondoggle, property owners such as the Granger Grifter Gang. And others.

Am I erroneous? Was there a celebration with the opening of the first of Fort Worth's pitiful little freeway overpass-like bridges? With the public walking across the new bridges.

If so I saw no photos of such, and would appreciate seeing one if such exists...

All Sikes Lake Goslings On Display Today With Pink Evening Primroses

On this 3rd Saturday of the 2021 version of May I rolled my bike north on the Circle Trail for a few miles, with a windy assist from the south speeding me along effortlessly. Eventually I tired of the easy sailing, so I exited the Circle Trail to head west to Sikes Lake. 

Whilst in the outer world today the temperature was nearing 80, with that aforementioned wind blowing in clouds which later today are scheduled to produce booming thunder and possible big balls of hail.

My past couple rides around Sikes Lake I have not seen that big throng of goslings I have previously made mention of. I have no clue where they go when they are not seen. It is not like there are a lot of places to hide dozens of geese.

Yesterday's bike ride I came up on a mom and dad goose pair with four goslings. There were waddling on the parking lot of Vernon College, which is located at the northwest end of Sikes Lake. I would have taken a photo of those geese at that odd location, but at that point in time I was focused on my malfunctioning music playing device.

Today I saw all the geese previously seen.

The big flock of dozens of goslings, and their full grown guardians, were first seen exiting the lake. Doing such appeared to be a struggle for some of the goslings. I crossed the bridge and got myself south of the flock to take the photo you see above, where you can see some of the goslings in the field of pink evening primroses.

A short distance, as in about 50 feet, to the east of the flock of gosling frolicking in the primroses, I came upon what appeared to be the goose family I saw yesterday at Vernon College.

Minus one gosling.

I have been told it is treacherous sailing for the goslings when they are paddling on the lake. There are big fish in Sikes Lake.

Catfish and bass.

I have seen those monsters jump out of the lake to catch a fly. Apparently those big fish will also quickly swallow a little gosling floating on by. Such would likely happen so quickly mom and dad goose would have no clue what happened to one of their babies.

Mother Nature can be a harsh mama at times...

The Serious Texas Hoodoo Cairn Controversy

Long ago, in the first decade of this century, I regularly hiked the Tandy Hills in Fort Worth.

At some point during that first decade there was a news story out of Utah about a scout master leading his troop of Boy Scouts in toppling over a Hoodoo in Kodachrome State Park. That state park is located right by Bryce Canyon National Park, at a much lower elevation, and features similar rock formations.

Around the time the scout master got in trouble in Utah an artfully stacked pile of rocks appeared next to one of the Tandy Hills trails. I remember seeing this and thinking it to be a remarkable feat of rock balancing. I took a photo and blogged about it, speculating on what created this remarkable feat of rock balancing. And with Utah Hoodoos fresh on my mind, I jokingly speculated about this, wondering something along the line "Was this a natural formation I had not noted before? A Texas version of a Utah Hoodoo".

Upon returning the next day I found the Tandy Hills Hoodoo had been toppled, just like that Utah Hoodoo. And then over and over and over and over again, new Hoodoos would appear on the Tandy Hills, always to be knocked down again.

So, yesterday I made mention of having been erroneous regarding the correct name of the Wichita Bluff Nature Area. This prompted an amusing comment from someone named Cowtown Crude...

Cowtown Crude has left a new comment on your post "Learned To Remove S Biking Wichita Bluff Nature Area With Thunder Cracked Window":

"...that I have been erroneously adding an 's' to Bluff.".

You also incorrectly refer to cairns as hoodoos.

Cairns - a mound of rough stones built as a memorial or landmark, typically on a hilltop or skyline. Man-made

Hoodoos - shafts of rock that protrude from the bottom of arid basins. Naturally occurring.

A recent episode of Jeopardy! included a clue with cairns as the answer.

_____________________

I knew those piles of rocks were not really Hoodoos, and that such piles were often manmade trail markers known as Cairns. But, I think I will stick with wrongly calling these remarkable feats of rock balancing Hoodoos.

Scroll down past the below Cairns and you will see my all time favorite photo, and some Washington Cairns

At some point in time during the 1990s, my nephews Christopher and Jeremy took me to the Mount Baker Ski Area on a warm September day.

That is my Favorite Nephew Jeremy on the left, which would make that my Favorite Nephew Christopher on the right. If you regularly read this blog, a few days ago you saw a photo of Jeremy and Christopher kissing their mother during Christopher's wedding weekend in Cabo San Lucas.

Jeremy and Christopher are sitting on top of Tabletop Mountain. Behind them is Mount Shuksan. The Mount Baker volcano is in the direction Christopher is looking.

And behind Jeremy and Christopher, between the nephews and Mount Shuksan, you can see a row of Cairns. I am just about 100% at the point in time I saw these I did not refer to them as Hoodoos. I don't think I knew of Hoodoos then. I don't remember if I knew they were known as Cairns at that point in time.

Looking at that photo of JR and CJ it causes me that homesick feeling. I was looking forward to seeing such scenery this summer. I doubt the hike up Tabletop would have happened. That would be fun though. It's an easy hike with a long series of switchbacks taking you to the top.

I do not plan on visiting the Wichita Bluff Nature Area Hoodoo Cairns today. But, my current plans may change as the hours of the day roll on by...

Learned To Remove S Biking Wichita Bluff Nature Area With Thunder Cracked Window

This morning I drove my bike to the east parking lot access to the Circle Trail on Loop 11. I had planned to roll my bike's wheels east on the Circle Trail to see what the current state of progress is of the construction of the link to the Circle Trail in Lucy Park.

But, the trail in that direction was blocked today by jackhammering on the trail near the parking lot.

So, instead of east I headed west to the Wichita Bluff Nature Area, where I realized today, upon seeing the entry sign, that I have been erroneously adding an 's' to Bluff.

Apparently this is only one Wichita Bluff.

I think I turned the Bluff plural because there is more than one instance of the trail going up and down on what I assumed were separate bluffs.

Anyway, I had myself a mighty fine time doing some speeding bike riding. And I managed to have on the right amount of clothing. With the temperature in the high 50s, and a wind blowing from the north, sweatpants and a long sleeved t-shirt kept me from getting too chilly.

Blue sky is scheduled to return tomorrow.

Yesterday's thunderstorm did damage.

Damage to my abode. 

A strike of lightning and the simultaneous clap of thunder felt like an earthquake, vibrating the floor and walls. And cracking the glass in one of my kitchen windows.

It has been over 20 years since I have experienced a real earthquake. I never felt any of the fracking quakes with plagued the D/FW area when the Barnett Shale earth poking was going on.

Wichita Bluffs Nature Area Wildflowers

This is the time of year when Texas is at its most scenic. Well, more accurately, this is the only time of year when the Texas landscape is naturally scenic.

As you can see, the Wichita Bluffs Nature Area is alive with a little color, and a lush jungle of green. 

Til today it had been awhile since I went hiking on the Wichita Bluffs. I do not remember last spring, or the spring before that, the Wichita Bluffs being this green, with so many wildflowers.

Conditions this year must be optimum for wildflowers to bloom. Even so, I have only seen the State Wildflower of Texas where people have planted it in their landscaping at their house. I've not seen a single bluebonnet blooming naturally anywhere on the landscape at my location in North Texas.

The last time I visited the Wichita Bluffs, the area where Hoodoos arise, the area had no Hoodoos. Today there was the Hoodoo you see above. There were no wildflowers blooming by the Hoodoo.

I think the orange wildflower you see above is known as an Indian Paintbrush. I could easily be wrong about that. I have no idea what the purplish/blue wildflower's name is.

As you can see, via the photo at the top, it is cloudy here today. A slight drizzle drizzled whilst I was hiking.

Yesterday the outer world heated to nearly 90. Today a big chill has cooled the outer world down into the 50s. Thunderstorms are on the weather menu for later today...