Today I Voted The New-Fangled Texas Paper Ballot Method

I voted this morning, and got my shirt stamped, indicating such.

Voting in Texas is so much more involved and entertaining than the type voting I was used to whilst living in Washington.

I do not remember what the year was when last I voted at a polling place in Washington. It would have been some point in time in the 1980s. By the 1990s I was voting via the mail-in ballot method. I do not know if Washington still has polling stations on election day, or if it is all mail-in ballots now.

In Oregon you are automatically registered to vote when you turn 18. You have to opt out if you do not want to be mailed a mail-in ballot.

If I remember right, the first time I voted in Texas it was the Bush/Gore general election year of 2000. Again, if I remember right, at that point in time you cast your votes by punching holes in a paper ballot.

I do not think Texas had early voting back in 2000. I remember it was a long long line.

The last several times voting in Texas has been via electronic machines. You entered a code via spinning a dial, then kept spinning that dial to make your voting selections. It seemed very video gamish. And sort of confusing to us elderly folks.

But, now, today, once again, a totally new way of voting. 

First off, in Texas you have to show your voter registration card, and a photo I.D., then scribble your name on a touch screen. You then go to the next station where you are given a blank paper ballot and your ballot code. 

My ballot code today was 53435. I'm looking at it right now.

You then go to the next station, where you do the actual voting. You enter the code, via touch screen. Which then instructs you to insert the blank ballot into the printer. When proper insertion is detected, you begin voting, via touch screen.

When you are satisfied with your choices, you touch a button that causes the printer to print your ballot. You then take your printed ballot to another machine, where you insert the ballot into another insertion point, which sucks in the ballot and the screen tells you that you have successfully voted.

You are then given the "I VOTED" stamp.

I asked what the purpose was of this more convoluted process.

So as to have a paper ballot record of each voter's voting.

Oh.

So, some states in America, like Oregon and Washington, just mail voters their ballot, with the voter either returning the ballot by mail or dropping the ballot in a ballot drop-box.

Whilst another state, Texas, uses an entirely different, more complicated method.

Today, some of it seemed totally pointless. Like the signing your name on the touch screen. The stylus used to do so did not render it possible to make even a remotely legible signature. I watched the guy ahead of me do his signature and thought he must not know how to write. And then it was my turn and I saw it was not possible to make a legible signature. So, what was the point of the signature?

And now I wait a week to see if anyone I voted for won...

Perfect Wichita Bluff Nature Area Conditions With Washington License Plates

With weather conditions near perfect, on this last day of the 2022 version of October, also known as Halloween, I took myself to the west entry to the Wichita Bluff Nature Area for some salubrious acquisition of endorphins via fast paced hill hiking.

As you can see, there is a little cloud action, rendering it not a totally clear blue-sky day.

That covered picnic pavilion you see here is my turn around point when I hike the Bluffs from the west.

This is also the high point of the Wichita Bluff Nature Area.

Heading home, after the Bluff hiking, I saw something I have rarely seen in Texas, that I used to see all the time when I lived in Washington.

A car with a Washington state license plate.

I do not know why zooming in on the license plate caused the water drops effect. I suspect my windshield is in need of being washed.

Washington has not changed its license plate design since the celebration of the centennial of Washington becoming a state in 1889.

That mountain you can almost see on the license plate is Washington's biggest volcano, Mount Rainier.

The current primary Texas license plate is plain black and white. And has changed several times since I've been in Texas.

I don't know why Texas does not have a license plate with the biggest volcano in Texas on it...

Final Sunny Sunday October Lucy Park Visit

On this final sunny Sunday of the 2022 version of October, my motorized means of motion took me back to Lucy Park for some salubrious nature communing.

As you can see via the photo documentation, the recent rain has raised the water level of the Wichita River, but not high enough to reach the deck of the Lucy Park suspension bridge, which is something I have eye witnessed happening.

You can also see via the photo documentation that the leaves in the trees are finally beginning to get their proper fall color scheme.

In a couple hours I get to watch the Seattle Seahawks in my time zone for the first time this football season...

Another Tale Of Two Cities

No, that is not the stunning skyline of beautiful downtown Fort Worth you are looking at here, or a completed section of Fort Worth's imaginary waterfront on its imaginary lake or imaginary island.

Speaking of Fort Worth, last week Elsie Hotpepper Took Us Back To America's Biggest Boondoggle where we learned that the pseudo public works project known as the Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island Vision, a vision Fort Worth has been trying to see for this entire century, now estimates it will take another decade to manage to dig a cement lined ditch, to add Trinity River water to, flowing under three little bridges, which took seven years to build, over dry land.

Seven years to build three little bridges. Over dry land.

About the same time Fort Worth began trying to build those three little bridges, another American town, Seattle, being boring a tunnel under its downtown, so that the earthquake damaged Alaskan Way Viaduct, which had long been a blight on Seattle's waterfront, could be removed.

That tunnel has been completed for three years. The Alaskan Way Viaduct is long gone. And the re-build of the Seattle waterfront is well underway, to be competed in 2025.

That photo at the top is from an article in today's Seattle Times titled Seattle Aquarium’s Ocean Pavilion will transform its focus and the waterfront.  

That photo is the first good look I have had of what a section of the Seattle waterfront looks like without the Alaskan Way Viaduct.

How is it one town in America can get big things done, whilst another town in America gets little done, in slow motion?

An excerpt from today's Seattle Times article shows a stark contrast between this ongoing project in Seattle, and what you might read in Fort Worth print media about its decades long project and its slow fruition...

YOU HAVE TO squint and use your imagination to visualize the finished product, but a transformation is underway on Seattle’s central waterfront. Where the Alaskan Way Viaduct once loomed, a walkway connecting Pike Place Market to Puget Sound is taking shape. The outlines of parks, playgrounds, bike lanes and a broad pedestrian promenade are beginning to emerge. One pier already has been rebuilt to welcome the public, and another is in the works.

Civic leaders say Seattle hasn’t experienced such a profound makeover since 1962, when the World’s Fair reshaped public infrastructure and propelled the city into the future. When the work is completed in 2025, foot traffic along Elliott Bay is expected to triple.

“This landscape that was dominated by a big, honking, gray, rumbling freeway will now be a massive public park for the people,” says Seattle City Councilmember Andrew Lewis, whose district includes the waterfront.

At the center of it all will be the Seattle Aquarium’s new Ocean Pavilion: a 50,000-square-foot exhibit space featuring sharks, rays and other animals and ecosystems from the tropical Pacific. Integrated with the city’s elevated walkway, the structure’s roof will be a public plaza with unimpeded views of the sunset and Mount Rainier. At ground level, a circular port called an oculus will allow passersby to peer into a 325,000-gallon coral canyon teeming with thousands of fish and invertebrates.

Projected to be done in mid-2024, the expansion is Seattle Aquarium’s most ambitious and costly undertaking since it opened 45 years ago in a wooden building at Pier 59. It’s a natural fit to anchor the waterfront redevelopment, Lewis says. The aquarium is already hugely popular, he points out, and the new building will enhance its ability to attract and educate new generations of visitors.

You reading this in the DFW zone, can you imagine reading an article in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram about such a project underway in Fort Worth? 

No. A town that takes seven years to build three little bridges over dry land, has some serious issues in dire need of being addressed...

Friday Rain Floods My Location Along With A Lot Of Thunder

Rain arrived, as per prediction, last night, along with the also predicted thunderstorming. Several hours into daylight the rain continues to rain down upon us.

Rain down upon us in amounts so copious that my primary exit route to my vehicle is flooded, which is what you are looking at in the photo documentation, looking down from my elevated patio vantage point.

I think this is the highest I have seen my exit route flood since I have been being flooded at my current location.

It may be possible to get to my vehicle, dry, via another route. 

I think I will just be content to stay indoors until the rain abates...

Google Remembers Driving Miss Daisy To Monument Valley & State Fair Of Texas & More

Two days in a row, for the first time, Google has sent to my email, emails purporting to be memories from that day, in which I actually remember all the memories. 

At the upper left, that is me looking at my antique, long gone Casion digital camera, which had a feature which allowed you to rotate the camera lens towards oneself making for what, in this century, is known as a selfie.

In this particular 'selfie' we ae in Monument Valley, in Arizona, two days after getting off a Lake Powell houseboat. The day we exited the houseboat we stayed at the San Juan Inn, in Mexican Hat, Utah.

Below the selfie, on the lower left, that is the sky ride at the State Fair of Texas, in Dallas. 

The upper right is the lake in Veterans Oasis Park in Chandler, Arizona. Below the lake photo is Driving Miss Daisy Around Chandler Veterans Oasis With Snakes. 

The lower right is an arch in Arches National Park in Utah.

And now, on to today's Google memories...

The upper left is, once again, the State Fair of Texas.

The other four Google memories are all from Dreamy Draw Park at Piestewa Peak, in Phoenix. At that location we did Dreamy Draw Hiking Miss Daisy In & Out Up Piestewa Peak.

That was a memorable day. Mom had a lot of fun getting rolled on trails through the park. I remember at one point mom memorably saying, "I didn't think I'd ever get to do something like this again." 

I do not think mom realized how steep the trail was, a couple times. The transit chair had good brakes.

So, there you go, my Google memories from the past two days...

The Dreaded Holiday Season Has Begun At Midwestern State University

A few days ago I saw that the annual installation of the Burns Fantasy of Light had begun at Midwestern State University. 

For me, this signals the start of the dreaded holiday season. 

We are now on the fast track to Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas and a Happy New Year.

I stopped at the Fantasy of Lights on my way back from Lucy Park today, to photo document Cinderella's carriage.

The evil step-sisters have not yet arrived.

Nor have Dorothy, Toto, the Tin Man, Cowardly Lion and the Scarecrow.

High Tide At Sikes Lake With Happy Geese

The sky has returned to being totally blue at my North Texas location, after being gray most of yesterday. 

The incoming rain dropped enough wet stuff to have water spilling over the spillway of the Sikes Lake dam. 

That incoming rain came in with a cold front with chilled in the 40s, last night, was warmed to only 58 degrees when I drove to Sikes Lake this morning.

It did not seem like enough rain rained down to fill Sike Lake back to full pool. But, apparently it did drip enough.

The former low tide tideflats are now back covered by a high tide. The geese seemed to be enjoying floating again, without their goose feet scraping the lake bottom.

I Googled "goose feet" to see what goose feet are actually called, and learned the proper term is pes anserinus.

Yes, I can see how pes anserinus would easily be the common term one would use when referring to goose feet.

Even colder temperatures are on the menu later in the week. Into the 30s. I need to go on my annual long underwear hunt...

Monday Morning Rainy Day In North Texas

It is a dark and stormy Monday morning at my North Texas location.

So far no thunderbooming, but strong wind gusts are blowing rain sideways.

In the view above we are looking west out of one of my living room windows.

The rain has already flooded my primary access route to the carport.

I need to make my way to the carport this morning to drive to the library to replenish my book supply.

This is the first heavy rain in many months. I don't know if one rainstorm can end a drought, but it seems it should put a dent in it...

Strong Wind Grounds Sikes Lake Geese Population

On this next to last Sunday of the 2022 version of October, a cold front is moving into town, with wind gusting around 45 mph.

The temperature drop is scheduled to arrive later today, along with some rain and thunderstorming.

So, it was to Sikes Like I took myself for some high speeding leaning into the gusting wind. 

The Sikes Lake geese appear to be a bit traumatized, and grounded, by the strong wind. In the photo documentation it appears the geese are having a meeting, trying to decide what to do about the shrinking lake, pondering if maybe they should fly to some new roosting grounds, once the wind dies down.

I can not remember when we last had a strong thunderstorm at my location. In previous years such happened frequently. 

The cold has not yet arrived. It is 84 in the outer world, right now, coming up on 2 in the afternoon...