Pleasant Walk Around Sikes Lake After Pleasant 2023 Super Bowl

It was back to my neighborhood Sikes Lake I ventured on this second Monday of the second month of 2023, for a fast walk around the lake.

With the outer world warmed up, and with no wind blowing, it was back in shorts and t-shirt for today's communing with nature.

Later today, well, tonight, rain and thunderstorms are on the weather menu. With wet dripping possible for tomorrow, too.

My Super Bowl party this year was super. I made four pizzas, from scratch. Best pizzas I have ever made.

And for the first time in memory the actual game that comes with the Super Bowl held my attention clear til the end.

More often than not I lose interest in the Super Bowl game and go off to do something else, requesting that I be informed when a commercial break happens. 

There were a few amusing commercials during this year's Super Bowl. But, it seems the Super Bowl commercials are not as entertaining, or surprising as it used to be back when the Super Bowl commercials became a special thing, like when Apple introduced the Macintosh. I think that was it.

Oh, and, speaking of Apple, I liked the Halftime Show.

Seemed dangerous, those floating platforms. Had OSHA been consulted? I did not remember Rihanna had so many hit songs til she started singing them, bringing back the memory of hearing the songs on the radio.

And I wish that thing way too many modern singers do, as in touching themselves in a location one would think one would not touch when making a public spectacle of oneself. I think it was the late Michael Jackson who introduced this bizarre move. 

And, don't get me started on twerking...

Happy Birthday Little Sister Jackie

Seems real recent in my memory, but it was a long long long time ago, on this date, February 12, way back in the sixth decade of the previous century, when my little brother, Jake and sister, Nancy, sat on a curb on Fairhaven Avenue, looking up at the hospital on the other side of the street, waiting for our dad to hold our new baby sister up to a window so we could see sister Jackie for the first time.

I can remember this so clearly.

It was a happy day.

When you are the oldest sibling of multiple siblings you get to experience something the younger siblings do not get to experience.

The arrival of a new baby brother or sister.

Now, I do not remember the arrival of brother Jake, he is only 13 months younger than me. I sort of remember the arrival of sister Nancy. I think it was in the Mount Vernon hospital. 

Like I already mentioned, I clearly remember the arrival of Jackie.

And then seven years later my mom had me driving her somewhere. I remember it was on Rio Vista Avenue, in Burlington, when mom said she had something she wanted to tell me, and proceeded to tell me there was a new incoming brother or sister. I think I was 16 at the time.

Over the course of the next couple weeks Jake and Nancy were also informed of the new incoming. 

And then, all of us, me, Jake, Nancy and mom and dad, went into Jackie's bedroom to tell her the good news.

Jackie did not take this news well. She insisted such could not happen. It took awhile til Jackie accepted the idea that she was going to have a new baby brother or sister. 

Before my youngest sibling was born we had cement poured in the backyard for a patio. We had been to California the year before, including going to Hollywood and Graumann's Chinese Theater, where the stars put their handprints and names in cement.

So, we replicated that with all our names and handprints. And, not knowing if our incoming new baby sibling was a boy or girl, we had already decided on the name, Joey if it was a boy, Michele if it was a girl.

And so we wrote in the cement, "Joey or Michele," and I think made a little handprint.

I wonder if that is still in the backyard of the house I grew up in? Seems like the last time I asked that someone went and looked. I do not remember what the result of looking was...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JACKIE!!! 

Blue Saturday Bicycle Thief Strikes Again

The blue view from my kitchen window on this second Saturday of the second month of 2023.

The sky is blue. And so am I.

I left my abode for just a couple minutes, to go to the mailbox. When I returned I saw my favorite bike had been stolen. 

Rather brazen.

The bike was on the patio. The thief had to go up stairs to get to the patio. The bike is not easy to take down and up the stairs.

This is now the third bike I have had stolen since I have been in Texas...

Rainbow Return To Clear Blue Sky In North Texas With Linda Lou

By 5 in the afternoon, yesterday, I felt the need to escape being indoors.

Rain was continuing to drip, but, even so, I opted to make a run for my vehicle.

Linda Lou opted to ride with me to Walmart.

Upon arrival at the Walmart parking lot I saw a sure sign that the days of gray dripping were coming to an end.

A rainbow.

And now, on this second Thursday of the second month of 2023, a clear blue sky has returned to North Texas.

I see a walk around Sikes Lake, or Lucy Park, in my future for today...

Day Two Of Rain In Wichita Falls Now With Lightning Strikes

On this second Wednesday of the second month of 2023 the view out my kitchen window is even more dismal than yester morning's drippy dismal view.

And this morning's rain has lightning strikes and thunder booms in the mix.

Blue sky is scheduled to return this afternoon.

Two days of this and I am beginning to be SAD. As in Seasonally Affected Disorder type SAD....

Tuesday Return To Winter After Hot Monday

You are looking out my kitchen window, looking south, on the first Tuesday of the second month of 2023. 

Rain being dripping by mid-morning. And continues to drip, periodically going into downpour mode.

Yesterday, late afternoon, when I drove to Walmart, the temperature was 81 degrees. By this morning we lost about half those degrees, with the current temperature already at the predicted high for the day, of 45 degrees.

This going from summer to winter to back to summer to winter again, in the space of 10 days, must be confusing for the trees, thinking it is time to start growing leaves, and then a fresh deep freeze putting a halt to the leaf blooming, once again.

Yesterday I was tempted to switch the climate control to 'cool', but didn't. Instead, I got the ceiling fans spinning.

This morning the climate control is in 'heat' mode...

Email Memories I Remember From Microsoft

Once again, memories in my email. I have been erroneously thinking these are Google memories. They are not a Google thing. They are a Microsoft thing. Memories from Microsoft's OneDrive, not Google.

I remember today's memories. But that which is being remembered did not happen in February. These memories happened in August and September. In February those mountains views are not accessible.

In the upper left that is favorite nephews Chris and Jeremy, with Mount Shuksan behind them. We are starting the hike up Tabletop Mountain.

Below Chris and Jeremy, that is just Jeremy threatening to throw a snowball at me, with Mount Baker behind him. At this location we are on the north side of Mount Baker.

To the right of Jeremy that is favorite nephew Joey, hiking up Mount Baker, from the south side of the volcano.

Above Joey that is a McDonald's in North Dallas. It was a unique McDonald's, designed to look like a giant Happy Meal box, among other unique architectural elements. I believe this McDonald's no longer exists. I believe the last time I was at that McDonald's was in January of 2009, with mom and dad.

Warm Sunday Walking Lucy Park Leads to Jurassic Dinosaurs

It was back to Lucy Park on this first Sunday of the second month of 2023, for some refreshing nature communing under a clear blue windless sky, which you can see via the above photo documentation.

I should have been in shorts and t-shirt. I overheated. 

After Lucy Park, on the way back to my abode, I came upon a herd of dinosaurs corralled inside a fence enclosure on the east end of the Sike Senter mall parking lot.

The herd of dinosaurs moved slowly, what with being reptiles, and thus cold-blooded, with 60 degrees rendering them sluggish. Rolling down my window to take a picture I was surprised by how loud the dinosaurs were.

I saw a sign attached to the fence which indicated this herd of dinosaurs is known as Jurassic Empire. I Google "Jurassic Empire Sikes Senter" to learn the following...

Jurassic Empire is the largest most realistic dinosaur drive-thru event in Texas. It will feature more than 50, moving, breathing, giant life-size realistic dinosaurs in their natural habitat, including a giant T-Rex. The drive-thru event will have you and your family going from the Jurassic era all the way through the Ice Age.

Admission prices are as follows: Weekdays, Thursdays, and Fridays: $45 per car for one to seven people and $75 for eight to 14 people. On the weekends, Saturday and Sunday: $55 per car for one to seven people and $85 for eight to 14 people.

___________________

Well, that explains the vehicles which were maneuvering through the orange cones. It somehow did not seem all that realistic, what with being on a parking lot, surrounded by a cyclone fence, with orange cones marking the route through the imaginary natural habitat.

Maybe little kids would find this to be fun. But? $45 being the cheapest admission price? Are there really all that many people who would think this would be worth $45? 

Clear Blue Walk Around Sikes Lake With The Patriotic Pulpit Making Dixie Great Again

Another beautiful clear blue sky day, on the 4th day of the 2nd month of 2023, walking around Sikes Lake.

The temperature a relatively balmy 54, with a gusty wind blowing.

On Saturday's, on the right wing nutjob radio station I listen to, it is the Patriotic Pulpit who does the nutjob duty. A new thing the nutjob right wingers blather is labeling people as being Marxist, or Commies. As if one does not need any additional evidence as to how stupid these types are, I doubt any of them could come remotely close to explaining what Marxism and Communism actually is.

The Patriotic Pulpit is followed by "Let's Make Dixie Great Again". No I am not making that up.

During that show they repeat multiple times an invitation to...

"Join in the fight against the so called liberal progressive, who are really Marxist communists, who are taking away cherished monuments to our history, taking down statues of heroes of the South, like Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis and others. It is only a matter of time til they come after other American heroes, like Thomas Jefferson and Francis Scott Key, author of the Star Spangled Banner."

All said in a twangy Southern accent.

I can only take listening to the Patriotic Pulpit for a couple minutes, til I switch to music, or the Saturday NPR show which is always about some aspect of cooking food. Today it was all about the Hawaiian cuisine....

Clear Blue Sky Return To Lucy Park

Back to Lucy Park today for the first time in days, after being snow and icebound day after day after day. During the ice lockdown I did manage to escape, twice, on Wednesday, and yesterday, with the ice mostly melted, Linda Lou rode with me to Walmart.

As you can see, via the Lucy Park photo documentation, there is nary a cloud in the clear blue sky. So nice to see blue again after so many gray days.

My vehicle's temperature monitoring device indicated it was 49 degrees when I got to Lucy Park, around 11 this morning. With absolutely no wind blowing. So, 49 degrees almost felt balmy. Particularly with the amply solar radiation.

In another month the Lucy Park trees should be starting their return to a jungle of green foliage.