Stormy Good Friday Walk Around Sikes Lake

 It was to Sikes Lake I ventured on this third Friday of the 2025 version of April. A day also known as Good Friday.

As you can see, via the photo documentation, our regular North Texas clear blue sky has been obliterated by a thick cloud cover.

That thick cloud cover dripped some big drops of rain whilst I was nature communing, but nowhere near being copious enough to wet the landscape, or me.

The weather forecast for today, tomorrow and Easter is for rain, hail, thunderstorms, strong wind, and possible tornadoes.

Thunder is not scheduled to begin booming til later this afternoon and then continuing through the night. 

I strongly suspect this is going to turn into a major storm. It has been awhile such has occurred at my current location. The creek which runs by my abode has been dry for a couple years now.

Below is what my nearby creek looks like when it is not dry. The name of the creek is Holliday Creek. Yes, spelled with two l's. This photo showed up this morning in the daily Microsoft OneDrive Memories from this Day....

I like the sound of roaring rapids. It is a soothing sound I hope to hear later today, or tomorrow...

Wednesday Considering Sikes Lake Fishing Before Easter Weekend Storms

It was back to Sikes Lake I ventured on this day after the Ides of April, also known as the 16th day and third Wednesday of the fourth month of 2025, for some nature communing under a clear blue sky, with the air heated pleasantly into the 70-degree zone, as measured via the Fahrenheit temperature measuring method.

My nature communing did not include catching fish. The sign you see photo documented, above, showed up a week or two ago, attached to a fence which blocked access to the lake, at that point, making fishing not possible.

The signs informs one of the type fish one may catch in Sikes Lake, and warns that one must be properly licensed to do any angling.

I have seen a few poles hovering over Sikes Lake, over the years. I have never seen anyone catch a fish, of any sort.

I do know that periodically Sikes Lake is stocked with fish. Of which variety I have no clue.

Tomorrow may be the last pleasant day, weather-wise, for a few days.

Currently the Easter weekend weather forecast for my North Texas location is for heavy rain, hail, thunderstorms and tornado conditions, beginning Good Friday, and lasting through Easter Sunday.

These dire weather conditions likely will wreak havoc with any possible plans I might come up with to attend any Easter morning sunrise services....

Looking For A Visitor From Somewhere Called Boardman

The blog you are looking at right now has what is known as a gadget. This gadget tracks the blog's Live Traffic Feed. 

Somewhat accurately.

The Live Traffic Feed does not compile a comprehensive listing of all blog traffic. I have another means by which I can see a comprehensive listing of the blog's traffic.

The screencap I made of the Live Traffic Feed I made early this morning, thus the many hours since the last noted traffic. As in, not much blog traffic, from America, during the past midnight hours.

So, the past couple weeks I have noticed that there have been multiple blog visits from a blog visitor located somewhere in America called Boardman.

Googling I found there is a Boardman, Oregon, and a Boardman Township, in Ohio.

Boardman, Oregon is a town on the Columbia Gorge, in the part of Oregon east of Mount Hood, known as Eastern Oregon.

The population of the Boardman in Ohio is way larger than the Oregon version.

Do I know someone in either Boardman? Not that I know of. I have relatives in the Amish zone of Ohio, a town called Sugarcreek. Sugarcreek is not close to Boardman Township.

Anyway, maybe making mention of this Boardman mystery will cause some sort of feedback from one of the Boardmans...

Windy Sikes Lake Monday With Evening Primroses

On this second Monday of the 2025 version of April, it was to Sikes Lake I ventured for a windy lake walk under a clear blue sky.

As you can see, via the photo documentation, it is that time of the year when the Texas landscape turns colorful, with wildflowers, with the most prominent wildflower, seen in my North Texas zone of the Lone Star State, being the pink bloom known, for reasons unknown to me, as Evening Primroses.

I remember way back late in the previous century, in April of, I think 1998, driving to Texas to test the feasibility of moving there, and being surprised by all the flowers we were seeing between Amarillo and the Dallas/Fort Worth zone.

In April of, I think, 2001, I ventured south to what is known as Texas Hill Country, to hike up Enchanted Rock and visit Fredericksburg. This was to be my one- and only-time seeing Texas wildflowers in all their glory. 

The wildflowers of Texas Hill Country were not quite as colorful as the tulip fields of my old Skagit Valley home zone. But, being natural, not a cultivated agricultural product, made the Texas Hill Country wildflowers as impressive, if not more so, than the Skagit tulips.

Let me see if I can find a photo I took that day, early this century, of Texas Hill Country wildflowers...

The above scene was seen a few miles north of Enchanted Rock. As you can see, wildflowers far into the horizon. Except for the model in the foreground...

Sweltering 96 Texas Degrees

It seems like only a couple days ago big balls of hail pummeled my location, which was chilled to below freezing, with frost frosting the rooftops and a few snowflakes making it to ground level.

It seems like that because that is what happened a couple days ago.

And now, on this second Saturday of the fourth month of 2025, I got in my vehicle this afternoon, to drive to ALDI, to find my vehicle's temperature monitoring device situated on the rearview mirror, was telling me the temperature was 96 degrees.

The outer world felt HOTTER than 96 degrees due to the fact that there was no wind blowing, thus no wind chill happening.

Soon cold water coming out of the tap will no longer be cold. That makes for refreshing showers, with no need to add any HOT water to the mix.

This coming summer I should be feeling cooler than last summer, due to the fact I have lost weight, and thus have less of an insulative layer of adipose tissue. 

I see some of the plus-sized people at my current Texas location and wonder how they manage it, in the HEAT, with such a well-developed thick layer of insulative adipose tissue...

Finding Nephews Jason & Joey At Lake Grapevine With Significant Others

A couple days ago in a blog post titled Microsoft OneDrive Remembers Nephews Jason & Joey In Texas I made mention of the fact that I was unable to find, among the hundreds of photo folders folded on my computer, a photo I remembered taking that day, way back in 2005, when I went to D/FW International Airport to find my nephews, Jason and Joey, and their girlfriends.

That photo I was unable to find a couple days ago, I found last night whilst looking for a photo of myself and my siblings, for International Siblings Day purposes.

Above, that would be me in the middle, with nephew Joey to my right, with Joey's girlfriend between he and me. I do not remember that particular girlfriend's name. That would be nephew Jason on my left. I do remember that particular girlfriend's name. She is Spencer Jack's mom, Jenny.

Behind us, that is Lake Grapevine. I'd driven the kids across the Lake Grapevine Dam to the park which was the trailhead location of my favorite D/FW mountain bike trail.

The above photo pre-dated the taking of photos using one's phone. That photo would have been taken with my now long-gone Olympus digital camera.

I do not remember the means by which one had that camera automatically take a photo. I do sort of remember one could set the number of seconds before the photo was taken.

I find it unsettling to realize the above photo was taken over two decades ago. Yet seems so recent in my memory...

KOMO Takes Us To Beaver Marsh Road Roozengarde Skagit Valley Tulip Festival Tulips

I saw that which you see above, on Facebook, this morning. A photo collage from Seattle's KOMO ABC TV, showing some of the Roozengarde tulips currently blooming on the Skagit Flats in the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival.

Various locations on the Skagit Flats are designated Tulip festival centers, such as the Roozengarde complex, and Tulip Town, and more.

Roozengarde is on Beaver Marsh Road. 

The Slotemaker-Jones Family Complex is also on Beaver Marsh Road. That is where my Great Nephew, Hank Frank, Hank Frank's dad, my Nephew Joey, his first wife Monique, and my little brother, Hank Frank's Grandpa Jake, reside.

I have not heard any complaints from the Hank Frankers regarding being jammed by Tulip Traffic.

I remember way back in the last century, when the Skagit Tulip Festival first began, I was living in West Mount Vernon. I did not even know a new festival had begun. What I did know was the first weekend of it I found traffic stalled crossing the Skagit River bridge between west and east Mount Vernon and continuing to be stalled, or moving slow, as the line of cars moved west.

Such is no longer the case as, over the years, measures went into place directing traffic off I-5 to all the various exits which lead to the tulip fields.

The Skagit Valley Tulip Festival goes on the entire month of April. By the year 2025 the festival, and the tulips, have become world renowned, showing up on various lists listing things like the world's best festivals, or America's most scenic landscapes.

I have seen a tulip or two blooming since I have been in Texas. And I have seen wildflowers adding color to the usually drab Texas landscape, but I have never seen anything coloring up the Texas landscape to the degree done by the Skagit Valley tulips...

Microsoft OneDrive Remembers Nephews Jason & Joey In Texas

Sometimes these emails from Microsoft billing themselves as Microsoft OneDrive Memories From This Day are a bit unsettling. 

Such as is the case today.

I am assuming it is correct that these memories are from a day in April. I am also assuming that the year is 2005.

20 years ago.

As in two decades ago.

Two of my favorite nephews, Jason and Joey, and their girlfriends, at that point in time, had been on a cruise, sailing out of Florida, if I am remembering correctly.

If I am additionally remembering correctly, and sometimes I do, Jason and Joey's mother, she being my favorite ex-sister-in-law, Cindy, had let me know when the boys would be landing at D/FW. And that she'd told the boys that she was letting their uncle know they'd be landing.

So, I made it to park at whatever terminal the landing was taking place, somehow found my way to the right gate. Which I know sounds like no big deal. But you would only think that if you've never been to Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport.

It is HUGE.

I have thrice gotten lost just trying to find where I'd parked in a D/FW parking garage.

Anyway, I stood at what I hoped was the right location, and after a few minutes my nephews showed up. I coaxed them out of the gate, which I did not expect to succeed at, but I did.

I then drove the boys and their girlfriends to Lake Grapevine, crossing the dam, going into the park which was the location of the trailhead of my favorite mountain bike trail.

At Lake Grapevine Jason and Jenny had a big announcement.

 I was told I was the first to know, but later learned I was not, that being that Jason had proposed, and Jenny had accepted. 

And little did I know, that day at Lake Grapevine, that a year later I'd be heading north for a wedding, and two years after that I would be flying up to Washington again, this time getting to meet Jason and Jenny's Spencer Jack offspring.

Now, I must leave you for a moment to see if I can find the photo at Lake Grapevine I took that day two decades ago.

No luck. But the search had me seeing hundreds of photos I had not seen in a long time.

Back To Sikes Lake Under A Clear Blue Cloud-Free Sky

A cloud-free, clear blue sky has returned to my Wichita Falls location in Texas. After several days in a row, overcast, cold, windy and raining.

As you can see, via today's look at Sikes Lake, the lack of wind rendering waves has turned the lake into a giant mirror.

Methinks today was the most pleasant outdoor day yet this year. Multiple others were enjoying the return of the blue-sky norm.

Last night, as warned, the temperature dipped below freezing, as evidenced by the frost covering roofs for a short while after the sun arrived for its daily heating duty.

There is no apparent damage done by last night's likely extremely short freeze, which was barely below 32 degrees, as measured by the Fahrenheit method.

I would think it highly likely that last night marks the last time the outer world freezes at my location, til the exit of Summer's chilly arrival of Fall.

It felt good to be outside endorphin-ing today, after several days of wandering Walmart being my aerobic outlet.

I think I may be addicted to endorphins and suffer withdrawal symptoms when I do not get my adequate daily dose...

Wichita Falls Saturday Anti-Trump Rally With New Stoplight

This Monday morning's Wichita Falls Times Record News, that being this town's one and only local newspaper, of sorts, a newspaper which mainly focuses on local sports, crime and the weather, had an article, with photo documentation, of Saturday's downtown Wichita Falls anti-Trump protest.

This was not much of an article of the reporting variety, reporting what was said, in speeches, or any interviewing of attendees. 

In the photo I screen capped from the front page we see no umbrellas. Other photos showed most attendees under cover of umbrellas. I opted not to participate due to the cold temperature, strong wind, and off and on rain.

I suspect Saturday's will not be the last of anti-Trump rallies. I likely will get other opportunities to participate. 

And on another note, making note of an example of what is deemed newsworthy in the local Wichita Falls newspaper, on the front page there was headline link to another article, with the headline of that article being...

New stoplight installed in downtown Wichita Falls