No Rain On The Tandy Hills While I Check Out The Original Shrine

It has been awhile since I accessed the Tandy Hills via the top of Mount Tandy.

The Tandy Shrine has tripled in size. Tires have been added. And a kid's toy lawn mower. And 2 black plastic garbage bags, stuffed full. I did not look in the garbage bags.

I think I may be overdoing it in my quest to try and get in shape for running The Amazing Race with the Queen of Wink. I am feeling more than a little exhausted.

The rain that was forecast to fall today, has not arrived. Nor have clouds. I was hoping a good rain would clear the air of whatever is polluting it, that is making my eyes burn.

It is 84, right now, at almost 4 in the afternoon. The pool was noticeably warmer this morning. It should be even warmer tomorrow morning. If I muster the energy to find out.

Speaking of morning, this morning, before 6, there was a very loud boom. I expected to hear sirens, but did not. I've asked others if they heard the big boom. Others have. All say it sounded like a big explosion.

I just got interrupted by Miss Puerto, calling to confirm tomorrow morning's exit to Puerto Rico plan. I hope it all goes drama free with no police involvement.

It Is A Dark But Not Stormy October Morning In Texas

It is a dark, but not yet stormy October 19 morning. I was awakened an hour or two ago by a very loud boom. It was not thunder. More like a shotgun blast.

Today the prediction, from weather forecasters, is for a 30% chance of wet stuff hitting the ground. My prediction is we will stay dry today in my zone of North Texas.

A few days ago Betty Jo Bouvier sent me a video showing the Seattle skyline growing from the 1950s to a new skyscraper due to be open for business in 2011. Before the video zooms in to the new skyscraper the perspective is from out in Seattle's Town Lake, known as Elliott Bay.

You can go watch the video here. Click the "Full Screen" option on the lower right. Then you'll be able to see the Space Needle pop up in 1961. Seeing the Kingdome pop to life and then death was sort of sad. That building had a very short life span.

I wonder what a similar video shot from the location of Fort Worth's future little Town Lake, showing the evolution of Fort Worth's skyline would look. Sort of sleepy, I suspect.

Anyway, it is being sort of warm this morning. 67 out there while I wait for the sun to provide some illumination so I can see my way to the pool.

No Rain Has Fallen But The Trinity River Is Rising

I showed you this same view of the Trinity River on Saturday. At that point in time the sandbar was way bigger. Today, crossing the Beach Street Bridge over the Trinity I saw that the river has risen.

How can that be?

We have had no rain. Though some is predicted to fall tomorrow. And the day after tomorrow.

The river has risen so much it is about to re-float some inner tubes that have been dry docked. Maybe J.D. Granger is reading this in time to send out a rescue team to get the inner tubes before they go back into float mode.

I turned around from the inner tubes, and slowly disappearing sandbar, to look east to the Trinity Dam/Bridge, to see a white pickup truck sitting on the middle of the dam, above where the whirlpool was whirling strong before the water went low. I figured due to the rising water, the whirlpool must be back.

A white pickup truck. My one longtime reader knows I have a really bad history with white pickup trucks. So, I decided to bike on down to the truck and see if I could find myself in some sort of interesting situation.

Oh. It is a Tarrant Regional Water District white pickup. This seemed a bit less nefarious than an Express Energy Services white pickup.

A guy with some power tools was doing I do not know what. He was on the phone with someone, sounding a bit concerned. I thought if I stopped by the truck, with the worker guy right there, that I might get to ask what he was doing. But, he never got off the phone. I stood there taking pictures for a couple minutes and then continued on my way.

Even though the Trinity River was quite a bit higher than it was on Saturday, the whirlpool had not returned. I do not think any water was making it through the dam. Thus the rising water on the one side of the dam and shrinking water on the other side. This must be what the Tarrant Regional Water District guy was working on.

On Saturday I saw that DANGER sign on the next dam upriver, saying that "maintenance was in progress." No similar sign was on the Trinity dam outside Gateway Park.

Interesting to me that we have a river here that you, apparently, can turn on and off. Except when it is in flood mode.

The only other river I have lived up close to was the Skagit River in Washington. The Skagit River really does not have the off and on feature that the Trinity River has.

Except.

There is a really rugged, wild section of the Skagit beneath Gorge Dam. If you are having fun playing in that section and you hear sirens, you need to make it quickly to high ground, due to water being released. If you have seen the movie, Parallax View, you have seen how scary the Gorge Dam can be. The Trinity River seems fairly benign in comparison.

Except for those J.D. Granger inner tube floats.

I Was Ordered To Stop By The Fort Worth Bike Gestapo In Gateway Park Today

It has been awhile since I have run into Fort Worth Police in Gestapo mode. So, I guess I was due.

Around 4 this afternoon I went to Gateway Park, intending to bike to the Trinity River for a photo opportunity.

As I pulled into the Gateway Park parking lot, the one by the rugby fields, accessed via the entry from Randol Mill/East 1st Street, I was startled to see a swarm of dozens of Fort Worth cops on bikes.

This created a very odd scene. It was some sort of instructional situation. I had no idea Fort Worth had so many bicycle cops.

There was bike cop activity all over the parking lot. It was a pain to drive through it.

Upon my return from the Trinity Trail a van drove on to the parking lot. This had the cops hollering "car" over and over again. Even though it was a van.

So, I loaded my bike up and decided to exit via the road that runs around the perimeter of the parking lot. This seemed the logical exit to me.

I was following the pair you see through my windshield. Make note of the group in the distance to their right.

As I got to that group I slowed way up, expecting the Gestapo to get out of my way.

Instead, one of the Fort Worth Gestapo actually raised his hand in what looked like the Heil Hitler Nazi salute and ordered me to STOP.

I did so, whilst giving the guy a what the hell shrug of my shoulders look.

I really did not know where to go to get out of there. A barrier runs the length of the parking lot. You can see that in the picture at the top. I had to get around that. But at the other end of the barrier was the Gestapo Group you saw in the first picture.

I decided to turn around and see if I could get through that other Gestapo Group.

I was successful.

Now, I'm thinking, this is a public park. I had every right to expect to drive in and out without my egress and ingress being impeded on by the Fort Worth Gestapo on two-wheelers.

If a group of civilians took over a Gateway Park parking lot in this manner and ordered a Fort Worth Gestapo police car to stop, what do you think would happen?

Now, this particular parking lot has a gate. The Gestapo could easily have closed that gate. I would have been perfectly happy to park in the more distant parking lot and peacefully pedal through the parking lot with the swarm of Fort Worth Bike Gestapo. They were creating a hazard in that parking lot, which I feel they had no right to create.

Someone should have ticketed them.

Hiking The Tandy Hills With A Bird Cacaphony

That is Tandy Hills Shrine II you're looking at. I managed to get a semi-decent picture of the rusty cable that I found added to the shrine on Saturday.

Why was this rusty cable on the Tandy Hills, I can't help but wonder?

Rain is scheduled to arrive tomorrow. I hope it arrives in sufficient quantity to wash the air clean of whatever is polluting it right now that has my eyes itching so bad.

There was a lot of bird racket today on the Tandy Hills. This seemed unusual to me. What had all the birds chirping so much? I really don't see all that many birds flying about the Tandy Hills. Today it was like a bird convention was in town and it was being held in the Tandy Hills.

I am likely going to be pedaling out of Gateway Park to the Trinity Trail again this early evening. I saw something I wanted to take a picture of as I crossed the Beach Street Bridge today.

I have heard from Elsie Hotpepper. She is claiming she is not pouting.

I Found Why The Gateway Park Trails Are Closed

On Sunday I biked from Gateway Park to the Trinity Trail to take some pictures.

When I got back to Gateway Park I thought to myself I had not been a scofflaw for at least a week and felt the need to do some scofflawing.

Ever since Hurricane Hermine morphed in to Tropical Storm Hermine and drenched North Texas, causing the worst flooding I've seen since I've been in Texas, the paved trails in the eastern part of Gateway Park have been blocked with "Trail Closed" signs.

I wondered what the flood damage had been, so yesterday I decided to end my curiosity. Well, you can see in the picture what the problem is. The Trinity River removed a big chunk of real estate, right up the edge of the trail.

You can not really tell it from the picture, but it's a very steep drop off. Logs have been placed at either end of the drop off to stop anyone blissfully biking along from going over the edge.

I believe this is the location where the paved trail had already been relocated away from the river, where you could see the old trail ready to fall into the river. I think the flood cleaned that mess up. But that could have been at a different location. I did not pedal any further, but I did cover most of the blocked off trail.

This problem seems easy to fix. Just move the trail away from the riverbank 50 feet and put up a fence along the drop off. We'll see how long it takes to make this fix.

Another interesting thing I saw whilst pedaling on the forbidden trail was a lot of water remaining in ponds where water previously did not sit. Just like the new ponds in River Legacy Park, the Gateway Park ponds are a very swampy shade of green.

Up Early In Training In Texas For The Amazing Race

As you can see from the view through the bars of my prison cell, October 18 is yet one more nice, clear blue sky day in Texas.

The blue sky day thing should be ending today, if the weather predictions of multiple days of incoming rain prove to be accurate.

I was in the pool, that you can see through the bars, soon after the sun lit up the place. The pool was very pleasantly temperatured.

Temperatured is being red-flagged as being a misspelling. I am choosing the "add to dictionary" option, thus turning "temperatured" into a legit word.

I learned last night that I need to get myself in shape for The Amazing Race and an audition video. The Queen of Wink and I are going to race around the world and be first to the final finish line, thus winning a million dollars.

I was shocked this morning to read my old hometown newspaper, on-line, to learn that a friend of mine from high school had gone missing whilst hiking on Sauk Mountain. I made an urgent inquiry of Betty Jo Bouvier and learned this was a different person, of the same name, who had gone missing. I've hiked to the top of Sauk Mountain many times. I don't quite see how one would get lost, without intending to do so.

I have not heard from Elsie Hotpepper for days. I think she must be pouting due to erroneously thinking I suggested that she was an old lady. All I did was refer to Elsie as a "lady of a certain vintage." That phrase does not mean "old lady." It could mean young lady, which, of course, it does, in reference to Elsie Hotpepper.

I think I will go hiking the Tandy Hills today as part of that get in shape for The Amazing Race plan. I hope I don't over do it.