Super Bowl Sunday

This year,I'm actually looking forward to the Super Bowl. Don't know why. Maybe an East coast team playing a West coast team sounded reasonable. Two brothers;one that coaches each team is touching. The name, Ravens, were in the vocabulary when the 49ers were actually gold miners in 1849. You could even draw some comparison between sunrises and sunsets or Atlantic ocean and the Pacific ocean. How about river comparisons? One is East of the Mississippi,one West. Mountain ranges separate the two teams. Actually, the list could go on and on. But what does it all mean? Well, until this year, it meant absolutely nothing! So what's so different between this year and past years? Again, absolutely nothing other than the fact that now, I'll have material for another post when one of these two teams actually win the game. Well, that's lame, you say. I'd say you be right! 

But because the Hockey lockout  is over, I'm multi-tasking again! #gofigure.

Old Locker Room at former Texas Stadium

Play board from old Raven's game in December, 2008

The original !

Bunny Outline and A Green Heart

A Green Heart at the Chinese Lantern Festival  Takes Shape

This past fair season, Fair Park held a very large area to display the Chinese Lantern Festival. It was such a success that after the State Fair ended, the display ran a few additional weeks. Now that the media calendar is beginning to search for such material, I was able to find a bunny being built and a heart. The heart I shot was green. I choose it because it fits so well with ecology. That famous money-making Cupid treat, candy, fits because even at Valentines, mint chocolate has its followers,too.

A Bunny Head Takes Shape. The electrical bulbs and wiring can be seen inside in sunlight.

 

The Beautiful Lotus Bloom in Silk on a Blue Sky
All these are lighted from the inside and were fantastic at nighttime.

A Second Calatrava Bridge Is Now Approved!

Note the beautiful red ring around the eye. Click on the image to enlarge.

With the first Santiago Calatrava bridge now built and supporting traffic with its cable stays, a second Calatrava bridge,though scaled back, has now been approved to carry Interstate 30 traffic over the Trinity River. This second bridge will have bike trails and hopefully, construction of the Trinity River park will begin later this spring or early summer as the bridge building once again begins West of downtown. Most people don't get excited over projects like this. But for me, it runs deep in my blood and construction projects of this size are like new batteries in an old toy.





 

Walgreen's To The Rescue

Sea gull at Sunset Bay

The plumage is amazing

 It was in the 70's today. Even in Texas, that is a gift in late January because February really can be the coldest month of the winter. I get cabin fever after about three days in the house. So, when I discovered that one of my prescriptions was due for refill, I logged on and submitted the request to Walgreens. This morning, I had an email that my prescription was ready for pick up. Perfect!  An afternoon under the blue sky and sun. With a stress-test coming up shortly, it will also cover a cardiac walk and exercise. Sweet!

Subject matter was a bit limited, but along came a co-operative and curious sea gull. They really are beautiful birds. There must have been five or six photographers all looking for something interesting and for a rare winter's day, nothing was happening today.

 

A man walks  his dog and a woman rest in thought.

Architecture Comes in Varied Forms

Yesterday, while looking for something interesting to blog about, this little wren's nest could not be passed up for its architecture elements and stringing. It seems that every winter, I run across something like this that is unique and interesting. What is so amazing to me is the size of the wren overall. It's not a very big bird.
I have seen some hummingbird nest that are smaller and more detailed, but this one caught my interest because of its location right over a busy bike trail.

Paddlesurf

                                                                                                                                                                      It's always a gift to get a 60-plus degree day in                              

A super nice paddle board he sells at their shop

I watched him put this in the water and it was one of the most easy I have ever witnessed.

Off from the ramp and headed toward the dam. I saw him from the road down at the dam later enjoying his paddle surf

Mid January. With plenty of blue sky early on, before the high cloudiness rolls in toward sunset, it didn't take much to get me motivated to get out and walk. Deciding where to go was the next problem as Dr. Oz was at Cowboy's Stadium giving free physicals to over 1500, the annual Stockyard Rodeo  Exhibit will be filling the stockyards in Ft. Worth with a million visitor, Founder's Plaza at DFW had aviation geek weekend going on at Texas Trail and Airport West so the magic rabbit in the hat is always White Rock Lake. With all the good weather, there would be people all over the lake and that means finding something unusual and not normally found. Well, as the luck of the  draw happens.......White Rock was a winner again.

This gentleman is a partner in a paddle board shop and had with him one of the new stand up paddle boards. The shop has some unique activities planned for a bit later on this spring. It  sounded awesome. His shop: RIOSUP. They offer: Core Fitness Training and also have boards/gear/Eco tours.


  

A Train of Trains

History moving up the road from Dallas to Frisco. This is the consist of the hospital move of two engines and two diesels on their own wheels. It had left Irving about 45 minutes prior from this spot and from the Gribble siding going north toward Carrollton.

Just north of Gribble siding. The train behind waited as this consist passed it on the right, then back on the main track .

The Santa Fe diesel familiar to every one at Fair Park

Spot No7 and another moved as a hospital move

Chained Down and 20'06" on the move

Flipping/Turning and Airport

The Dallas airports were flipped today landing south to north because of the strong north wind. Caught this Southwest flight coming in low over Deep Ellum and downtown landing runways 31 R and L rather than 13 R/L. The sunlight was perfect on the reading racks at the Klyde Warren Deck Park.

Outdoor Reading Material at the Klyde Warren Deck Park

Racks are made available by DMN and the Belo Foundation.

The flip approach landing runways 31 R/L rather than 13 R/L

And the Fans Want More!

Once in a while, a previous post generates a spike in popularity. For information: info@dallaspaparazzo.com



 

2-10

2-20

2-30

2-40

2-50

2-60

Working Out In The Park

While waiting to receive a text that my prescriptions had been filled, it was time to  run a couple of errands. While out, lunch,though a bit late, was filled at a Subway sandwich shop while continuing to finish my errands when I saw two news helicopters hovering over LBJ at the Dallas North Tollway. Managing to get over a bock to bypass the immediate congestion and picking up the service road again,I drove the service road to White Rock Creek and parked at a small park that is used mostly for soccer games to eat the sandwich and watch the back-up on LBJ that was then backed up beyond Hillcrest Avenue. Later, it was reported that some one had jumped from an overpass to the traffic lanes below.  Somehow, all this construction on LBJ, let alone the traffic, has got to improve life and blend in with the finished High 5 to end one of the worse traffic stretches in the several states.

 Pulled in and parked, I began to chow down on my Subway sandwich when I looked up and noticed that a guy was getting gear out of his trunk. I watched him hang his punching bag and get things organized. He started his workout. As I finished my sandwich, the thought that I did not have any really good pictures of a punching bag, I got my camera set and walked over to near where the guy was working out. I didn't want to upset his routine so I waited until he got a rest point and I ask him if I could take a few shots. He agreed and went back to his workout. These shots are the last few minutes of his routine.


 

One of the best setups outdoors that I have seen.

A Left

A Right

A thank you to this man for allowing the shots and the editorial use for this blog.

A Pelican Practices His "Ho Down Number"

Crazy weather find animals responding just like humans. Today, the temps were in the low 70* F range but the roller coaster will bring 'em down for the weekend where we are rolled up in a comforter. Reading  a good book or watching a good movie or finding a good game on TV seems to be about what the weatherman is forecasting all ready.

 But, this pelican was so comical. I could almost hear the fiddle and the banjo strumming in the background.
 

Check out the second from right as he holds on to his partner with a wing and has the left leg and web foot raised as though
he was in a barn yard ho down. Can't you hear the fiddle and banjo strumming in the back ground? 

The line between darkness and light is moving East to West. Here, you can actually see the line as darkness falls on Dallas.

Looking to the left of the sunset you can see some of the skyline in downtown Dallas. So, this would be looking more Southwest from Northeast.

A Man of Percy Bysshe Shelley

In college, I did not know it at the time but I had signed up for an English class taught by a man who later would become a very dear friend. He was the scholar that scholars would like to emulate. In the summers, he returned to his London flat in his homeland where 600 year old libraries were as common as black ravens in London Tower and publishing houses of scholarly works and noted authors had been on the same street for centuries. He loved good brandy. He was constantly writing forwards for his publisher's clients as well as for his own publications, new or a re-edit of a previous publication. He dressed in fine tweeds and to some in our gourp, his very large collection of American Jazz was a bonanza when he held discussion groups and potlucks. The man loved American Jazz.

At Christmas, he would send me copies of works of art that his family held in their English estate that were beautifully handcrafted lithos the size of over- sized note cards. Since life isn't perfect, my collection of those were lost to a divorce that didn't have to be as bitter as it was, but turned out that way. Over the years, I have thought of him. Several years ago, he did pass. Yet, like the lines of Shelley, his memory holds as much guilded gold as the Taj Mahal.

Two weeks ago, I ran across an index of authors that were listed as scholars in certain fields. In the English literature category were page after page of published works on his life's work--the works of Percy Bysshe Shelley. And  when I had finished the list, what I had heard Neville recite time and time again unbiddenly came to mind:

Death is the veil which those who live call life.

They sleep,and it is lifted.

 



 



Yarn Art in an outdoor setting.

A Splash of Color on a Bleak Winter's Day

Sail boats at a marina in North Texas

Boats this size can sail on the Great Lakes with
 an eye on Marine Warnings for 6-8 foot waves or above and fast moving storms

I like change. In fact, I have been known to embrace it. But somethings just are not the same as the genuine article. I'm talking about the difference between a puddle and a lake. There again, I am not a negative person. When I have posted to this blog it is nearly one hundred percent positive for the city of Dallas, it's park system and all the things that are available here as a great city. But.....I have watched the Marine Industry in the Dallas Market for many years. And the sailing clubs that are on the larger puddles in North Texas, including beautiful White Rock Lake, make up a lot of the sail boat market. What I don't understand is when do these boats actually meet the water and sail away for the day--or two--or even three? I see the boats canvased in the fall, uncovered in the spring, sit most of the summer and then recanvased in the fall.When I see regattas, they are in dingies with a short pole mast. This past summer, I saw a young chap and his friend with an old catamaran actually doing what sail boaters do with boats. He did it a couple of times and that was that.Later,when I saw him, he wanted to sell me a change in my electric provider. That was telling me that he was done taking his catamaran out on the puddle again. His interest had changed that fast. Boats are a lot of work any way you look at it.  So this year when the annual Port Huron to Mackinac race is run on Lake Huron or the Chicago to Mackinac race is run from Chicago, on Lake Michigan and through the Straits of Mackinac, my heart pounds a bit more than normal, or better yet, hoping so see one more time, beautiful and romantic era  the three-mast skooner Arkansas Best Freight sails out of Saugatuck, Michigan in the summers, if they still have that unusual flagship for a trucking freightline company. I'd have to put that on my bucket list for sure. So, there isn't any disrespect to the lakes here in North Texas. It is water that we need. It can be recreational to a limited extent, but when it comes to sail boats.....well, you can't beat the Great Lakes and I say that with love. A very,very large amount of love!

Lake Highland Center Begins Construction

Gravity Still Wins

with a multi-level parking garage. It's not what everyone thought that they would see. There is a pad with pipes coming out of the cement for plumbing and appears to be condos or apartments . Still, the past two years have been a delight  with no construction. We all knew that eventually that day would come and so it has.
 



New art on display

The balancing act

Video being made for social media

                                                  


During the trip to check out the construction, I discovered two new metal art pieces that have recently been displayed by the Office of Cultural Affairs for the City of Dallas.  Sweet.  It just continues to prove that everything in life is a trade off. You give up something and you get something else in return. The construction of a peaceful block of land was obtained from old apartments. The solitude of water, beauty and wildlife gave way to construction and for that construction sacrifice, the city set two new works of art.

Spring this year will see more construction but 20 feet below on the walks to the the Lake Highland Train Station  along the creek, new beauty will explode and the area will transform and morph into what the developer originally saw in the property.

Have Been Chasing Grimlins All Day Long

Yesterday afternoon went out for a couple hours waiting on the pharmacy to fill my scripts and color was the king pin target. Every thing was bleak and grey and wintry. Shots with some color might have been the target but it was a bit more difficult. The only thing that stood out from  a hill top was some boats on the lake.



Blades with little wheels

A Big Wheel

 

A New Look for a New Year

Sung to the tune of Stars and Stripes Forever: Be kind to your web footed friends, 'cause that duck may be some body's mother!

Two American Bald Eagles at White Rock  with the former H.L. Hunt's  Mt. Vernon in the background.The mansion is a duplicate of Thomas Jefferson's, Mr. Vernon.

Deep Ellum, Texas aka East Main Street,Dallas Eclectic art,song and much more. It was also the home for a while of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow. Another interesting fact: The Belo Mansion on Ross Avenue in the downtown art's district was a funeral home and held the funeral service of Clyde Barrow.

We are pleased to introduce you to our new official look on our website. Work on the blog has yet to begin but it is scheduled to be updated also.