New Boats at the Mandalay Dock

New pedal boats with red canvas top covers (retractable)are now docked on Lake Carolyn at Las Colinas. You rent by the hour and can pedal into the canals and follow the canals under the bridges and come back out on the lake.Or,you can come back the way you came into the canals. The disturbing thing about all of this is that there is a sign posted that requires you to get a license from Dallas County Water Reclamation for "commercial" photos. Just so happens, there is a little photography business at the beginning of the canals on the west side of Las Colinas Blvd. Hum! Sounds a bit like a money-grabbing scheme if there ever was one.And here is the kicker. It's a permit--not a license fee--good only for the day that you are shooting pictures and the one-time use permit cost a whopping $50.00!

  Paul, the Administration Manager at Dallas County Utility and Reclamation District was still out to lunch at 2:10 PM and not available for additional information.

 I'd like to post a picture of the new boats but I am a senior citizen and I've been warned by the AARP not to fall for schemes such as this against senior citizens. In lieu of the boats, I took a picture of the sign posted by the DURD!

Days in June

Mom and Dad(upper left)  introduced the two pups in the foreground (lower right).

UPDATE TO POST OF Saturday,June 15,2013.  The question: is it a muskrat or a nutria? The answer is in:

Muskrat is a North American rodent with webbed feet and dark brown fur.

Nutria is a South American rodent with webbed feet and dark brown fur.

What we have here is therefore, a North American rodent called a muskrat!  and since the initial image was posted, there is an update to that as well. Here it is

Celebrating the First Day of Summer

Enjoying the hunt

Anchoring

Somethings and summer just go together like milk and oreos. Other things are just aligned with the forces of nature that draw sportsmen like metal to a magnet. Either way, when you mix both summer and fishing, you get something like this.

I called out to the gentlemen and ask if I could take a couple of pictures. He replied that I could.Then, I ask the second most important question: Are they biting? and he replied this time with: "NO" That doesn't take away from the sport at all. Everyone knows that fishing takes a lot of patience.

Union Pacific 4018 Love Leaves Many Hurt Feelings

No.4018 Big Boy Outside at Fair Park

A non-reported derailment delayed the Big Boy's move.

The 4018 Big Boy was siting on the siding outside the Fair Park fence for the first time in 49 years. People were streaming into the outside parking lot to see the behemoth. What a beauty!

It's sad that Union Pacific predicts that it would cost between $3M to $7M  to restore the 4018 to full working order. There were only 25 built. Only 8 remain. To bad to museum has signed a deal with the devil rather than using some of the tools at hand to raise the funds to restore the engine.

 

Update,Currently and Finally

UPDATE:  The Solar Impulse flew an unexpected leg of its flight because of the weather conditions. After taking off from St. Louis' Lambert Field, it was scheduled to fly on to Dulles International in the Virginia countryside outside Washington,D.C. Instead, it landed in Cincinnati, Ohio for 16 hours and is en route to Dulles at this writing. There was a pilot change made also. It appears someone needed to eat a big steak on the ground in that 16-hours,too! Go to their website to find out who had the steak. https://www.solarimpulse.com. From Washington, they will make the last leg on to New York JFK before packing up and heading home to Switzerland. It was an adventure to meet Bertrand and Andre while they were at D.F.W.International.

CURRENTLY: I am doing some research on the difference between a muskrat and a nutria. Some seem to think what I have been seeing is a nutria. Others, agree, that I have seen a muskrat. Either way, whether it's a nutria or a muskrat, I've always called them muskrats. So, the only way to settle this in my mind is to research it completely and then report the findings. Stay tuned. The picture is of the beast in question. Some,most likely, will just call it a big rat. Again, stay tuned.

FINALLY: The picture of the three men has a rather interesting story that goes along. When it is hot, my appetite drops off drastically. Lunch is usually something very light and ever since I was a kid, I enjoyed sitting at a picnic table overlooking water. My errands usually end up either at Bachman Lake or White Rock Lake during the summer. If it's Bachman, then it's Whataburger. If it's White Rock, it's either Chili's to Go or McDonald's ( I know-there is a big difference in those two!)This past week, it was McDonald's. While sitting at the picnic table, I could see three men in a canoe and they were having one rough time paddling. The canoe was going one side and then the other and they were loosing ground for any forward motion rapidly.

Next, I noticed that not any of the three men were wearing a life vest or jacket. That is always a concern in any water activity. For nearly an hour, these guys were struggling. Then, as if by a guiding hand, they managed to get near enough the shore that one of the men got out. Shortly, there were two in the canoe and they were heading toward where I was sitting. There was a boat dock less than 100 yards away.

As it turns out, originally, three miles down the lake toward the dam, they had found the canoe sitting at a boat dock. On one of the seats under a rock, was a napkin that read: FREE CANOE. The guys said that they couldn't resist a ride on a hot afternoon. They climbed in and with only sticks of limbs that had washed up around the dock, they used those for paddles.

When, I had seen them near the shoreline, they had, indeed, let out one of the others who had realized how unsafe it was and decided to walk around the cove to the boat dock where he would rejoin the others. One of the guys had been to the Ukraine and Turkey and was sporting a shirt from Australia.

I did submit the images to a Live News Feed and they were posted later that evening.

The Adventurers at White Rock Lake

Some say,Muskrat.Some say, Nutria. Time to do some research.

 

Unofficially Love Field Hit 100 Today

A Red-Winged Black Bird on the fly

Just working the reed shoots

It has been one of those odd things that makes little or no sense, but the Weather Service has one official reporting station for both Dallas and Ft. Worth. It's rather frustrating to have it pour down rain near Love Field  and not rain a drop  at DFW. Frustrating to learn the official rain for the day is zero because Love doesn't count and DFW got nothing,not a single drop.

So, today, it was 100 at Love and only 97 at DFW. The official high for Dallas today,therefore,was 97 and not 100 degrees. So,it was 100 in Dallas but not officially the first 100-degree day of the season. What is even more frustrating is that on the Weather Service web site, they list hour by hour the temps and rain and all that stuff for Love on one page and for DFW and other airports in the area, on another page,but officially, for the two major cities in the Metroplex, its DFW or nothing that counts.It's been that way for years and the weather men must have some kind of fun with keeping statistics that are official but count as unofficial but can be official if what they are officially recording  happens at DFW International. Kind of makes the head spin doesn't it?

That's why I perked up when I saw a Game Warden sitting at a picnic table writting a ticket for one of the fishermen not having a license.That was unusual, but times are tuff for revenue! Or,seeing a second  Dallas Morning News photographer. It seems they use the lake like I do. When nothing else is happening, there is always something unusual at the lake. Boats,be they rowing or sail;bicycles,unicycles;roller-bladers,skate boarders;paddle boarders;cute and unusual dogs,bobcats,coyotes,bald eagles,snakes,monk parots,pelicans,egrets,blue herons,woodpeckers. There is always something out of the ordinary somewhere around the lake.

Even that brings slim pickings some days but one finds some spectacular things like this red-winged blackbird on the fly and two ducks that know that a camera is focused on them. Maybe these two ducks know it was 100 degrees today, even if the 100 degrees at Love Field didn't count as the first 100-degree day of the year,officially.



 

Just Gone Fishin', Maybe

Just Gone Fishin'

Time changes how we look at something.

We have all seen the signs, Just Gone Fishin'. I remember a friend of my dad that finally started dating after his wife had passed away from cancer. She worked in a hospital and everyone in town kidded her about dating with a sign on their cars that said the familiar saying. I was just 7 or 8 at the time but I still remember how funny it was then.

But what do you do when you find the fishing place and it looks like no one is home?  Just Gone Fishin' or just playing hookie!

A White Rock Sail

The lazy afternoons of summer have already set in for the season with the needle on the temperature gauge headed to just shy of the 100 * F mark. Actually, I was hoping that this would be the relief year since we have had three hard summers of drought and high heat.

A trip to the White Rock to eat lunch under a shade tree and enjoy the wild life also found a couple of mariners putting up the sail for an afternoon on the lake.

A Good Ruben at the Farmer's Market

The Sales Demo Lady

The Shop Owner

The lines inside were long,long and more long.

There were no parking spots inside shed 1 or 3.

Once in a great while, my taste buds call out for a good tasting and the good quality of a superb Ruben sandwich. The best that I have found in Dallas comes from a vendor in shed 2. While there, but not before the Ruben had totally been consumed,  I notice a large increase of vendors that were not there the last time I enjoyed a Ruben sandwich here. After saying hello to the owner of the Chicago Sausage Company and who made my first Ruben to perfection, I wander down the isles. I found two women wearing  that perfect color of red gourmet chef's hat. This was a picture waiting to happen and there I was with a camera. I ask if I could take their picture and both of them were so nice to allow me a picture of each of them.

 The shop sells gourmet vinegars,balsamic and others, as well as a variety of olive oils. Take a trip to the Dallas Farmer's Market and drop by and get a good Ruben then go see the gals with that perfect red colored gourmet hat and pick up some gourmet balsamic vinegar.

Did you know that a tablespoon of balsamic in pasta cuts the bad things in pasta down by 30%? I found that out a couple of months ago and have been using balsamic in my pasta ever since. It's even better than before.

Here are the two nice women in the red gourmet chef's hats and a couple of images from the outside crowds that had filled the parking spots outside shed no.1; the spots inside shed no. 2 and no.3. Today I saw more people at the Farmer's Market than I have ever seen there before in the twelve  years that I have shopped there.