Winding Down to Thanksgiving, Is That Possible?

A checker board on the backside of the games librarian. All you need is a valid driver's license to check out a board.

The burnt orange colors are refreshing to see.

The other question that weighed in today is this: Do the dogs like the astro turf in the new Klyde Warren Deck Park? The answers may surprise you. Yes, it is possible to wind down to Thanksgiving and yes, the dogs love the astro turf and  for those of you that are going to be trying to figure out how the rest of this post fits in to the title post, well, it's one of those things that you have to wind down  for to see the connection.

Last year I decided that it was time to break that cycle of running to Walmart for everything because they were the cheapest. Were they, really?  Doing some research and really watching  where I was  spending the most and what I was getting for the money spent, I had an amazing shock. Walmart isn't that cheap overall.
I found that I was being drawn in for items like trash bags and paper products. The rest of the items were way more than I was paying at Kroger's or other places.

Well, it's been a year now and I have not set foot inside a Walmart. I've eaten more healthy, I have lost the weight that I was slowly adding  that required me to buy new cloths because I was getting bigger month by month. Now, I fit back in the cloths that I haven't worn for ages, my blood pressure has dropped  to a very healthy level where it remains. I don't feel as stressed at the check out lines as I did at a Walmart and generally I am a much happier person today that a year ago. Most of all, my lab work has don't a complete flip for the better.

Before I began the experiment, someone had made mention to me that they too, had broken the Walmart Cycle. At the time, I didn't really fully understand what that person had meant. Well, today, I may not fully understand  all the workings of what has happened, but even the commercials on Television don't captivate me now as they once did. I actually laugh about the "bring your receipt and compare" see how much you saved. Actually, when I had done that to check Walmart  in the beginning to see where my spending was going.....Walmart was getting the larger percentage of my money Today, I find the savings to be greater grocery wise at Kroger's and  a few other places that I shop.

So, as we wind down for Thanksgiving, The insanity of Black Friday and Blue Wednesday and Green Tuesday don't get me stressed out any more.. I'm actually happier since I broke the Walmart Cycle. Let's put that under Red Thursday since Black Friday seems to be taken. Have a good holiday and I'll keep the  trips to Walmart at zero for another year!

The Twinkie Saga Expands

Well, according to the info coming out of Irving from the Corporate Offices of Interstate Brands Corporation this morning, Twinkies are done and some 17,000 plus jobs are lost. One news reporter ask that, "if for some reason the unions had a change of heart and wanted to go back to work the closing of the 33 plants would not be needed"? The answer was rather hard-nosed  sprinkled with a dusting of non-humanness: No, it's to late. The deadline has passed [paraphrased]. Over the years, I have known men who have run large-scale operation from a General Mills Cheerio factory to the founder of Hickory Farms to Radio Station empires and not one of them came close to what I see coming out of corporations having problems today.  That could be one of the problems why the companies are in bankruptcy in the first place.
Years ago (being late 70's) CEO Roderick of US Steel said in an address that the ranks of middle management qualified to move into upper management and capable of running tomorrow's corporations were not being fulfilled. This was a major concern for him, for his company US Steel and Corporate America as a whole. As it has played out over several decades, Mr. Roderick was right on target!

The funny side of  all this is seeing on the local noon news, a reporter reporting from the very store where I went to get my Twinkies, yesterday. It's always reassuring to see you are ahead of the pack.Added to that.....someone on e-bay was offering Twinkies on e-bay for $100.00 a box. To bad my brain doesn't think in those lines or I would have wiped out the shelves yesterday and spent the entire night listing it all on e-bay.

I just had another Twinkies with a hot cup of coffee. Yum!

Tell me it ain't so!

Some corporate structure somewhere will sweep in and grab up the Twinkies brand. The remaining executives at Interstate Brands will sweep the profits of the sale into their golden parachute on the way out the door and live happily ever-after. The Twinkies will survive and all is well. Except the guy who has a $10.00 Twinkies and to afraid to eat it! Mine cost $0.20 and it taste just like it did when I was a kid. Besides, I have two more boxes that I could sell on e-bay when the prices hit $250 per box if someone is that big of a fool to let the brand die on the vine.

 

And The Caissons Go Rolling Along

My readers would never believe the connection that got me out to the National Cemetery today, but I'm gonna tell it like it happened anyway. As everyone has heard by now, Interstate Brands Corporation with their Corporate Office in Irving, Texas has said that they are shutting down their 31 bakeries because of labor more than their bankruptcy that they are currently in. That's the people who bake the famous Hostess Twinkie golden sponge cake.

While I haven't had a Twinkie in years I went on the web and discovered that while there are no bakeries here in Dallas, they do have two "day old" stores. One was in Hurst, the other in Oak Cliff. There wasn't much difference in miles to either one of the two stores , but there was a big difference in traffic to one over the other so I gave the cat a hug, told her to be good and I headed out the door. By the time I got to the store, I was a few miles shy of Cowboys Stadium but about half again the distance to the Dallas -Ft. Worth National Cemetery. I like going there in the spring and also like visiting in the fall. So, with a right hand turn and a left hand turn, it was a straight shot our Keist Blvd. past Reverend Jake's Potter House (Whitney Houston's Funeral Speaker) which is just a large block from the Dallas Baptist University Campus. This campus sits on a massive hill overlooking  Mountain Creek  Lake but the spectacular draw for me is the architecture of it's buildings, especially the church that has the massive steeple. If you have ever been to Old Charleston in Charleston, South Carolina, the church up the hill from the market has one of those steeples. I wish I could find a place to park and just gaze upon the elements of the fantastic architecture. I did stop at the guard post house last spring and they said I could take pictures, just not from the grounds. Later, I ran into a retired professor who said to me, "who told you you couldn't take pictures?" He was rather disturbed to say the least, but I do understand to some degree---especially in today's society-- but the architecture is impressive and inspiring and I still want some shots from the grounds.

Almost got sidetracked-- but when you see those buildings....you need to make a turn onto Mountain Creek Parkway as the cemetery is adjacent to the university's property.

With a bag on the seat of the car full of Twinkie Boxes, here I am in between  several funerals. To me, it is an honour to be among those that fight for our freedom, even in death. Silently, from  one of the hill tops, I said a prayer for the fallen and their families.

Beauty and Honour

Looking toward the front gate, but the drive along the funeral route will leave your speachless.

Many times, I have written about how I end up coming up with an image. Never, have I been driven by a Hostess Twinkie Sponge Cake but as it turned out, I got my Twinkies and I got my shot, as unusual as it may be to have that kind of a driving force to end up in the National Cemetery. The death of a Twinkie Brand unnecessarily kind of runs parallel to an necessary death for a soldier.

Service Areas A-E  and Memorial Walk

 

Fall Afternoon of Potpourri Images

Old No. 7 to sick to travel on it's own,hence the hospital move.

Good grief, how long has that been there?

When days are free of appointments  from my medical friends who poke and jab and twist and probe their areas of expertise, I celebrate byspending the entire afternoon just looking at fall colors and light patterns. Surprisingly enough, I find some interesting things to photograph. I call those afternoons Potpourri Images. Here are a few.

A soccer ball on a rebuilt dock in late afternoon sunlight.

 

The Awesome Success of..........

the Klyde Warren Deck Park that is the new 5-acre park built over the Woodall Rodgers Freeway that had cut off Uptown from Downtown for years has now united the two parts of the city with success. The park was packed with people playing checkers, using putting greens, playing table tennis, using chess tables, throwing footballs,baseballs, spreading blankets for picnicking on the common areas, and doing a whole lot of eating from the many gourmet food trucks lined up on the downtown side People walking their pets, were everywhere and there was a birthday party happening,too. I was shocked to see that many people downtown in a park and it not being a parade or march or something political or civic.

Klyde Warren Deck Park

The key image of what a united Uptown and Downtown looks like.
Looking North into Uptown from the downtown side of the Klyde Warren Deck Park.

 

The bottom line is that it is safe to project that the new park is already a major success for Dallas. If today's crowd is any indication of what is to come from here on out.......just wait until the pavilion  is ready and the bands and performers begin to take the stage.

Jane's Lane in the Klyde Warren Deck Park.

 

People from Nepal

A couple of weeks ago, I meet four extended family members that are living here in Dallas area. They are from Nepal. The beauty of the country, the culture of the country are two things that I like about their country. While the Democratic Republic of Nepal has only been formally proclaimed since the early 1950s it is difficult to remember that this former kingdom / realm is in a part of the world that has history dating back nearly 5000 years. It is pointed out in history that when Columbus was announcing that he took credit for founding the new world in 1492, the realm in Nepal had been split into three kingdoms some 10 years earlier in 1482. Kathmandu, Patan and Bhaktapur were created in that 1482 political move. So the nation that contains the world's highest point, Mt. Everest, stately noted by so many that scale the 29,029 foot peak from the Nepali side, The Great Himalaya Range is still growing upward on the Euro-Asia plate as the Indo-Gangetic Plain which is on the India sub-continent slides below the Euro-Asian pushing up the mountain higher and higher. Lasers and GPS measurements give the geologist the best and most accurate readings ever taken.

A Nepali Extended Family that now live here in Dallas.

One thing that I didn't know about the region is that  the Kathmandu Valley celebrates the four major seasons  plus the monsoon season which is stopped by the mountain range from going any farther North. The nation, which is a tad bigger than the US state of Arkansas, measures 490 plus by 125 plus miles and the high plain in the Arctic circle starts at a bit more that  the 14,210 feet of Pike's Peak in US Colorado. So there are some unique statistics about the country.

For me, when I was in fourth grade, my teacher gave the class an assignment to tell the class where would be the one place in the world that we would like to visit someday. I had always remembered that lesson more than any other.

In 1985, as my flights departure and climb-out in one of the last departures from Rio de Janiero's old airport,I looked down over the beautiful bay and Sugar loaf, the beaches  of Ipo and Coco, it came to me what the point made in that lesson had been in fourth grade and realizing that at that moment, I had been to my dream place.Then,  my thoughts turned immediately to where I would want to go next. The years have made it more difficult to pinpoint one place specifically. Still-- not having zeroed in any closer on what would be my bucket list now----I came up with (a) Nepal and Kathmandu  (b) Mt. Kilimanjaro in Africa before the snow caps completely melt  (c) China or Australia. However, as in anything the list grows to St. Petersburg/Kiev, sunset from the Atlas Mountains, an as strange as it may seem, Paris. My father,a 20 year-old farm boy, was in Paris during the liberation in WWII. I also remember the old song. "How you gonna  keep 'em down on the farm after they've seen P-A-R-E-E". The song came from WW I in 1919 from W.Donaldson,Victor sung by Baritone, Arthur Field.
 

A Few Heavies

American Airlines is obviously a big user at DFW International Airport. Normally, the bulk of the fleet coming in are the workhorse craft, MD-80s. Yesterday, I noticed few MD-80s but a lot of their Regional jets flown by American Eagle. It took me a while to realize that the rest of the traffic was fairly normal then it hit me...what I was seeing was the Hurricane Sandy backlash with equipment stuck in places where they couldn't get out etc. That equipment had to be filled in with something else until the planes could flow back into the system. I have one word for the visual shock.....amazing!
Here are a few heavies arriving.

A China Airlines Cargo 747 on final to Runway 18R

A British Airways Passenger Flight also with 747 equipment.
I liked the old name--- BOAC. It had a romantic ring to it.