Monarch Butterfly and Bird Migration Has Reached Texas

I hate adjusting while balance, so, as you can see, I don't!!!

The milk weed in the Great Lakes has already received frost this fall. Over head, I have noticed large numbers of birds riding the thermals which looks like the pelicans have arrived on area Lakes to refuel for several weeks before they continue their migration south.

This morning, I took the cat out. She likes to sit in her chair on the porch. Then, I noticed overhead around tree top level, hundreds of Monarch Butterflies. Sure enough. The Monarchs have reached north Texas on their way to the mountains of Mexico to winter in awesome displays of hanging strings of Monarchs from the trees that are falling to poaching. This is causing the lost of Monarchs in dangerous numbers for loss of habitat.

At White Rock Lake, the lake was filled with log-setting pelicans in huge numbers.....more than were there the same time last fall. There were many,many more still riding the thermals high above the lake. Farther out in the lake were even more black cormorants sitting on down logs stuck in the mud.

Yes, migration is fully underway. Enjoy the Monarchs and the beautiful fall weather.

Having this in the yard is great.

Another Great Commercial

Another commercial has hit the air waves that is attracting tons of viewers on You Tube or sites of special interest devoted to photography, graphic arts and film. There is no surprise in learning that it was produced for Union Pacific Railroad and it's 150th year in America. Bravo! Bravo!

Already, there have been over 25,000 views on You Tube with a 217 Likes to 7 ratio.  The last commercial to hit the charts was, of course, the Omega watch commercial and it has now spread to a great American railroad. The link: http://youtu.be/3Z9T_HBlyWg

Credits: This commercial is the property of Union Pacific Railroad and the music was commissioned by Union Pacific specifically for this commercial. Contact Union Pacific (http://www.UP.com) to let them know how you like the commercial. It is total class, and very well done.
Also credit: You Tube for the link to this commercial. 

Columbus Day Parade

It seems that the Continental Bridge Pedestrian Park is getting quite the work out. The Columbus Day Parade was held Sunday, starting on the east end of the bridge park, winding its way to the west Plaza area, where a member of the Italian Parliament gave a brief address. It was a well done event!

The Color Guard

Strike Up The Band. You know that Purple is the color of Royalty, don't you?

Texas Horse Park  Riders and this was no laughing matter!

The Airline Battles in Dallas

Besides American's latest worry at DFW and their loss of gates at Love,  there is a new battle taking place at Love Field and DFW. At Love Field, there are twenty gates. Southwest has control over 16 of them. Virgin American won the 2 gates up for grab as a result of the American Airline merger. Virgin, after its official win will give up its gates at DFW. American had been leasing those gates to Delta. United had the remaining 2 gates.

The City of Dallas just informed Delta that they had two weeks to vacate their gates. As everyone knows here in Dallas, the Wright Amendment that previously had held Southwest captive to where it could fly will expires on October 13. Virgin needs their gates. In fact, they have made full use of those gates with expanded service out of  Love Field and they haven't even begun to fly from Love until October 13. Delta just announced that they will sue the City of Dallas over those gates. Southwest is throwing a party to say good-bye to the Wright Amendment.

Meanwhile, over at the big airport. Doug Parker, CEO of American Airlines is fearful of the Emirates Airbus 380 service. In fact, the Businessweek article head line read," Emirates Flies into America and U.S. Airlines Grow Anxious. While Tim Clark, Emirates Airline President is grabbing up all the available gates he can get at airports were American airports can already handle or are planning to expand to be able to handle the super-giant, A-380. Emirates sees a market in the States. They only have less than 10 percent of it currently.

Last Monday, September 29th, Qantas beat even Emirates with the arrival of yet another daily A-380 to DFW. So while Doug Parker was talking about his fear of Emirates, Qantas arrived with their A-380 daily service to Sydney. At any rate, there are now two A-380s arriving at DFW daily. It does appear that Parker is concerned about Emirates more, however, because they fly more A-380s than anyone and are buying more. Funny, Parker should be worried.  His airline doesn't even own  one A-380 and does not seem to have any plans to get one. American, with one of the oldest fleets  of all the airlines started to upgrade. There was also a rebranding of American with a new livery that still leaves customers unhappy with the new look. While still in bankruptcy, American began to replace their MD-80s with 737s, 777, and other like craft.Now that they are out of the courts, Doug seems to be worried about Emirates.

So while Gary Kelly is happy as the number one airline at Love and everyone loves the new paint on Southwest, it's his counter part, Doug Parker who controls more gates at DFW that seems to be unhappy. So unhappy, it seems, that one of his planes at DFW was recently see going head to head with the Emirates A-380 on the taxiway at DFW. Appearance IS everything, Doug.

Even Sir Richard Branson is happy. He is about ready to take off into space. Virgin American and Southwest  can fly your passengers to New Mexico to the Virgin Galactic space port.  Hang in there Doug, somehow you will figure out how to get your own A-380. Perhaps you can spearhead a renaming of your partner airline, One World, to something that's not so limited.

Qantas' A-380. Check out the kangaroo with the cowboy hat on!

American Airlines 777 and the new Emirates double deck A-380 on the taxiways at DFW

Mother Nature's Fall Prunning

A line of severe thunderstorms stretching from Mexico to Canada moved through Dallas late yesterday afternoon. The squall line only lasted about 45-minutes but it was a long 45-minutes. Winds were at hurricane force when the bow-echo came through. Over 140,000 people were without power, even today. Roofs came off buildings in Arlington, brick walls collapsed in the stockyards in Ft. Worth. Trees in University Park fell across streets and in Lake Highland, trees fell on houses. Very large trees fell on houses, in fact.

The last time that I saw rain come down in a horizontal pattern was during Hurricane David when it struck the South Carolina coast in 1979 but, yesterday, it came down that way here in Dallas. Today, I went over to Whole Foods to get some pistachio. I had to go around the block because Dart Police had the crossing at Blackwell and Greenville closed. After getting the cholesterol-lowering tasty things, it was on to White Rock for the first time in several weeks. In June, I had posted a blog post on the Cremation of the Big Oaks at White Rock. I wanted to see how much damage had occurred. Into the short trip over to the lake  it didn't take long to see that the damage from the wind was more severe than I had thought. In the course of three miles, I came across three houses with big trees laying across  their roofs. At the lake on the west side, there was damage to two of the trees that I had written about. On the east side of the lake, the damage was even more severe. One tree at the Stone Tables had been completely uprooted with the cement post barriers still in the root system and sod.

I'm not a tree-hugger but I hate to see beautiful old trees with so much character taken out in such large numbers. It was only 90 days ago that another storm had take out a massive old oak on the curve just east of the stone tables. And the one taken out Thursday was not the only one at the stone tables. There are also some wooden tables south of the shelter house at the stone tables and a big tree branch covered at least three of those tables.

The parking lot at Winfrey Point was covered in leaves and twigs like carpet. Along the drive down toward the parking lot of the ball diamonds were a couple of big branches that were hit as well.

Take a look see.

House # 1 damage

House # 2 damage

Stone table area with another big tree at the road and behind here  that was felled by the storm.

Life Recycles, But At What Cost?

 

 The original post with shots before any work done can be seen in the Archive of this blog dated April 04,2013, "The Last to go for Buckingham."
The former mail box seen below this photo, stood on the driver's side of the white pick-up truck at the end of the driveway. The street seen in the mailbox picture runs perpendicular to the truck.

The past 10-days have been a lot of discomfort for me. I have been under the weather, so-to-speak. Some of that feeling has been  a reaction to my medication. The pharmacy info sheet calls it "side-effects". I'll be nice and not mention what I call it, however. Never-the-less, the cat has been happy to have me "in-house" but she still does not like to share "her" chairs. Every now and then, I feel a paw lightly touch my back and claws begin to find the nerve endings. She's just letting me know that she is "sharing" her chair with me. I don't own a single chair in this house. I only "lease" them from the cat, don't you see?

But, I have been able to get some reading done. I've had  some enjoyable listening to some old symphonies that I haven't heard in some time. My Mahler collection is nearly complete. And, Richard Wagner -- my Lord, the man composed for the angles.

Also, I have been reviewing my complete portfolio. The one common factor that appears throughout the time line of shooting  seems to be that more and more of the images seem to be disappearing at the original shoot locations. Time causes things to change, sure, but man seems to be at the mercy of the "new age developer" that  has no interest  nor care about historic values in structures than the wrapper from a burger or a Starbucks  container that held his latte earlier in the day. The bottom-line mentality has spread to the proving grounds of bulldozers and water-tank trucks. Nothing drives home that point more than the text that I just got from long-time friend, Jamal, who just informed me that he has closed his C-store. The  post-office behind him is gone. It's now condos. The retirement village across from his side-street entrance is closing for re-development, but the kicker is that the Blockbuster store across the street was re-developed and leased by Walmart and that set the stage for Jamal's business could not last. The property under the Walmart is one of many owned by a former Dallas City Councilman, no less. 

The house is long gone. The street is nearly gone and the developer has cleared all the trees, excavated the property from one end to another and laid all the sewers and  drains and made water connections for several new homes that will now stand behind the formal Buckingham, Texas  city hall. Buckingham was annexed by the City of Garland. All that remains today is a park on the corner with a historical marker. 

The original post with shots before any work done can be seen in the Archive of this blog dated April 04,2013, "The Last to go for Buckingham."

There's A Song In The Air

We have all said it. We all complain. Over the years, I have come to learn that those that complain the least are really the one's who don't mean it as much.Yes, the first Christmas song of the season has hit the airwaves. "It's not even Halloween", I said when I heard it. Then, I saw a commercial that had a tad and a hint of the holidays in the visuals. It does seem to get earlier and earlier each year, not counting the wholesale shows that occur in July. But the real measure of how early it gets is when you start to hear the choral works from Westminster and King's and all the others in the U.K.on the radio programs. English choral works are the benchmark, after all.

In fact, it struck me so much, that I turned to my favorite classical radio station WXXI-FM in Rochester, New York to check on their live stream schedule. It seems that even the radio schedules manage somehow to wiggle in a song or two hear and there and broadcast schedules are like clockwork. No one messes with them! Ever! Why WXXI you ask? Well, maybe you don't ask but the real reason why I listen to them is because of their International Market being so close to Toronto and Ottawa and the Great Lakes with a larger audience per square mile of listeners and a great Choral college just down the block.

Yes, here's another one of my inter secrets. I love choral music. In fact, my organ teacher in college was a noted choral composer who got me interested in cantors at a Jewish Synagogue where she was organist. She taught 5 days a week, played the Saturday Services at the Temple and Sunday Services at a large Baptist Church. The woman was cast iron diverse! But, what I learned from her still controls how I play today. When I do. If any, anymore.

English choral composers like John Rudder or Stephen Cleobury, Director of Music, King's College, Cambridge, England,  have made their mark on both new and traditional choral works, but it is at Christmas time that even my heart seems to respond well to the beauty of sound as it echos in the high vaults of English Cathedrals. And, besides where else can you bring together choral works and great organ installations into such splendid mixtures?With the audio technology today, you don't even have to be in the cathedral to sense the sound within those walls. Since I don't fly anymore, because of  my bionic implant, listening to an HD-CD is probably more comfortable than the riggers of travel anyway.

Last year, with the bad weather here in Dallas, the Christmas Parade was skipped.  I try to support the Christmas Parade in downtown Dallas because the charity is one of the best. It made me think of the former J.L.Hudson parade down Woodward  Avenue in Detroit. As a kid, I grew up watcing the Cotton Bowl Parade and the Hudson Parade on television every year. I have seen both in the cold. Now, it's just a matter of choice. Do I want to get out in the crowd or just flip on the tuner and listen to music? The choice gets easier every year! But the spirit of the holidays  will always go with me beyond the grief and the sorrow. Music has been my crutch to lean on and get me through the holidays year after year now.

96-Days 'til Christmas