Interesting Finds

 Since selling my car, riding the bus and the trains have been my only mode of transportation----except walking, now that I have almost reached full recovery. Of course, there are days of exception due to weather (not an excuse) and more recovery as an on-going process. Having said that, my workflow has more than quadrupled in recent weeks. That---is what makes this all possible. 

Now, when I had my car and I made my daily route about the Metroplex following my travel wheel that I used for years to set up a route. That enabled me to cover and recover the Metroplex without missing anything when following up on construction products, or new ones. It became an act of faith at time. When I got in the car and pulled out onto the street,"Lord," I would say, "The wheel is yours. Take me where you want to go." Not surprisingly, my best days of shooting and getting images that sold 50 times over or more, came from those days. In short, I had no plans of where to go on those days, just turn the wheel almost blindly. 

Now that I do ride the public transportation, I had a thought a couple of weeks back. Why not do the same thing riding the bus or trains? And so I did. And so, every day this week I have sold pictures. I've found things that I would never have found on my own. Today, I found an amazing tree budding out with red seeds that are much like the 'helicopter' seed pods of the Maple trees. I had never seen those before. Oh, I've seem hundreds of time those little 'helicopters' flying down through the air from a Maple but the pods were tan to light green and rather leathery. These were identical in looks but they were bright red and while they were rigid, they were also soft to the touch. The tree bark was white like a Sycamore tree. And, if that wasn't enough, I found the southern version of a yellow Forsythia. One like I remember when growing up. In the Great Lakes, they are pretty much the same but there is a minor variation on bloom development and opening stages. Relatively minor differences. Since being back in Dallas, I have looked for them, but only today, did I find the Forsythia of my childhood.

 

 

 

 

Storms of two years ago and a lot of buildings still look like this one---unfinished.

 More storms tomorrow. Strong tornadoes forecast with heavy rain producing flash flooding, hail and more as the dry line passes. It's gonna be an interesting morning, afternoon and evening in North Central Texas.

Hopefully, the downtime tomorrow will afford me the opportunity to edit pictures from today.. There were not as many as the last batch. About half the size in numbers. But, there were some interesting takes on a new project that I have been working on.

A New Benchmark on the camera. A 5-miles of walking the University Trail. A metamorphic glass filled with Bush (not the beer)

 It was a perfect day. Barely any wind, temps in the mid 70°F range. I'm having to relearn some of the bus routes because of the changes made January 24, 2022. Today I had to ride the new 17 route, which was the old 84 only to find that DART has eliminated a section that I had been looking for, only to find that the changes in January wiped out that section. Little things like that do slow my travel down somewhat, but it has opened up other avenues that have created some better shots but not always convenient at the moment. 

Tomorrow should be the same weather wise but Monday is going to be a stormy day with a could be amount of rain in the 1-2 inch area. We need the rain badly, but not the storms. To many storms. I have seen more storms in the past two years than the entire time since I came back to Texas. Go figure. Yet, I'm not complaining. An old man my age with a snow shovel is history! I mentioned to Dr. Pat not long ago (he's the bio anthropologist that I know at UMass) that I auctioned my snow shovel off before leaving the Great Lakes. He sent me a picture of a big snow pile in front of his house with a show shovel sticking in the top of the pile with the tag line, "I'm in here somewhere." 

Could be a good time to get out again by late in the coming week through the week end. It is not cut in stone by mother nature yet. I set a new benchmark today with 137 downloaded from the camera when I got home tonight. Not since before I had my first surgery in 2019 have I shot a number that high. Prior to 2019, I was shooting in the neighborhood of 250-75 per day. Last week, I surprised myself with 70 images in one afternoon. Looking back at the file log from 2019 to January 2022, my images were in a slump because I could not walk without falling, then it was walking with a cane for nearly 6-7 months and the past three months walking has become a lifeline to self rehab and today was a great day, too. At home, feeling pretty good, there wasn't any swelling in my feet and legs. It is a slow process to get back up on that horse again. But, my determination is strong and not letting things get me down is hard wired in this old noggin. Call it strong will if you like. 

When I got off the Red Line at Lovers Lane, I saw a couple of guys hanging around just waiting for me to take a shot at them. It was rather funny in as much as he had ear plugs in but he was watching me get my camera out of the bag and waved to me. 

His partner got a late start.

The 12$M Cable-stayed Bridge over busy Mockingbird Lane at SMU/Mockingbird Station

                                                                               Real Green Grass Growing Already. Last Monday when I came home the landscape guy was cutting my grass and his partner had already trimmed the side walks. The guy with the noisy jet pack on his back was coming down the other side blowing the trimmings into the grass. I hear that it is like a good mulch.

An obedient school for dogs---I later found out on the East Campus of SMU across from the main campus west of US75- North Central Expressway (then a section between the two exits to Presidential Center, George W. Bush.were renamed George W. Bush). So, get this: there is a Bush street on the west campus being the back side of the man beside the library; then, an Expressway renamed for Bush on the back side of the dog. A Mockingbird under the feet of both man and dog and a SMU Blvd across the top of the metamorphic glass, which is the passageway to the East Campus in front of the library where a 15-story tower stands guard with  a neon Mustang and the SMU east campus sign. By the way,  a massive crane with a full crew of men were assembling an identical sign that was ready to be lifted up as I got the heck out of Dodge. To much Bush for one day. I didn't mean that type of Bush. To much action in one block on either side of the Presidential Center. I would have preferred a Bush in a glass, alright, nice and cold with a good Rubin with a side Dill spear and a few chips on the plate.

Think this was cute. It was on the side of the building on the trail leading into Mockingbird SMU/Mockingbird Station. So was the wood alongside the trail at a hotel near the Bush Presidential Center. The BBQ is good!! Didn't say the price was, though.

Bradley Pears Bloom.

 First the daffodils, then the red buds and now the third anchor of a trilogy have blossomed---the Bradley Pears.

Checked your rims and tires lately?

 With winter all but behind us, I stopped today at C&M tires in the 9800 block of Walnut Street. The sun lighting up the chrome rims caught my eye. Texas heat has away of wearing down tires quickly. Don't get caught short. I always checked my tires about this time of the year. The guys at C&M are a great bunch of guys so next your in that part of the city, check them out They also have other locations in the Dallas area but for some reason, these guys have always treated me well.

Another Tornado Just Missed Me!! Hit Leonard, Texas

 I walked out on my porch to check on my plant that I have been carefully taking care of inside all winter. It had just begun to show new shoots about an inch above where it was when I brought it inside. With temps being in the 60°F to 80°F all week long and no freezes I had put in out on the porch for the next several day. But with the hail warnings, I was being a helicopter human over my plant.

Just as I stepped out on the porch,  a flash of lightening drew my attention to the sky. Back into the house, grabbed the camera and I returned to the porch where I shot images for over an hour of very, very angry clouds. As they moved NE of me at a fairly slow pace compared to the faster movement I usually see, I remember thinking at the time that someone is going to get a funnel cloud because of the evident rotation that I was seeing. 

A couple of years ago my front door blew open. I got up to close it and saw a funnel cloud with so much rotation, I was having trouble shutting the door. That cloud destroyed about 16 miles of homes, businesses and schools, right through my old neighborhood, cutting a continuing path of destruction that missed my house by under four-tenths of a mile. I was just walking in that same area this past Sunday and took a picture where I washed my car, taking my cat, Hotdog with me. Looking at the leveled space there I stood at a skid of bricks that remained from storm repairs on a privacy fence, I thought about how much I loved that cat! Now, a day later  it was Déjàvu again. This time while the clouds were low, areas had cleared away along the dry line showing the blue sky and the towering clouds above what I was also seeing from my porch. Leonard, Tx did have a touchdown with a lot of damage from the news storm chasers reporters. Again, it was a close call. To close for comfort.

Another 4-mile walk finds some interesting things along the way.

 Since the cold returns tomorrow and today was the high end of the roller coaster, I set out at noon to see what I could find along the way on one of my discovery missions. One of the things that I was going to be looking for was the red bud tree that was seen from the bus last week. Almost instantly, I began to notice that tree limbs had been butchered one after another. The complaints are well documented as the utility cuts the branches that are under the power lines. The red bud was a casualty.

The seed balls from several Sycamore trees were smashed under the tires that had driven over them between the street and the sidewalk. One tree trunk came up to within 5 feet of the wires and the other side of the trunk towered to some 40-45 feet. From an landscape point of view. It looked awful. So sad. I do understand the need to do the process but that is a whole separate point of view. I just can't understand why the city planted the trees there in the first place. So many of these were city plants. I guess that some one in the department that does that just never thought that the trees would ever grow that high. 

Next. The Atchison,Topeka and Santa Fe tracks, historic in their own right, now part of the Kansas City Southern Railroad, yielded to the city for trains running from the yards that put together double stacked Inter modal trains. Running not far from my house, the trains once blew their whistles. The city went to a no horn crossings that were served by crossing gates.  For years I loved listening to the sound of the trains coming to and fro, Depending on the wind, as a train approached or diminished in distance after passing, I could judge by the sound of the horn if it was approaching one of the two crossings that I live between. Recently, however, I had noted a strange difference in sounds giving the assumption that the trains were always going the same way. Today, I discovered  why that had changed. Atop the two signal poles is a remote controlled whistle operated from the trains traveling in either direction. That is  fixed horns that never move like a locomotive. Mystery solved. 

Years ago I listened to an vinyl album named,"One Stormy Night". It was an amazing recording of sounds of train horns mixed with amazing orchestration of music scores. It was an amazing album in which to listen while reading a good novel, or to study by. As a kid, when our family traveled to my great aunts for a few day, her front porch was the first place that I headed for. She lived on a street--Railroad Street---in fact. Amazingly, that AT&SF train track was the same one some 300 miles north of where I live now. It was a busy two-track line with sidings. My paternal grandfather's farm butted up to an old Missouri & Pacific line. My dad bought a lot in town that had the same train tracks into town that had passed by my grandfathers farm. Dad later sold the lot for one on a hill side where our new house was built. 

Here I am still fascinated with trains and don't mind riding them even today. Now that gas is expensive again, it is likely to rise even more. Selling my car nearly two years ago in favor of the trains and buses here has not been one problem outside of the normal weather delays in ice storms for the light rails. The big diesels run with no problems.In fact, it's been a good move to have sold it when I did.

Across the street was a station selling at $4.05 for unleaded regular. But see the $5.29 in green? That's diesel that delivers your groceries to the stores and why you are paying higher prices for food stuff and the like. It's a double whammy! I can remember the gas wars of the mid 60's when diesel went for $0.04 a gallon and regular gas was selling for $0.17 a gallon. Dad had a rule that I could take the car on Friday nights and go out with my friends. The rule was to bring the car back with equal or more gas than what you found it. My friends would kick in a buck each and I never had a problem with dad about not having left the car short on fuel. $4.00 would fill the car us in those days. The gas wars on the Ohio Michigan border were fairly regular as in Detroit, the Imperial gallon was more than the US gallon in volume so to counter that, the gas wars equaled the playing field.

The remote control horns on either side on the flashing signals solved the mystery as to why the sound never moved in location like it once did when the trains sounded the horns on the locomotive engine.

Most all the sycamore trees seen today all had branches loaded with buds ready to pop open. Next week we are forecast to have mid 70's and lows in the mid 50's for at least a week to 10-day run. That will bring them out as green for sure.