Tag Archives: Logan

Birthday Weekend!!

Son Logan is having a birthday this weekend. For some reason either he is growing or his mother and grandmother are both shrinking.

He is a patient kid, he puts up with all my hiking, geocaching, and other things I like to do.

He’s a scholar, presently at a community college and may be going to a four year university soon, and staying in the dorm. And his mother and I will be empty nesters, except for our five other kids (dogs and cats.)

And he is always ready for a good stretch!!

And he is patient with his dad sticking a camera in his face. I have almost 5800 photos of him in my archives.

And lucky for him, he takes after his mom. I think he is a good looking kid.

Especially when he is next time.

He loves chilling in his grandmother’s poo.

And he is a big reader. He goes everywhere with a book.

He and his mom love parasailing together.

And he loves video games.

Happy Birthday Logan!! We love you.

Skywatch Friday – A U2 Sky

Heather and I went to the U2 Concert last night here in Tulsa. In fact Tulsa is where U2 is starting their latest tour. They of course put on a great show. It had a sad tinge to it that I think is reflective of our country right now.

And then earlier this week we had a full moon. Fish Moon, Pink Moon, Sprouting Grass Moon, I love all the different names we have for full moons. The problem is, that I took this photo the night after the full moon. Still it was 98% full. I can’t tell the difference. Aren’t you happy with me that I came out and was honest with you about this? Don’t always count on it!! I’m a scoundrel with the facts.

The sculpture is “Monument to Forgiveness” in honor of Tahlequah, Oklahoma being the end point of many Native American on the Trail of Tears when they got evicted from the southeastern USA. Check out “www.monumenttoforgiveness.org“

On our trip to the JT Nickel Wildlife Preserve on Sunday, Logan and I stopped at Northeastern State University for a look see. They are starting a program for people with Special Needs to get a university experience. We are applying and have high hopes. They are taking only five this, their first year of the program.

He’s doing well at school and is still working maintenance at Walmart. He’s a hard working kid.

I’m linking with Skywatch Friday, better late than never.

Our World – First Hike of 2018 on Turkey Mountain

Son Logan and I went on a hike on Tulsa’s Turkey Mountain Wilderness Area last Friday. It was cold to start but sunny. The sunny part of it made for some great shadows.

I’m still recovering from my knee injury so I picked an easy trail. The upper yellow trail from the south to north. When I run I like to take this route to start because it is a slight downhill the whole way and I feel like areal runner. No running this time but it was still pretty easy.

We found us a tree. Turkey Mountain is full of trees. There is plenty for everybody so if you come here feel free to claim one. Please leave it though. Take all the pictures you want and visit anytime!

The upper yellow trail passes some moonscape type terrain.

We also found an old oil well. Turkey Mountain used to have lots of wells back in the day and there are reminders around everywhere.

We also found this shelter made of branches. It is at the highest point on Turkey Mountain. I am not sure who used it. I doubt it was a homeless person. The surrounding area had no trash or debris at all. Most homeless camps are pretty messy. Plus most homeless camps are near places where they can get water and food. This place is a pretty arduous hike for a homeless person. So it is a mystery to me. I have a feeling somebody came up and camped here. In my evening runs on the mountain I have seen several people leaving the parking lot with camping gear. Camping is forbidden but I am not the camping police is my motto.

By the time we got back to the parking lot, it was a lot warmer. Plus if the hike is downhill all the out, then it is uphill all the way back. Plus I decided to pick a little tougher trail with more rocks. We were ready to get home and down some cold water.

I am linking with Our World Tuesday, come join the party!!

Finally, Rain

We finally had some rain today. Not a whole lot and it brought some cold weather along but things were getting very dry.

I just now noticed the nativity piece located in the prime position below the monitor and above the power strip.

Logan is doing well with his new job at a grocery store. He worked in the deli for a while and is now working maintenance and appears to be doing well. He is getting all growns up it seems. I took him to a medical lab for some blood work and he checked himself in.

I love taking photographs of refineries and other industrial stuff. I read that in Japan indusrial tourism is a thing. They call it Kojo Moe. People try and visit factories and other industrial facilities. I can understand that. I think I would have a hard time getting the other two in the family to join me.

LJ the cat is happy. It got cold enough for us to turn the fireplace on. Sometimes I think he is going to burst into flames.

We are having a little bit of a toned down Christmas this year. We have had lots of distractions but I am taking a few days off and my brother is driving in to visit. We’ll eat good and maybe watch a movie or two. My main problem with Christmas is that I can’t turn it off as fast as many people can. I always want to stay on the vibe for a week or so. Lots of people seem to be done with it the day after. Too quick for me. I love the time between Christmas and New Years.

Skywatch Friday – Recovery Walk

On Sunday, son Logan and I went for a walk on Tulsa’s Turkey Mountain. I had run a race the day before so I just wanted so get out and stretch my legs a little bit. Something called a “recovery walk” or a “recovery run” except I was not running.

Turkey Mountain has a few double track miles of trails but most of it is single track. Once we got a quarter mile away from the parking lot, we had the place to ourselves.

The air was just barely warm, and dry, and the skies were deep blue.

The just barely changed leaves were almost fluorescent with the sun shining through them.

The grasses are just now turning color.

Here is a track of our journey. We stayed on the “Snake Trail” not because of snakes but because the trail folds back on itself.

I’m running a 25K race this coming weekend on Turkey Mountain, the TurkeynTaturs 25K. We’ll be running the Snake Trail and just about all the other trails on Turkey Mountain as well. I’lve pretty much run them all. I plan on taking my time and trotting the non-rocky flats and downhill segments and walking through the rocks and uphills.

This is a cumulative “heat map” showing all the trails I had run as of several months ago. As you can see I run a lot on Turkey Mountain. I love it and the race Saturday will be a tour of all of it.

Wish me luck!! It will be the longest race that I have run since 1997 when I ran the Madison Marathon in Wisconsin.

I’m linking with Skywatch Friday

Emily and Libby get Hitched

This past weekend we ventured to Oklahoma City with the world’s greatest MIL, Nana, to attend the wedding of our sweet friends and family, Libby and Emily above. No they didn’t get married in a swimming pool!! This is from earlier.

It was a classy affair. Instead of a guest book they had this thing. You signed a little wooden heart and put it in a slot at the top. Being the classy guy I am, I not only signed it, I went ahead and put a Dallas Cowboys star next to my name. Not that they are Cowboys fans, but they should be!!! Right!!?? I don’t see my name. Some Eagles fan probably took it out.

The wedding party was very attractive. I stole this pic from Cheri Lou’s facebook. She is probably going to sue me for doing that. So I need you to contribute to my legal defense fund. Just send me your credit card number including that four digit supernumber that unlocks all sorts of good things and your billing address. I anticipate ongoing needs so dont’ be cheap with me.

And this is a Yogi original photo. I mean what is up with this group of people, they are ll over the place. Look at them. That is Sweetie on the left, then Nana, then Cheri Lou, and behind her is her husband, Sweetie’s cousin, Joe, and the kid in the back is Logan. Quite a group wouldn’t you say, and the bar isn’t even open. This is my photo but Cheri Lou is probably going to sue over this picture as well. So double up on the legal defense fund. And Sweetie is going to dump me so I need an extra donation for that also. And you will never guess it from this photo, but The BAR WAS NOT EVEN OPEN yet!! Yep, they are all stone cold sober.

And here is me with the kid and Heather aka Sweetie. Doesn’t she have a sweet smile?

And here is Nana and bored grandson.

And here is the cake, You can tell the bar still isn’t open.

Things are looking up though. Heather and I found a shuffleboard table. We do shuffleboard!! We courted playing shuffleboard. That is our thing. We also found a cooler. At least I did.

More selfies, you can tell the bar isn’t open yet!!

After the ceremony, the bar opened!! And Sweetie danced. She loves line dancing. I can’t do it.

Logan wouldn’t dance with his Mom, (this is awkward he said). But he cut a rug with his Aunt Cheri Lou.

And next thing I knew, Heather is leading the Conga line. Why not?

Yep, Emily and Libby got hitched and it was a heck of a party.

Shadow Shot Sunday – Random Shadows

Here is son Logan on our way to ONEOK Field to watch baseball. Notice the book in his hand. Smart kid doesn’t care a flip about baseball but he is a good sport especially since we eat barbecue beforehand he gets ice cream during.

At work they built a new picnic area out in front of the building with a ramada over it. The shadows are supposed to be in the shape of a natural gas flame. Yeah, well maybe is what I say but my employer keeps the tables cleaned off and it is a nice place in good weather to eat lunch. No smoking, which makes it even better.

More shadows here on a fence along a local trail.

Linking with Shadow Shot Sunday 2

Happy Father’s Day Dad

Another Father’s Day and I am blessed to still have my Father. He lives a thousand miles away but I think about him all the time. He is my personal hero. Dad is getting better at the group selfie thing.

He grew up in the plains of South Dakota but somehow became a Forest Ranger with the US Forest Service.

We lived in some really out of the way places. This was Coyote, New Mexico. In case you are wondering, I am the good looking kid. It has been years since my brother and I have held hands like that. It may be a few years before it happens again.

He fought forest fires for a living.

And suffered from the same photography frustrations as I do now. Left to right I think that is me, sister Ellen, and brother Bob.

Dad was always student of history. We took a journey to Fort Sill, Oklahoma several years ago and found Geronimo’s grave in a very out of the way place on a very cold day in November.

Here is a publicity still by the Forest Service with him and me and my Smokey Bear on the Santa Fe National Forest. I am still waiting for the royalty check.

Here is Mom and Dad in Ireland back in the 80’s. They had lots of fun together.

This is Dad with my sister Ellen, brother Bob, and me at a church reunion in Payson, Arizona.

Dad even tried a little geocaching, here with me and sister Ellen. Mainly trying to be a good sport more than a love for the sport. He was always a good sport.

He has slowed down a little bit but is still sharp as a tack and is still living life.

Happy Father’s Day Dad, I love you.

Summertime in the City

Summer is here and we have already had our vacation so we are grinding it out. Logan is taking summer college classes downtown. He missed his bus the other day so he got to sit in my cubicle and read.

I took a class earlier this week on Leadership Training. It was held at a hotel and the swimming pool was next to the meeting rooms. We should have brought our suits.

Coming back from vacation in Alabama we found a decent liquor store with a knowledgeable clerk who gave me tips on all sorts of local and regional brews we don’t get in Oklahoma. This is a Key Lime Pie Gose. Gose beers are kind of sour and salty and they are just the thing in the summer. This one was great.

I wore my hydration pack for the first time for my weekly run on Turkey Mountain. I can carry 1.5 liters of water instead of just 750 ml that I can carry in my water bottle plus a lot easier to carry. You have to watch your balance though climbing up rock faces. Too easy to lean backwards too much. The pack doesn’t make me any faster but I can run farther and not be so wiped out at the end of the run.

Logan is getting a few more weeks of job skills training at Goodwill Industries. They have a pretty decent program for kids on the Autism Spectrum. Next up they will help him find a job. And then they provide job coaching. We are grateful for the support.

I won a $25 Goodwill store gift certificate at a Goodwill event just before we went on vacation. What do I buy at Goodwill? They surprised me with their collection of inexpensive books. So I got a box of books!! Which I will recycle through my account at used book store here in town that basically costs me a dollar when I exchange like for like quality of books. Sometimes I think I am extraordinarily cheap. Maybe but I like making a game out of it also.

What to do the rest of the summer. On the list are

Visiting my sister, Ellen who has started work in Yellowstone Park as a seasonal worker for a vendor. Check the link for her blog. She is making the most of her time there.
Going to see my Dad in Idaho.
We were talking that we have not been to New Mexico in a while. The green chiles are calling me

How about you, what do you have on your plate?

Oh yes, the latest Microsoft Windows upgrade has slowed my machine down tremendously. I thought I might have to get a new one but I am trying a huge increase in RAM from Crucial dot com. I am going from 2 gb to 16 gb at pretty reasonable cost. If it works. I’ll let you know. It should be here in a couple weeks. I can’t hardly run photoshop any longer.

Life’s a Beach – Birthday Edition

Logan started his birthday on the beach, reading.

It ended up raining and so the planned parasailing got put off for another day. We ended up doing a little shopping and running errands and such.

He wanted dinner at Shipp’s Harbor, a nice restaurant that we all loved.

It is in a marina. I love marinas. Looking at the different kinds of boats and seeing if I can tell which ones get used and which ones never get taken out.

We went to see a movie, “The Fate of the Furious”, part of the Fast and Furious franchise. It had some great scenes filmed in Havana with old cars and such. It also had a luscious Charlize Theron as a bad girl trying to steal nuclear launch codes. She commandeers a bunch of cars to go into driverless mode to attack the convoy that has the launch codes. Great scene.

We also had birthday cake of course.

And so a great day was had by all.

YogisDen.us

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