(Photo taken mid June)
It’s been hot here in Oklahoma this summer. Yesterday we set a new record in Tulsa at a high of 107F. The sun burns hot during the day and now the moon is burning bright.
Monthly Archives: July 2011
Arkansas River Amphitheater
The Arkansas River Amphitheater on the west bank of the river during my Tuesday morning.
The Tulsa Paranormal Investigation Team checks out the Ghost of Thomas Gilcrease
The Tulsa Paranormal Investigation Team (“TPIT”) has been reading “Tulsa’s Haunted Memories” by Teri French about the various ghosties and such that are haunting areas in the Tulsa area and we have decided to start checking things out. Our first assignment was to check out the Thomas Gilcrease Mansion on the grounds of Tulsa’s Gilcrease Museum.
Here is TPIT’s chief investigator, SuperPizzaBoy. You can tell by his folded arms that he doesn’t believe in ghosts.
Supposedly Mr. Gilcrease floats, so to speak, between the Museum, his old house, and the gardens. Ms. French reports a high turnover among the guards. I can understand the house is old and looks haunted.
We couldn’t get inside the house but we checked the gardens pretty well. We didn’t meet him or any other ghost. Lots of windows, we felt we were being watched by somebody.
We had a little excitement when I saw something in the window looking back at me. Turned out, it was me. How do you like the hip hop style pants? At least I got them pulled up around my waist, unlike most people who wear them.
We had another brief excitement, but it was just SPB teasing his dad.
TPIT’s official conclusion is that Mr. Gilcrease’s ghost had taken Sunday off.
Do you believe in ghosts?
I’m hooking up with the Real Housewives of Oklahoma Into Your Neck of the Woods this week.
Ruby Running on Sunday
Sunday Morning I went out to run with some friends starting at the Jenks bridge.
I got there a little late. There are three directions that one can head. I thought they might be headed west so I went on across the Jenks bridge across the Arkansas River.
Guess What?
I didn’t find them, but I had my camera, so this was my first Ruby Tuesday photo of the morning.
I went down Main Street. Jenks is a suburb of Tulsa and they have really spruced up their downtown trying to lure the suburbanites out of the malls and box stores.
It’s a nice place to come and shop. I had it all to myself at 6 am.
Note the self portrait above. What kind of dufus uses their flash to take a photograph of something across the street. Three guesses, and the first two don’t count.
Looks lke an ice cream shop but its just the local paper.
Want to relive the route with me? Sure you do, here’s the map.
Check out lots of red themed photographs from all over the world at Ruby Tuesday
God Makes All Things Beautiful
“I have seen the God-given task with which the sons of men are to be occupied. He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also He has put eternity in their hearts, except that no one can find out the work that God does from beginning to end.
I know that nothing is better for them than to rejoice, and to do good in their lives,”
Ecclesiastes 3:10-12 (NKJV)
Geese Reflections
Sometimes I think that I shouldn’t worry about a Zombies because geese are taking over the world.
Have you ever stopped by a nice serene pond and been mobbed?
Gullliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift
I have been reading “Gulliver’s Travels” by Jonathan Swift on my Ipod Touch for the last several months during the odd moments of time like waiting in line. The book is a novel in four parts about the travels of Lemuel Gulliver to various parts of the world. The book was a real surprise for me. I had always thought of it as a children’s book. The classic scene is Gulliver tied up by the Lilliputian’s until they figure out that he doesn’t mean to harm them.
(http://etc.usf.edu/clipart/galleries/literature/gulliverstravels.php)
There is this vague sense that things are all great at the end.
Wrong! The Lilliptutan’s are a bunch of small minded people and Gulliver soon ends up in trouble. First he puts out a fire in the Queen’s castle by urinating on it, drenching the Queen. That makes her mad. Second, he helps the Lilliputan’s in their long standing war against the island of Blefusco but refuses to help make Blefusco totally subservient to Lilliput. He is sentenced to be blinded as punishment for this treason so he escapes.
Next he winds up in the Kingdom of Brobdingnag where instead of being twelve times bigger than the inhabitants as he was in Lilliput,he is twelve times smaller. He is found by a farmer who displays him for money. Gulliver ends up in the royal court and then the story gets kind of kinky. He is used as a kind of a sexual plaything and is molested by the women of the court, including a sixteen your old girl. Gulliver writes about how disgusting the giant naked women are. This part was a hoot. I wouldn’t read it as a bedtime story to your kids.
(http://eroticarta2z.com/art/illustration_for_gulliver_s_travels.html)
Gulliver leaves Brobdingnag and has several other adventures. His final destination is the Country of the Houyhnhnm. The Houyhnhnm are a kind of a horse shaped beings. Their are human’s there called Yahoo who are looked down upon by the Houyhnhnm as being base and menial and not good for much. The Houyhnhnm are very advanced and rational and listen with dismay as Gulliver tells them about Europe and how governments are run.
Eventually Gulliver has to leave Houyhnhnm and return to England. At this point he has been transformed from the happy go lucky adventurer to a recluse, disgusted by all contact with humans, even with his wife, whom can hardly stand.
The book is a great read. Swift is very imaginative and has a great writing style. I give it four stars out of five. It”s a classic. I’m going to miss it.
Does anybody have a recommendation for another classic for me to read?
Mayo Hotel Skywatch
(Pardon the blur and the reflections)
The Mayo Hotel is right next door to my office building to the north. A few weeks ago a storm blew through town and made it dark as night in the middle of the day. Their neon light came on it got so dark.
The storm looked mean and wet but blew through without a drop. All I have to show for it is this photograph.
Satellites and the Truth About Bodice Ripping
I just love technology, especially satellite technology. My favorite hobby is geocaching. I’m going to take this space to again thank my fellow Americans for taxing themselves and taking out loans for billions of dollars so that I can find tupperware in the woods.
I’m not kidding, I really appreciate it!
I use a watch with a GPS that accurately measures just how miserably slow I run.
Many people can walk faster than that. I salute them.
Recently I bought a new car. A Korean Kia Soul.
It has Satellite Radio in it. I’ve had Satellite Radio in my truck, but I have more channels in my new car. It has a book channel where they actually read books. All kind of books, I’m listening to Anna Karenina by Tolstoy and Presumed Innocent by Scott Turrow. I’ve also listened to some Romance Novels which reminds me of the that sub genre “Bodice Rippers.”
I haven’t read one all the way through myself. I used to have a secretary who read them though. She would leave bookmarks with yellow stickies for all the “good parts.” I would grab it and read the good parts aloud. The good parts sound hilarious when you say them aloud as opposed to reading them. I thought it was great sport.
They are still hilarious. All the pulsating, quivering, thrusting, gasping, panting, and grunting sound really funny spoken out loud. I wasn’t thinking anything about it though until I saw yesterday morning that the esteemed Wall Street Journal had a video on Victorian Ladies Underwear and the research that some Romantic Novel Writers are doing on Victorian underwear so they can write Victorian “romance” scenes properly.
I’m all for following the truth wherever it leads you, but I’m not sure that this endeavor is going to go anywhere good. For one thing, have you ever seen Queen Victoria’s underwear? (Warning this photograph is really disturbing.)
Anyway, you can see the video yourself below.
So what do you think? Do you demand historical accuracy in your reading or would you rather have a good story?
