Weekend Reflections – Turkey Mountain

Wednesday evening after work I headed to Turkey Mountain. Much has been happening lately and I can always get my head on straight up on the Mountain.

It has been raining lately so the trails are not as dusty as they were last summer.

There are even some sizeable puddles alongside some of the trails.

I’ve been experimenting with puddle reflections lately. You can really do that during a drouth. The above is one of my favorites so far.

The Westside YMCA runs a day camp on the north side of the mountain. They had spruced up their trail signs. I could hear some loud drumming and yelling going on. I was curious about what was going on but I stayed away.

I did stop and take a pic of their fishing pond though. Nice to see them starting to fill up again.

A previous employer of mine has a pipeline that runs across the mountain. I’m big into connectivity and I’m very familiar with this pipeline and the network it connects to. If I bang it with a hammer (I’d never do that of course it would damage the coating) I can just imagine the sound traveling from here to almost every state in the lower 48 and Canada and also Mexico. I have maps so that I can show you just how that would work. Of course, you would have to put your ears to the pipe and listen very attentively to hear me hammering.

My new trailrunning friend. We ran together for a little bit but I was too slow for him so he waved and was off.

At the parking lot, two final reflections, Cityplex Tower and the full moon both reflecting the sun back at me.

Weekend Reflections

Skywatch Friday – Oklahomans and Our Sky

The Moore tornado has thrown me for a loop this week. I apologize I just hadn’t felt like posting or visiting other blogs. I have been glued to twitter and facebook and news sites reading about the tornado and its aftermath. CNN.COM has an essay by Oklahoma Today Editor Nathan Gunter that really spoke to me. He writes about the relationship between Okies and the sky.

“Oklahomans have a special relationship with the sky. We know how to look up. On the prairies of western Oklahoma, the skies are so big, and so full, it is easy to feel you may begin to fall upward, or even fly. To live underneath this unbroken expanse of heaven can be at once inspiring and terrifying.”

“Our identity is in softly rolling prairies giving way to forested hills, in long stretches of horizon that make you feel like you could see almost to eternity, and in big skies stretched tight above it all. We have learned to watch those skies — for blessings, for rain, for sunshine, for wind and for signs of danger.”

“Green-tinted clouds are never a good sign; a hook echo on a radar — the telltale swirl at the edge of a storm pattern indicating strong rotation — means take cover.”

“In Moore, it began almost as soon as the tornado touched down. Teachers at Plaza Towers and Briarwood elementary schools threw their bodies over their students to protect them from debris. Survivors flooded the streets helping to dig their neighbors out from under collapsed homes. Trucks filled with supplies raced to the scene.

We help. That is how we begin. It’s what we know how to do. Word just came from Red Cross Oklahoma that Oklahoma City Thunder star forward Kevin Durant has donated $1 million to disaster relief efforts; Devon Energy, headquartered in Oklahoma City, donated $2.5 million. Thousands more from all over the country have donated what they can.”

“For Okies, this is what home is about.”

I can’t really add anything else.

Skywatch Friday

Moore, Oklahoma Tornado

(Back side of storm system that developed into the Joplin, Missouri tornado of May 22, 2011, 158 killed)

We have had some bad weather today in Oklahoma. A huge tornado went right through Moore, Oklahoma and as I write this post, there have been 51 confirmed deaths, including 21 children, and a large number of people unaccounted including 24 in an elementary school.

(Canadian County, Oklahoma – aftermath of tornado of May 24, 2011 – 6 killed)

We get a little antsy here in Oklahoma when the weather is warm and humid here in Oklahoma and the winds get a little swirly. There is too much energy in the air. The storms seem to in west Texas in the heat of the afternoon and set out in a roughly northeast direction across Oklahoma. The television stations go nuts with their storm radars and cameras and their weather chasers. It’s all very anxiety producing.

(Weatherchaser car, 2012 Chickasha, Oklahoma)

To some it seems to be a sport and lots of fun. I even read reports of tourists paying to ride with tornado chasers. I think they are nuts.

(More Canadian County, Oklahoma tornado aftermath)

We clear out our saferoom and hope and pray for the best. Most of the time nothing happens and we bitch about missing the playoff game, or the last holes of the golf tournament although we are not too serious about it.

(Leedey Tornado Monument, May 31, 1947, seven killed)

Today though, we are not complaining about anything. We are shocked by the loss of life, especially that of children, and hope and pray that that twenty four unaccounted for children at Plaza Towers elementary school made it home.

Our World – Boston Avenue Church

Boston Avenue Church is a Methodist Church in Tulsa designed in the art deco style by Bruce Goff. It is one of the most beautiful buildings I’ve ever seen and I’ve posted photographs of it several times. I took this picture from a window where I work. I cropped out the bottom a little because of some ugly rooftops that intruded in the photo.

We used to be members when we first moved to town and I can tell you that the interior of the building is as spectacular as the exterior. They used to have guided tours of the building every Sunday after the last service.

In a city known for its art deco treasures Boston Avenue Church is the masterpiece. Check it out if you ever make it to town. Tell them Yogi sent you.

Our World Tuesday

Scavenger Hunt Sunday – from Trios to Volkswagen Microbuses

After a few weeks of doing other things I’m back to Ashley Sisk’s Scavenger Hunt Sunday. Lots and lots of fun, but lots of work also.

Three

How about the reflection of three trees on the San Antonio River?

Hand(s)

Here in Tulsa we can beat anybody else’s hands with the Praying Hands at Oral Roberts University.

Fence

I found this old school rock fence at Tulsa’s first park, Owen Park.

Cuddly

Sweetie and SuperPizzaBoy. I got lots and lots of cuddly pics with those two.

Sign

A local drug attorney in Tulsa parks his drug van in a parking lot here in Tulsa. For good or bad, here in Oklahoma we put drug dealers and many users away for a long time.

Scavenger Hunt Sunday

Weekend Reflections – Bright Shiny Things

Last Sunday morning Sweetie and I left SuperPizzaBoy at home so he could read poetry, listen to music and ponder important thoughts play video games. (No we didn’t go to church, we were total sinners and didn’t feel bad about it either. I know that we are on your prayer list.) Oh, sorry, I got off track. We went to a local nursery to shop for plants.

At least Sweetie was shopping for plants. I brought my camera along and was taking pictures. Taking pictures (cuz I’m not a photographers, I don’t capture images, I take pictures) of the plants but also…

of the bright shiny stuff they have for sale there. I just can’t believe that let people like me take pictures for free.

I just love it. I also think its a case of bloggernomics. You don’t know what bloggernomics is? Here is a lesson. See all those bright shiny balls below. I don’t know how much each string of baubles is but if you are a blogger...

You get all of them for free!!!! That’s bloggernomics.

It applies to multiple flats of flowers or

a whole pile of reflective balls. And as a bonus you don’t have to haul them out to the car, or unload, and then haul to the back yard. Or water them, or replace them after hail storms or any of that other stuff that comes with the concept of “owning” things.

Is that a win/win or what?

And when we were all done I was happy, and so was Sweetie. Here she is watering the flowers we put in at her mother Nana’s house (World’s greatest MIL in case you are wondering who Nana is.) Look at Sweetie’s big smile.

Nana was happy also, and so was SuperPizzaBoy! No telling what he did at the house while we were gone. I don’t want to know. Trust me.

So, do have any good examples of bloggernomics?

Weekend Reflections

Skywatch Friday – Blue Sky and White Clouds Through the Trees

The sky through the trees at Tulsa’s Heller Park.

Skywatch Friday

Flowery Hands Wednesday

From a double exposure with my La Sardina 35mm Lomography film camera. I hid the sun with my hand on a bright clear day and snapped the shutter. I then took a picture of my wife’s knockout roses without advancing the film and voila! rosy hands. It worked out better than I thought it would. Poor man’s texturizing maybe?

ABC Wednesday – R is for …

R is for Rain!

Downtown Oklahoma City. I was warm and dry in a pedestrian bridge.

ABC Wednesday

Our World – Tulsa’s Owen Park

Tulsa’s Owen Park, Tulsa’s oldest public park, is a jewel just to the northwest of downtown. As peaceful as it is now, it began with a accidental nitroglycerine explosion in 1904 in a nitroglycerine storage shed. Nitroglycerine was used for oil field purposes. The explosion’s crater became what is now Own Creek Pond pictured above. I love that story, another account said that the pond came about when the city dammed a ravine in the park. That definitely lacks in drama and thus is probably not true, at least in my thinking.

The property has been a park since 1909. It sold by Chauncy Owen to the city of Tulsa. Apparently it was the major park in Tulsa for years.

I love old obscure memorials. I loved the brass work on the one above. It is the Indian Memorial. Just several hundred feeet east is the junction of the Creek, Osage, and Cherokee tribal nations. Let me tell you something, there is not much of anything more complicated than the history of the Indian Tribes in Oklahoma.

There is another monument nearby that commemorates a barbecue held on the property in 1921. It was for families who had been in the area for 30 years or more. Not exactly the welcome wagon is it?

I noticed that Chancey Owens attended, and several branches of the Perryman family who played a huge role in early day Tulsa. I find it amazing that somebody considered a barbecue so important that they built a monument to it. Have you ever been to a event that good? Me neither.

So, is that it for Owen Park? A remnant of early day history, well I think things are happening.

A brand spanking new play park with splash pad. Splash pads are all the rage now. We just need some kids. They’ll show when school’s out.

When the weather is hot there is nothing like these dumping buckets. They’ll cool you off in no time.

Also, an old building on site is being converted to the Discovery Lab of the Tulsa Children’s Museum. Check out the link, it sounds fun. It opens later this month.

Also, the neighborhood seems to be coming back. This house above is rght across the street. I just love those first floor doors and windows and the staircase to the left.

So, I think things are looking up for Owen Park.