Christmas, Firemen, Exotic Dancers, and Fun in Downtown Tulsa

It’s been a while since I’ve shared what is going on in downtown Tulsa. So grab your coat and put on your hat and lets go.

First, Winterfest, not much going on at noon but in the evening they have ice skating and hot chocolate.

The ice rink is problematical. Sometimes they have trouble with keeping the ice frozen especially when it is windy. The operators of the rink say that the wind is a problem because the air friction with the ice creates heat that melts the ice. HAH!! Wrong. As a licensed professional chemical engineer I’d tell them that the air temperature is higher than the ice temperature so the air cools and the ice warms. The wind accelerates this. We call this convective heat transfer. If the sun is shining and warming the ice. That is called radiative heat transfer.

Lots of construction going on these days. One of my customers is building their own building. SHUDDER, I hope they make it. Building our own building in the energy business is risky. They are a conservative well managed company

The old and the new. The Midcontinent Building is in the distance. Built back in the 20’s when Tulsa’s energy industry was wheeling and dealing. Of course the black buildings in the foreground are modern. They are also the headquarters for Samson. A family owned oil company that recently sold itself to Kohlberg Kravis and Roberts (“KKR”) for $7.2 Billion. Reportedly the second biggest buyout in the USA this year. Wheeling and dealing is still going on in Tulsa. Just think shale oil and gas.

Next, a monument to Tulsa Firemen. I had to kind of study this a little bit. The guy in front is from the early 20th century the guy in back in contemporary. Tulsa firemen (and firemen the world over are awesome.)

Right around the corner is Tulsa’s monument to exotic dancers. Yeah, that what it looks like to me anyway. I don’t know why they are so close to the firemen.

Salvation Army bell ringers. Haven’t seen them in years downtown.

In what I think is the outstanding idea of the year is popup shops. Several local merchants have set up temporary stores in a couple of the old art deco buildings. They sell lots of cool stuff much of it handmade locally. I love it, love it, love it. They are going to be open until December 30.

If nothing else check out the the lobby of the Philcade building. Host to many of the popups. The downtown deco building owners are very proud of their properties. They encourage photography and some of them have fact sheets the guards will give you. I love that generosity of spirit.

Know something else. My favorite Christmas decorations are wreaths. There, you guys now everything about me.

Hey look it’s Occupy Tulsa. Occupying looks like boring stuff to me. I don’t know how they are doing overhauling our financial system but they stay busy with general assemblies, working groups, and facebook updates. I have never seen them use the weird hand signals they use to facilitate consensus during their meetings. I guess they don’t need them when the five of them get together.

Last stop the cake shop across the street from the office. I love what people are doing with cake design these days.

Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins

I just finished Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins, the second book in her Hunger Games Trilogy. The story of Katniss and Peeta continues. Wikipedia’s summary of the trilogy is here. The books are meant for young adults but I love them. The books move quickly through the story and there are plenty of twists and turns in the plot. I’ll be reading the final book soon.

I give it four stars out of five.

Breaking Dawn Part One

Sweetie and I went to see Breaking Dawn part one the other day. How about I give a fast recap, with not too many spoilers.

Let me see, Bella is now all growns up, she and Edward decide to get married! Sweet, right?

Take a good look at this photograph, its about the only time Bella ever looks happy.

She and Edward have a good time at the private island. They take their clothes off and get in the water.

They get tired of playing in the water and they put their clothes back on and play some chess.

And then they get tired of chess and take their clothes back off. Young people these days.

Meanwhile, Jacob is running around in the rain. You know he’s a lot better looking and more likable than Edward but I always worried about this boy. At least Edward knows to come inside when it rains. He just can figure out whether he keeps his clothes on or off.

And then… You’ll have to go see for yourself. Let’s just say that the fur flies.

Here is the trailer.

I give the movie about three stars out of five. I mean it’s not too bad. Women just go crazy over it. Guys, big hint, watching the movies is definitely less painful than reading the books.

Bedlam

Saturday night is the time for the annual Bedlam football game between the University of Oklahoma and Oklahoma State University. I didn’t go to either school but I enjoy watching it. I just want it be a good game. If either team played defense the game might even be interesting. This was supposed to be a big year for OU but they stumbled. OSU was going strong and they had a small lapse. So this game is about bragging rights in Oklahoma and the championship of the Big 12 Conference. Over the years OU has dominated OSU, winning 76 games, losing only 17, with 7 ties. I enjoy teasing fans of both teams and generally keeping the pot stirred.

I just hope that it is a good game.

Skywatch Friday – Changing Light

We are well into Fall and sliding into Winter. The days are still nice and some of the trees still have their leaves despite our stiff Oklahoma breezes.

(At entrance to Tulsa’s Philbrook Museum of Art)

Daylight Savings Time has ended so the sun is setting at about 5:15 pm. I work until 6 so I get to see some great sunsets late in the day.

The Arkansas River reflecting the sky. A refinery is just to the left of the river. In the foreground is our county courthouse on the left and city county library on lower right. I experimented with Picnick’s “HDRish” treatment to try and bring the buildings out of the blackness.

Have you tried any experiments lately?

Skywatch Friday

Philbrook Museum Festival of the Trees

Tuesday I met Sweetie and world’s best MIL, Nana at the Philbrook Museum here in Tulsa to check out their Festival of Trees. Also it is Nana’s birthday! This is from last year, darn me I don’t have a picture of them together since then. Take it from me, they both get better looking ever year.

The Festival of the Trees is all about Christmas. So of course they had a Santa.

And all sorts of trees made by local individuals, classes, and other groups. You can buy these works of art.

If I had a cabin in the woods, I would want this tree for that. It needs a little color though. I’m thinking some red strands of some sorts.

This was my favorite tree. I loved it.

Nana liked this one. Of course she is decorating for a tropical Christmas this year.

This is what she has in her living room. You should see what her tree is.

I liked this frame full of balls.

This I found plain disturbing. I’m going to have nightmares.

I think this is the Blair Witch Project tree. That is also very disturbing.

I don’t find this disturbing at all.

They had gingerbread houses also. I loved this little red school house. I reserve the right to repost for Ruby Tuesday, anybody mind?

This was the most joyous house. I love how they glued the kids faces to each of the cookies. Or maybe, maybe that might be a little disturbing also. What do you think?

A “Cars” themed post. Love it, love it, love it. Second best movie ever made.

And for you Christmas lovers from the People’s Republic of Kansas. A special “OZ” gingerbread house. I love the ruby slippers underneath the house.

And Hogwarts, I love Harry Potter. Those movies are all tied for about 6th on the alltime best movie list.

And this was my favorite gingerbread house of all. I like how it is at an angle and whopperjawed and all that. Whopperjawed is an Oklahoma technical term. I have a lot of readers from Canada and Great Britain who need some translation sometimes.

Anyway, we looked around and then I had to leave. Helping America solve her energy problems and all that you know.

Our World – Muskogee, Oklahoma

My Dad came for a short visit from Idaho for Thanksgiving. He likes historical type stuff and I wanted to show him something new so we headed down the turnpike to Muskogee.

First we went to the Five Civilized Tribes Museum. It is not that big but it is powerful. It has displays on the five tribes that were forcibly resettled from the southeast USA to Oklahoma. No photos are allowed but they have a dynamite display on Native American Medal of Honor awardees from the Five Civilized Tribes. Upstairs they had an art show going on. Check it out when you are in town. Very inexpensive admission charge.

The building it is housed in is the original Agency Headquarters from the 19th century. Very handsome in it own right. Gotta remember to stay off the grass if you go!

Next we went down to the Port of Muskogee to check out the USS Batfish. The Batfish was a submarine that sunk fourteen enemy ships during World War II. Unfortunately the museum was closed but we could look at the vessel through the fence.

There were some other things to look at also. Some anti-aircraft guns.

And this. It looks like it could ruin somebody’s whole day downrange.

And a little bit of humor.

It was an overcast day with no color. So how about a photo of my Soul.

Then we toured the port a little bit. I’m in the natural gas business. We are always looking for pipe. Our engineers can’t ever find any. We found some. Come and get it guys.

We found this cool machine. Dad and I love looking at this kind of stuff. Sweetie and SPB can’t stand it.

So, we had a pretty good road trip.

Our World Tuesday

Hugo – the Movie

Watched Hugo the movie on Sunday. The family loved it. Entertaining enough for kids, meaty enough for the parents. I loved it. I recommend you go see it. We saw the 3D version. Here is our latest family portrait.

Have you seen a good movie lately?

Today’s Flowers – Poinsettia

Sweetie wanted to get some poinsettias for some friends and family members so we headed out to A New Leaf in the Tulsa suburb of Broken Arrow. It is a not for profit organization that provides, among other things, job training services for individuals with disabilities, and they had Poinsettias in all sorts of colors and patterns.

There is no such thing as popping in and out of a greenhouse for Sweetie. She is the gardener’s gardener.

I think she wanted one of each. We finally picked a few out. Is there anything better than flowers for Christmas? (Or any other occasion?)

Today’s Flowers

Did you know, according to TLC

Poinsettia’a are not toxic.

They are originally from Mexico.

They were introduced to the United States by Dr. Joel Roberts Poinsett, the first US ambassador to Mexico.

Black Friday Geocaching

SuperPizzaBoy and I decided to celebrate Black Friday by Geocaching.

The first one we tried was “Mental.” My GPSr said it was in the middle of this road. The description of the cache said to grasp with both hands. We couldn’t find it. If you spot it, let me know.

The second was not too far away by one of the best geocache hiders in Tulsa. I’m not going to say who he is or where we were because I don’t want to give it away.

When I’m frustrated finding a cache I always wonder if eating the berries would give make it easier for me. I’ve never tried it.

I looked everywhere. SPB took this picture of me up in a tree. It was quite a ways up there, fifteen or twenty inches maybe. Sometimes I think maybe the young earth creationists are right. I mean if I had any relation at all to a primate I would have at least one climbing gene. Don’t you think? I can sure put a death grip on a branch though.

SPB found the next cache nearby.

The fake snake is a nice touch. I’ll have to try that sometime. Back in the day, that was a favorite office prank to play on somebody. Put a rubber snake in somebody’s desk. Nowdays you’d get in trouble for doing that. Of course, HR departments now don’t have any people so you have to log into their web site to see what your self service punishment is.

The last place we went to was pretty popular. There was a group on the right of the tree and the guy on the right. It was getting cold so SPB and I decided to go home and try it again some other day.

What did you do on Black Friday?

YogisDen.us

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