Somebody’s Having a Birthday

https://flic.kr/p/2m27tHs

This sign got added to the yard last night.

https://flic.kr/p/2h3jtWJ

It’s for this guy, who is now a college man.

https://flic.kr/p/Rn9kXZ

But we remember him napping with Pooh Bear on the beach.

https://flic.kr/p/2kWgPyX

And riding Ranger the stick horse all over the house.

https://flic.kr/p/2kN5XZw

He’s a great son who we are proud of.

https://flic.kr/p/2g3YPRX

And here he is with his Grandmother, Nana.

https://flic.kr/p/2iPbnui

And hanging out in the flower gardens with his mom.

https://flic.kr/p/2gNkyRv

He loves hanging out with his Mom in quiet times.

https://flic.kr/p/VfgT2C

And more exciting times.

https://flic.kr/p/2kUWBQC

Happy Birthday Logan, we are proud of you and love you very much.

An addendum,

The Birthday Boy

https://flic.kr/p/2m279zR

I think he loved the yard sign. Heather hired an outfit to do it. It’s like a super-duper birthday card.

https://flic.kr/p/2m29FVY

Used the drone to get a little altitude plus it is its own tripod.

https://flic.kr/p/2m2eni8

A little bit higher angle. Tried to use the tripod with my Nikon but it would have to be in the middle of the street.

https://flic.kr/p/2m2druV

We loved the sign and missed it when the people came and pulled it up.

https://flic.kr/p/2m2envs

We had a birthday dinner at a nice restaurant.

And lots and lots of candles.

A good time was had by all!

Up Periscope!

We are having some great sunsets the past few days. We get a little bit of rain sometime during the day and then the remaining clouds reflect the setting sun perfectly. I am launching my drone from my back yard straight up to about 150 feet and pointing it west. It is about the same height as when I worked in downtown Tulsa in a high rise with a window looking west. The DJI Mavic Mini drone that I have has a gps that holds the craft in place. If the wind is too much too hold it sends an alarm and I will lower it a little bit.

This is our back yard at about 150 feet up.

This is quite a bit lower. I liked the reflections in our neighbor’s pool.

I hope that everybody has a great holiday weekend. I’m retired so they are all holiday weekends for me..

I am linking with Skywatch Friday. Come join the fun!!

Wordless Wednesday – Front Yard Flowers

Working the Tulsa Ironman Triathlon

We had a major sports event here in Tulsa Sunday. The North American Ironman race. A triathlon race covering over 2 miles of open water swimming in a lake starting a dark thirty in the morning, a 112 mile bike ride through the Osage Hills and finishing with a marathon distance run up and down Tulsa’s RiverParks trails. And no I didn’t participate in the race. I helped out an aid station on Sunday afternoon on the marathon course.

It seemed like most of the racers were from out of state. I was told it cost about $900 to enter the race. It’s like what!!!! Oh well. The organizers really had their act together on this. They can bring a lot of resources to bear. From my point of view as a volunteer they made it very easy to sign up and they broke the tasks down so even I could understand it.

I was in charge of Gatorade. I didn’t have a lot of takers. For one thing they had lots of aid stations so it wasn’t like they were famished when they got to us. I think another thing is that runners would rather have salty type foods or even pickle juice than Gatorade. Back in the day when I was running longer distances Gatorade didn’t sit too well with me. But hey, anybody that wanted some, I was ready! We never really got swarmed during the race. By the time the racers got to the running event, they were pretty well spaced out.

I was amazed by the racers. You have to be very dedicated to do this. You can’t really fake it to make it on a triathlon. The early front runners were running like there was no stress. When I left Sunday night at 7:30 there were still lots of runners just starting their second loop. I was thinking oh wow, are they going to make it another 13 miles or so. Out of all the people I saw I observed only a handful that were what some might call overweight. I saw a lot of people my age or older, probably the majority of them were women who looked very fit.

I was getting kind of hungry and the race organizers got pizza for the volunteers. Sign me up!!

I think the Ironman is coming back to Tulsa for two more years. I’ll be there, volunteering.

I’m linking with Our World Tuesday, come and check it out.

Skywatch Friday – Loving the Cloudy Skies and Rain

We’ve had lots of rain and cloudy skies lately. Kind of hard on the hiking but great for growing stuff and taking skywatch photos. I launched the drone from the backyard for the above photo. The controller was squawking at me about the high winds and dark skies but I sent it straight up over the back patio and straight back down. This is the view to the northwest of our backyard.

Wednesday I went back to Philbrook Museum for the first time since they shutdown last year. I really missed hanging out in their gardens. I took this photo with my cell phone. Everything looks scrunched up.

For contrast I took a similar photo with my Nikon. It’s more realistic looking with more depth in the photo. Cell phone cameras in my experience do a lot of flattening the perspective.

Crow Creek winds through the gardens of Philbrook on its way to the Arkansas River. I loved this tree reflection in the creek.

Out behind the Timpietto they had a poetry rock garden so I gathered up a few and made me some rock poetry. The Philbrook gardens is my happy place. I’ve spent hours there over the years and taken hundreds of photos and always find something new to see.

Meanwhile, back at the house. I think rainy overcast days are my favorite for breaking out the macro lens and taking photos of flowers. These are some of Heather’s zinnias that she planted last week.

Bike Ride on the RiverParks

Monday morning I took my bike for a ride on the RiverParks Trails here in Tulsa. It was about 15 miles which is a good ride for me. I have found if I start around 9 am or so then I avoid all the idiots on the E-scooters and E-bikes. I hate those things. They cause a lot of problems but that ship has sailed. They are here to stay

. The Gathering Place was all lit up with wildflowers. I think they are grooming things better now. Previously it looked unkempt and they got a lot of complaints. I like the new balance. I think it is still low maintenance and low water usage.

Stopped to take a phone call. Nobody on the trails but me!

I had a great time!! It’s like a moving meditation to me.

Spring Flowers & a Wedding

Sunday night, Heather and I dressed up and attended our first wedding in a long time at a beautiful venue out in the country. Although we are both vaccinated I was a little nervous sitting shoulder to shoulder with people inside. First time we have done that in a while.

The bride and groom had known each other in high school way back when and ended up together after going through some trials. The bride was radiant and the groom was smiling. I don’t know either one but it seems like this is meant to last.

It seems like we are seeing more and more of that. People have to grow up and get seasoned a little bit before they figure out what is going on.

DSCF0032 — **Flowers from Woodward Park 2020**

I wish them well. I hope I don’t get Covid!! Take care folks.

I am linking with Our World Tuesday

Garden Shadows & More

Late afternoon recently capturing the , getting the Garden Bee Shadow

Early in the morning, caught the photographer stealing a photo of my wife’s flowers.

And just for grins, my earliest “shadow” tagged photo, from 2008 of some bicyclists on the River Parks trails in Tulsa. Sorry for the fuzzy shot. It is from my intentionally crappy but fun Takashi 521FX camera.

The Takeshi can also do negatives. Here is son on a swing in 2010.

And finally a self portrait of the photographer in action.

I’m linking with Magical Mystery Teacher’s Shadow Shot Sunday. Come join in the fun!

Backyard Critters

When the pandemic started last year and work and everything else shut down my family started spending lots of time in our backyard. It was great. Safe and secure from covid since it was completly disinfected by the professionals from https://www.mosquito-authority.com/mosquito-barrier-control-services site, so we thought, we talked and noticed that as we get calm the backyards critters appeared. This year, things are a lot more hectic but Friday night we hung out in our back yard and the critters reappeared.

A male cardinal showed up. They are quite the Romeos, singing their love songs.

And a mockingbird. They imitate other birds.

A rabbit showed up and stayed quite a while. Looking around and giving itself a thorough grooming.

It was very flexible. I’ve taken lots of yoga classes this year cuz I think my flexibility might be my biggest issue as I get older. This rabbit doesn’t need to worry.

It groomed and groomed for over 30 minutes and we left it to its further grooming. That has to be the cleanest rabbit in Tulsa.

Heather made a new friend today. What we think is a house wren. We are not birders so if you have better information we welcome it.

When Heather goes outside, the wren shows up and sings to her.

For such a small bird, it makes a big sound. We are in love with this little critter.

And we have our everpresent squirrels. This guy froze on our back fence for five minutes before it left.

We love rediscovering that if we just go outside and be quiet for a few minutes then nature reappears.

We are linking with Eileen’s Saturday Critters. Come join us!!

Bicycle Riding the Osage Prairie Trail

Wednesday morning I loaded up the bike and drove to Skiatook about a half hour so north from Tulsa. There is a north south rails to trail called the Osage Prairie Trail that runs from just north of downtown Tulsa to a couple miles north of Skiatook. I always ride from the north end.

It was in the high 50’s when I started out with a pretty good breeze. I am glad that I brought a jacket. I started out going out and back the two mile segment north of Skiatook. It is a lot easier than what it used to be because their is now a pedestrian crossing with a light. Getting run over would ruin my whole day.

Very soon I was in some nice counryside, woods and meadows.

And some swamps. You can tell it has been raining here lately. There are several geocaches along the route and a few I have not found yet. I am not really wanting to wade in shin deep water to find them though.

Lots of cattle grazing on the route.

I loved the high thin clouds. After a short while it warmed up enough and I took my jacket off.

When I think northeastern Oklahoma, this is the kind of scene I think about.

The right of way for the trail is that of the old Midland Valley Railroad which was constructed early in the early 1900’s. It reached down into the oilfields around Tulsa and prospered for a while. They languished during the Depression. The railroad no longer exists. This is one of the original bridges.

I passed through the little town of Sperry and stopped at and old gas station what was used for filming a scene from the move “The Outsiders” by S.E. Hinton. They shot at locations all over the Tulsa area and I have tracked down many of them along with the new Outsiders Museum here in Tulsa. Check it out here.

I finished up at about 18.6 miles. There were no hills but I am kind of out of shape. I had fun though. It was like a two hour moving meditation and I was totally in the moment enjoying the wind and sun on my face and the bucolic scenery passing by. I came to and woke up at the country road crossings though. Don’t want to get run over at this point in my life. It was a fun two hours.

I have made several other posts of the Osage Prairie Trail over the years here, here and here if you are interested.

And then last night I noticed there was a little color in the sky at sunset so I launched my drone and snapped a few pics.

I am linking with Skywatch Friday, come join the fun!

YogisDen.us

Welcome to my world