The other day, the moon here was 99% full and we had some scattered clouds so I took some photos. This one looks like the moon has a face, featuring a split lips. Reminds me of a cat actually so I guess this isn’t a man on the moon it’s a cat or man in the moon kind of thing.
We had some color in the sky the other day so I launched the old drone. This is looking roughly south of northwest from our house. About 40 meters up.
And this is a similar view looking straight west at the same elevation.
And this is roughly southwest.
And looking straight east. One can see the faintest tints of pink in the clouds. I love reverse sunsets.
And that is it this week. I am linking with Skywatch Friday. Come check them out.
Spring is really getting going now. The leaves are almost electric green. I take photos and when I look at them afterwards they look almost unnatural.
Sometimes the skies are incredibly blue.
The air is light. The temperature may so 39F outside when I wake up but it doesn’t feel near that cold.
It’s a great time to be in Oklahoma.
I took a walk with a young friend and former coworker. One of the legions of people I know leaving the hydrocarbon industry for renewables like wind and solar power. Amazing the things he told me, the innovations that are occurring right now. He’s telling me about the hydrogen economy and the role ammonia could play. I am falling behind. I have to do my homework.
You hear the phrase, there is nothing new under the sun. I have never believed it. There is plenty new under the sun and the moon.
In celebration of Spring in Oklahoma, here is “Oh What a Beautiful Morning.”
And you know, if you play one Oklahoma song you have to play the ultimate Oklahoma song. In this state everyone knows the songs and the correct arm and hand motions for “lazy hawks circling in the sky.”
Nobody else has as great a state song as Oklahoma does.
Went for a walk on Presidents Day around Tulsa’s Lafortune Park. It is a little over 3 miles around so it is perfect for a walk or a run or whatever you want to do. The trail winds around two golf courses, a tennis center, a library, a playground, and some little league baseball fields so there is a lot going on.
It has several ponds which make for great reflections when the sky is decent.
The trees near water make for great reflections.
Trees in the winter can be spectacular.
Ditto
The library has a hip modern design, but it was closed. You can get their wifi in the parking lot though. They started that during covid. That was handy.
And a Bonus!!
I got a new cell phone that I am still “messing with.” I took this shot the other day in my front yard. A crescent moon, with Jupiter nearby, and Venus underneath. The moon is kind of fuzzy but I am still okay with it.
Earlier this week, I wanted to go hiking on Turkey Mountain but decided to do it a little differently. I started from the Herman and Kate Kaiser YMCA on the northwest side of the mountain. I’ve been in lots of races there and a few events but never just parked in their parking lot and went hiking from their trails (which intersects with all the other trails on the mountain.)
So I checked in at the lodge and headed off by Lake Logan and the dam that forms the lake.
I got a nice view of the lodge across the lake.
And headed down the faint trail to the northl.
It eventually merged into the bigger trails that the Riverparks Authority is installing.
I always love the wild trees on Turkey Mountain.
The new trails are designed for and popular with the mountain bikers. Lots of up and down and side to side.
Eventually I got off the new trail and onto a legacy trail. This part of the park was cleared out by the previous owners when they were trying to get Simon Outlet Malls to buy it. By the way, Simon Malls announced, for the the third or fourth time, that they are restarting construction on the site they bought when they encountered so much opposition to buying a piece of Turkey Mountain.
Got to my destination on 61st street. The last work day we had a group went and made a small length of trail to get to the street so that the bikers could go through there, onto the streets for a ways, and then to another park with brand new trails. The only thing better than trails is interconnected trails is my motto. And then it was time to head back.
I came across this scene which is wall about what an Urban Wilderness means. That is downtown Tulsa off in the distance.
Part of an old road. Turkey Mountain used to have an oil field on it along with farms, ranches, and moonshiner stills.
A sign that we are back on the Y property.
Uh, don’t ask me!
And I had a good hike, about two and a half miles. But one more thing.
We had a full moon and clear skies!! The Full Snow Moon.
This is the beloved Pedestrian Bridge across the Arkansas River that I posted earlier. I posted a similar photo on the Abandoned Oklahoma facebook group and boy talk about a strong response. Most people want to keep it and are outraged that nobody got any notice. Seriously folks, its been in the news for three years. It’s a little late because the demolition contractor moved this last Monday. I got messages asking if it would be possible to get a bridge section. I don’t know folks, I’m just the picture taker. Call the River Parks!! I’ll miss the bridge but am looking forward to the new one.
A play castle at Tulsa’s fabulous Gathering Place. Oh to be a kid again.
A cool sign on the drive to Sequoyah State Park. I was by a year or so ago and the motel was all run down with a for sale sign. It sold, the place is spruced up and it looked like they had a lot of people there. I love it.
And a 90% full moon. We had a big bright moon, but it wasn’t full but with rain in the forecast I went ahead and took this photo.
I hope that everybody is staying healthy. Here in Oklahoma, Covid is surging and our Governor is not really doing anything about so our family is still hiding out, wearing our masks, and avoiding clusters.
A few days ago we had a fast moving storm with threatened tornado and possible hail come through. (You could say that about any day in May here in Oklahoma it seems.)
Looking straight west.
So we sheltered in place and watched the TV news and yes we had some very heavy, brief downpours, no hail though, no tornadoes, thank goodness and then we emerged from our houses and the air was a little breezy and cool so I launched my drone. Not too high though, it senses windspeed and alarms if it might get away from me, so I lowered the altitude and and snapped a few photographs and a short video.
Looking northeast across the green belt.
This is the back side of the storm as it moved on further east in Oklahoma and on into Arkansas.
A short panorama of the western sky.
Anyway, chalk up another spring storm we survived.
And here is a shot of a near full moon. I amplified the detail on the moon and added a penciling type texture to the space around the moon to provide a sense of depth.
How are things where you are? Oklahoma is loosening up the restrictions a little and it seems that many of us are abandoning the guidelines and engaging in risky behavior. I just hope that we don’t have a second wave of infection.
Monday I went to my first session as a Reading Partners tutor and I think it went pretty well. The first grader is smart, well mannered, lively and has a great sense of humor.
Pepsi Lake
I read a story and then we went on a scavenger hunt and then I helped them with a book report. It took only about 45 minutes all told and I think we both had a good time.
This past weekend we had a stellar lunar event. It was a Full Moon, check, The January full moon is known as the Wolf Moon, check (also known as cold moon.” The moon was close to earth, so it was also a Super Moon because it was fractionally bigger (although I couldn’t tell) and we had a lunar eclipse going on and with the lunar eclipse the the moon turns a shade of red. Thus the Super Duper Blood Wolf Moon. Maybe we like our moons too much?
So here is the moon about an hour or so before anything starts happening. I don’t use my “good” camera to shoot the moon. I have a Canon SX40 SuperZoom. I saw on youtube that with it you just put the camera on Auto setting and then zoom up the moon until it is a big part of the screen and then click. And you know what? It works. I don’t worry about settings and tripods, I just hold it in my hand and do it.
And here we are with the eclipse just starting.
And further almost to a complete eclipse and this is where my method really falls apart because there is not enough light for the auto settings to work. So the camera ends up with like a 1/10th of a second shutter speed instead of 1/200th like the photo above. So this is out of focus and I had to use some heavy duty editing to amplify the light that did come out. Still not too bad a pic.
And a finale pic
jjj
I took my Nikon to work the other day because of Martin Luther King’s Day and at the end of the work day I used it to shoot a few shots of the western sky. So that is looking west and includes the Arkansas River. Works much better than the iphone pics I generally post. I’m going to start carrying the Nikon around with me more. It takes much better photos than the phone camera.
And that is about it this week! I am linking with Skywatch Friday
This month we had the Harvest Moon. I love full moons. I take photos of all I can and apply all sorts of filters and editing to them. I hope that doesn’t bother you.
I went for a walk last week and caught a sunset and as a bonus I got lots of long narrow tree trunk shadows.
This is the Powerline Trail on Turkey Mountain, here in Tulsa. It’s the fast route from the north end of the wilderness park to the parking lots on the south end. It’s not the easiest though, you go straight up and down a couple of big hills. But is hard to get lost on it.
The sky was clear and the moon was bright so I took a photo of it. Don’t forget this Friday we have a full blood moon coming up. This was about 86% gibbous phase. I don’t always get them but I love it when I can see the craters on the “bottom” of the moon.
And here we are in the ‘hood. I loved the clouds one day when I was on the front porch. I guess sometimes I am a lazy skywatcher. While we are in a sharing mood, I took the photo of the moon from my front yard as well. Do you have any true confessions you want to share?
And this is my favorite building in Tulsa. The Boston Avenue United Methodist Church. An art deco masterpiece built in the late 1920’s and designed by Bruce Goff and Adah Robinson. The interior is beautiful also. It was our family church when we first moved to Tulsa.
And this is from Oxley Nature Center. I love how the island appears to be suspended in air. (Okay maybe I’m stretching it a little bit.)
Okay, that’s it for this week. Don’t forget the full moon on Friday. Take some photos for me. I’m going to be at a baseball game so I am depending on you.
