Tag Archives: Our World Tuesday

Shadow Shot Sunday – Super Bowl Edition

The last football game of the season (big frowns).

Here is our little Lizzie on neighborhood watch with LJ down in the shadows below. They love to watch the goings on.

I went on a walk around our Lafortune Park the other day. Lots of good shadows there. I love playground shadows.

And winter tree shadows.

I found me some bleacher shadows at the baseball diamond.

A couple of friendly old guys (in other words about my age) came by on their bicycles. Don’t normally see bikes on the walking path but they were going very slow and not causing any problems.

Heather and I went to Philbrook Museum a week or so ago for an art respite. I think shadows are an integral part of some art.

And another work

This isn’t my photo, it’s an ipad jigsaw puzzle I did. I love the online puzzles. I don’t like real jigsaw puzzles. Such a mess and I have a real sensory issue with the paper backing. I can’t stand touching it. Plus the pieces scattered about are a mess. The online puzzles are cool. For rookies like me you can specify the orientation to be up and down which simplifies things greatly and when you make a fit, the screen has a small flash and a cool little clicking sound. And when you finish, the jigsaw lines go away and you get the photo. (Note, the copyright still belongs to the company, not me.)

And another puzzle I finished. I love the combination sea and landscapes with interesting buildings.

And speaking of not my photo, this is from my buddy Josh who is working this week in the Bakken Oil Field of North Dakota. He is always giving grief about how pensioners like me need to get back to work. I give him a hard time being so dang lazy.

https://flic.kr/p/2n3ddom

Here is another photo from Josh from the inside of a natural gas processing plant. I find the plants to be very cool. In fact they chill the gas down to about minus 132 F to extract the ethane, propane, butane, and natural gasoline out of it. Oh well, I can tell you don’t care. I don’t blame you. I am way off topic, sorry.

I’m staying off topic for a bit, sorry. It’s Super Bowl Sunday. Heather makes a Turkey Chili. That is all the snack I want for the game. Our son loves it as well. Don’t tell him that Heather loads it up with all sorts of vegetables that just mix right in.

I eat the chili with Fritos scoops. Don’t get me the regular Fritos, more sensory issues from me.

And this will be my beverage of choice. It comes well recommended.

I hope everybody is having a good and safe weekend. I am linking this hot mess of a post with Magical Mystery Teachers Shadow Shot Sunday 2 meme and with Lady Fi’s Our World Tuesday. Come join in the fun!

Our World – El Reno

El Reno is a gritty suburb west of Oklahoma City. It’s in the center of the wheat belt so there are a lot of grain elevators. It was a Rock Island railroad hub, and an oil and gas operations center as well. Nearby Fort Reno was a cavalry outpost during the wars with Native Americans. And Route 66 runs right through town.

They even have a special place for love-locks.

And it is part of my year long turning 66 on Route 66 celebration.

I’m linking with Our World Tuesday. Come join in!!

Our World – the Mysteries on Turkey Mountain

Things have really been busy lately.

Someone close to us got covid and by some miracle, they got right into the emergency room of the leading hospital in Tulsa. They got some great care and will be returning to their home soon. Please be careful folks.

I went for a weekday hike on Turkey Mountain a couple weeks ago. I had the place to myself. I saw two other people in my hour and half and three plus miles. You come on a weekend there are a lot more (unless you know where to go where nobody else is.)

I started down the new trail and then veered off on a small leafy trail paralleling the new one.

I veered back to the new trail to check out this cutout of bigfoot. There is quite a bigfoot culture in Oklahoma!!

I left the new trail and headed west. I came upon a bunch of old cans and rusted pots on the ground and I noticed this pipe hung up in the tree.

It has been there so long that one end is embedded in a tree. It looks to me like a really old camp site. Turkey Mountain has been populated by Native Americans, farmers, ranchers, railway men, oilwell drillers, and supposedly moonshiners and more lately meth labs. Who knows the vintage of this camp!?

A littel further west I came to Pepsi Lake. What are called ponds elsewhere in the world are lakes on Turkey Mountain. Don’t ask me why. Don’t ask me why these Pepsi truck bodies are perched on the Pepsi Lake Dam. The Pepsi
Bottling Company is nearby so there might be some sort of connection. So people tell things like that Pepsi put the bodies up there to protect the dam. They don’t know that, they are just guessing. How would that protect a dam anyway.

It does provide shelter for homeless people (not for very long, it is a long walk to civilization from Pepsi Lake. You can tell people have had parties of very sorts at the site.

And there is some decent tagging there. Please though, take your graffiti elsewhere.

It’s a mystery that I haven’t figured out yet.

Another mystery is this thing on the west side of the mountain. Not too many people know about it but I’ve been told it is an old moonshiners camp other people have said outlaws hung out here.

A friend of mine piped up and said he knows an old timer that lives close to the mountain who knew all about it. He said that it’s an old hunting camp. Wow, that’s boring. I’m sticking with old moonshiner’s camp! Who’s with me?

So here is a little map of my travels. I started down at the bottom and went counterclockwise. Like I said I didn’t see hardly anybody. Being retired is fun, going at off times.

I am linking with Our World Tuesday. Come join the fun!

Our World – Scavenger Hunt

Not to toot my own horn, but I guess I will. I helped to plan and implement a scavenger hunt on Turkey Mountain this past weekend. It was originally supposed to be New Year’s but it got postponed because of weather.

The RiverParks Authority gave me thirty items to give away. Small stuff like stickers (people go nuts over stickers these days) and key chains. I conceived the idea of using repurposed cd jewelboxes and designed new covers and “liner notes” for containers for the giveaway items.

So late last Friday I loaded up my jewel boxes and headed to Turkey Mountain. My friend Laurie from the Tulsa Urban Wilderness Coalition helped me place them on different parts of the mountain. It turned out to be a good workout with about 5 miles of hiking involved.

We didn’t really hide them because we wanted people to find them. The RiverParks Authority also had people out and about placing bigger items like water bottles and tshirts on the mountain. They also had people adding new stuff during the day.

We hid one in the famous washing machine at a crossroads on Turkey Mountain. (It’s actually a drier but I get dirty looks when I bring up that fact. Ever notice that anybody who says “actually” gets dirty looks.?

I was busy but I always take time for photos.

Especially when the sun is setting.

Here’s a screen shot of the facebook invite for the event.

Channel Six here in Tulsa showed up and did a story on the event.

A good time was had by all. I was proud to be a part of it.

I’m linking with Our World Tuesday. Come join the party!!

Closing Out 2021

I love the time between Christmas and New Years Day. The days leading up to Christmas are all in a rush especially if somebody in the family gets ill. Afterwards you can relax a little bit hopefully. I took advantage of one bright, sunny, day and went on a bike ride.

One of my favorite trails is alongside a turnpike on one side and fields and farms on the other. I ran into a mutt and jeff combination of horses.

You got the little one, all cute and fuzzy.

And the older one, both looking for something better to eat than the dry grass on offer.

I got to the end and rested a bit in the shadow of a billboard.

When I came home, this guy was waiting for me. iNaturalist tells me that this is a Coopers Hawk. He was using our mailbox as an observation perch. We have lots of squirrels and bunnies in the neighborhood and he was looking to eat one of those cute little critters.

Hey you know, cute little critters don’t live forever and hawks have to eat to right?

Are you on instagram? If so, are we following each other? My handle is @yogiab. These are my top nine posts for the year. I love instagram.

Do you live close to Tulsa? Come join in the First Day Hike and Scavenger Hunt on Turkey Mountain. It was supposed to be New Year’s Day but we postponed it until Saturday, January 8th from 8 am to 5 pm. Check out this facebook post for the details. We are hiding the above repurposed jewel boxes for people to find. They are going to have various Turkey Mountain stickers and key rings to find. There are also going to be a bunch of tee shirts hidden on the trails for people to find.

Do you like the cd cases. I repurposed them and designed and printed new covers and the liner notes are the Leave No Trace seven principles. I hope that I am not spoiling the surprise. The RiverParks Authority posted the photo on their website so I figured I can post my own photo on my site.

That’s about it for now. I wish everybody a Happy, Healthy, and Prosperous 2022. Take Care!

I am linking with the following memes. They are all fun so check them out!!

Saturday’s Critters hosted by Eileen.

Shadow Shot Sunday 2 hosted by the Magical Mystery Teacher.

And Our World Tuesday hosted by Lady Fi

Rhema Bible College Christmas Lights

One warm evening last week all three of us headed out to Broken Arrow to check out the Rhema Ministry Christmas LIghts.

They have been doing this for years and it is free and quite the show. The lights are spread out all over the campus. They also have really good pedestrian flow compared to previous years and that is important in these pandemic times.

There is no charge and there is a very chill vibe going on.

There are milliions of lights, and reflections of those lights all over the place.

It’s a Christian organization and of course Christmas is a big deal in Christianity, celebrating the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ.

There is certainly a lot of joy on the Rhema Campus.

I love the marching band.

And of course, you have to have Santa Claus.

I’m linking with Our World Tuesday. Come check it out!!

The Chickasha Festival of Light

After our son graduated last Friday we decided to go see Chickasha’s Festival of Light at a local park. We have been hearing about it for years so this was our chance.

It was fun. Lots of lights and stuff to do. The vibe was mellow. We loved it.

Our favorite lights was this Santa skiiing behind a reindeer driven motorboat.

The had a cool bridge covered with lights going over the pond.

It was a great place to take photos.

There was another area covered with colored lights, another fun photo op.

Yep I know, I need a haircut. Coming up this Friday.

In downtown Chickasha, not part of the Festival is this crate. It has a 40 foot tall leg lamp like the one in the movie Christmas Story. It is a tethered inflatable balloon and it was grounded Friday night because of high winds. We were disappointed. I found this youtube video that shows it.

We had a good time in Chickasha. Logan has graduated and I doubt we will ever be back. Oh well.

I am linking with Our World Tuesday. Check it out.

More on Turkey Mountain’s New Trail

Sunday evening I attended a stakeholder meeting on Turkey Mountain with the Tulsa Urban Wilderness Coalition and others to get a tour of the new trail they are building and get our feedback. Previously I had paralleled the trail this time we actually got to walk on it.

It’s going to be a bi-directional multi-use trail for bikers, runners and walkers. It is nice and wide and after seeing it I think it will work well.

For bicyclists they have a “Choose your adventure” options where you can take jumps if you want to or bypass them.

A huge difference from the existing trails is the extensive work they are doing to cut down on water erosion. They are following the land contours and the trail is side sloped one to two degrees to encourage water running perpendicular to the trail than down it. They are also taking the rocks they find and putting them downhill from the trail to help contain the dirt.

They have some great banked turns.

Here is an action shot of me (on the right) stolen from a friend’s facebook post. Hopefully he won’t sue me.

We came to end of the construction. They only have about a half mile or less to finish this segment. This is the first mile out of 13 or 14 miles in phase one of five phases.

They hope to open this in the next few weeks. I think it will be epic. They asked each one of us what we liked and what our concerns are. Everybody loves the trail, the main concern is minimizing conflicts between bicyclists and walker/runners. This trail will be the fastest bicycling trail on the mountain when it is completed and will be popular with the jumps and steep banks. The Riverparks Authority is planning on a lot of mitigation measures such as making sure that the turns have clear sight lines and education measures so everybody understands who has the right of way (people on foot do) and encourage mutual courtesy.

So we are pretty excited about our new trails. There are other changes coming as well. They might be having the first prescribed burn. That will help a lot getting rid of non-native species and clearing out the understory.

I am linking with Our World Tuesday. Come join in!!

Tanyard Creek – Bella Vista, Arkansas

On the last day of our trip to Bentonville, Arkansas, Heather and I ventured up to Bella Vista to check what’s up there.

I’d scoped out the Tanyard Creek Nature Trail in advance and we decided to give it a try.

It is gorgeous. A networked trail system built and maintained by volunteers. It is very nice. Very walker/hiker friendly because they don’t allow mountain bikes on many of the paths. The mountain bikers are not ignored as there are other trails they can use on the property.

The fall color was mainly gone but the creek is very nice. There is a series of waterfalls coming off a dam and the creek goes for quite a ways on the property.

There were other people there but the site is big enough to give everybody some space. I saw hardly any litter scattered around. Kudos to the park users for picking up after themselves.

The signage is outstanding. They identify many of the trees, plants and shrubs on site. They also identify a lot of the cultural history of the land such as places where Native Americans used to shelter way back when, and fragments of farms and houses from the settlers who arrived later. I would have missed most of the cultural items without the signage.

It was an enjoyable two mile jaunt. The place is loaded with geocaches also if you are into that. Heather is not so we didn’t look. I have an app on my phone that chirps when I get within 55 feet or so of a cache and my phone was chirping like crazy. We didn’t look for any though.

I got home and searched the area for caches boy howdy it is full of them. Oh well, next time.

Tanyard Creek doesn’t get the press that nearby Bentonville does and their amazing network of trails but there are lot less people and you don’t run the risk of getting run over by enthusiastic mountain bikers doing there thing.

I’m linking with Our World Tuesday. Come check it out.

The Mildred B. Cooper Memorial Chapel

My wife and I made a weekend trip to Bentonville, Arkansas for a short getaway. On our last day we ventured up to nearby Bella Vista and checked out the “Mildred B. Cooper Memorial Chapel.” A non-denominational wedding chapel. Hit the link above for more information. Check here for historical information on who Mildred B. Cooper was.

It was designed by E. Fay Jones along with his partner Maurice Jennings. Jones also designed the Thorncrown Chapel in Eureka Springs and the Marjorie Powell Allen Chapel near Kansas City, Missouri. I’ve been fortunate enough to see both chapels. Hit the links for my blog posts on those structures. Jones was an apprentice of Frank Lloyd Wright and the architecture school at the University of Arkansas bears his name, the Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design.

The Cooper Chapel is like the others. It is light, airy, and appears to float in the air. There are fifteen main arches, each 50 feet tall. In all 31 tons of steel were used and support 4640 square feet of glass.

It is open to the public every day unless it is booked for an event.

_DSC0273-2 — My wife inside the main entrance

It sits on a wooded knoll high above a lake. It is an incredible structure.

I’m linking with Our World Tuesday

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