Category: 2014

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Recently I stumbled on a movie titled The Wind That Blows the Barley.  The setting was 1920 Ireland and was about the conflict between the Irish wanting self-rule and the British wanting to maintain control.  It was entertaining but not a happy story.  Also last week I caught a beautiful, calm day and got in a round of golf at Comanche Trail.  When we had dinner with the Shewberts Sunday Gary suggested we play golf Monday, weather permitting.  In my view this time of year it is more important what the wind is doing than what the temperature is.  As it turned out, it was windy and threatening rain so we skipped golf.  But Thursday, well, it just doesn’t get any better for golf here on the high plains.  On Thursdays Gary plays with a friend who can’t play any other day so I was left to my own devices.  I decided I would play a big-boy course and decided on the Comanche Trail Arrowhead course.  I got off around 9:00 when it was still pretty chilly.  In fact, there was a little ice on a couple of the wooden bridges.  But the air was so calm and the sunshine so pleasant, I was never uncomfortable.  I was, however, a little intimidated by the large areas of long grass in front of many of the tee boxes.  They might as well be water because the chances of finding your ball if you hit into them was about the same.  I walked the course using a pull cart and was by myself all day so no one was there to see my silly shots, nor was there anyone to appreciate the handful of truly outstanding shots.  I’m anxious to have another go soon, but that will depend on the wind. Continue reading “Wind” →

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Pretty much a ho-hum week this week.  I guess the high point was Halloween when we had an actual trick-or-treater, the first in several years other than A&R.  The little feller was accompanied by his big brother and may have been part of the family that lives down the street in the Simmons place.   Simmons place, that’s how I refer to house in the neighborhood, by the names of the families that lived there as I grew up.  Anyway, they visit us ever so often to sell us candy for their school fund-raisers.  A&R and their parents also visited us after they finished the trunk-or-treat at the soon-to-open new church campus in northeast Amarillo.  They have committed to attending that campus for a year once it opens in the next few weeks.  I guess the idea is to have a core congregation while they build it up.  It is a less privileged part of town but no doubt in need of the Word.

I did play golf Thursday.  Gary Shewbert is back in town but I guess he has been too busy to call so I decided to play by myself.  I fell in with another fellow who claimed he had only been playing a month.  He was maybe around 50 and said he played every day.  He played much better than someone who had only been playing a month but who am I to doubt him.  He left after nine holes because there was a pretty strong north wind.  I didn’t mind the wind since I was for whatever reason playing at the upper end of my skill range.  Oh, and I saw Gary out there playing with another fellow who zinged his t-shot in my direction.

Saturday morning in spite of the cold wind I participated in a history walk out at Wildcat Bluff I’d signed up for.  I’m not sure of the leader’s bio, maybe he was an archeologist.  Anyway, he had participated back in the 90’s in a survey of the area that comprises Wildcat Bluff, listing the historic sites.  Some of them were those left by the ranchers and cowboys that worked the Frying Pan ranch and some were left by much earlier folks passing through.  He pointed out three areas where clay was quarried and used at a brick manufacturing enterprise on Western Street in the early 20th century.  It is my understanding the bricks that paved Polk Street came from there.  He also showed us the remains of a dock along West Amarillo Creek that runs through the area.  The creek has been dry for some time due to the use of irrigation in this part of the world, a plight of many such water ways around the area.   I guess I wouldn’t want to give up modern amenities but it would be so nice have some of the features of the Panhandle the way they were back in the day.  I can remember as a boy playing in the creek that runs through McBride Canyon.  It use to run as far as the rock house but I don’t think it has done that since sometime in the 60’s.

Joyce’s cat-breeding operation is going well.  There is the mother tabby, her two nearly grown kittens and five new kittens.  The latter are three tabbies and two solid black ones.  They show up about sundown for dinner and recreation and they are of course very cute.

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Not without some difficulty I managed to tear myself away from SA and go on a ramble.  The beautiful fall weather is too good to waste entirely on work.  Joyce had other things planned for the day so Tuesday afternoon I fired up the Pathfinder and headed up FM 207 in search of the site of Adobe Walls.  I’ve read several different things about that historic site, most recently a book about Billy Dixon, perhaps the most famous figure associated with Adobe Walls along with Quanah Parker.  The route took me through Panhandle, Borger and Stinnett, and area of the Panhandle I hadn’t been through before.  It wasn’t any different from the rest of the area for the most part but still an interesting drive from straight, flat plains, winding down through the Canadian River valley and back to the level again.  Wind mills have sprouted up in this part of the world like mushrooms and I passed through a wind farm with one less than a hundred feet on either side of the road.  I stopped to listen to them and found they make a sound like a passing car as the blades go around.  That might be objectionable if one were close enough to them but it didn’t compare with the noise from I 40 we contend with. Continue reading “Escape velocity” →

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Sunday night/Monday morning Joyce and I slept through a one-inch rain. I didn’t know it had rain until Joyce mentioned it at breakfast. She didn’t know how much since it was still too dark to check the rain gauges. Needless to say we needed the moisture, and the sleep, but we were amazed that we could sleep through that much rain and concluded it must have been a gentle one. That theory was supported by lack of evidence of runoff like we get with downpours. With the cool temperatures this moisture should last us a while. Continue reading “Sleeping soundly” →

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Last week I spent several days in or traveling to Fort Worth.  Wagner Oil, an old customer was having trouble printing their revenue checks and wanted me to come on-site to see if I could get the problems straightened out.  I spent a day there week before last when we were in the area for Vivian’s birthday.  I didn’t have a lot of confidence that I could solve their problems because they seemed unrelated to FormSprint.  I was willing to make the attempt, though, and turns out I was able to solve their problems, which were multiple.  We made some progress the first day I was there and I agreed to come back to be on hand when they ran their next batch of checks.  I spent the day before the check printing  sorting things out further and the next day when they ran checks they were very happy with the smooth operation.  I had a couple hours of free time the day before and spent them at the Forth Worth Botanical Gardens, mostly  in the Japanese gardens.  Besides the lovely gardens and impressive koi in the ponds, the place was alive with monarch butterflies, so much so that I had to duck now and then to keep from getting one right between the eyes.  There were some impressively large specimens. Continue reading “Fort Worth” →