Friday, August 14, 2009

























Time is getting pretty short; school starts the week after next and I have plenty to do before I start teaching the boys where I'm running the education program this year.
This sort of trip is what usually happens at this time of year; quick outings to the Thousand Lakes as the countdown to autumn becomes more apparent.
There were plenty of trucks headed south with atv's and trailers in tow today. Tomorrow is the first of the hunting season, the general bow hunt begins. Never know quite what to think as this sort of thing happens; people are so crazy about these things nowadays. The 'typical' American male worries hell out of me, in many ways.

Thursday, August 13, 2009

There's another drill rig in an odd spot, this one right off of Skyline drive west of Miller's flat Reservoir (just west of a very special spot to me, a creek we call Endowment Run). There's a significant amount of outbuildings and the rig, right out on the end of a ridge.
Strange behavior and frustrating placement. I wonder who put this one through on National Forest land.








































The ridge it's on, just short of the cirque at the north east end of the horizontal ridge.

Sunday, August 9, 2009

From the Parade magazine in today’s Sunday paper:
Q Why are my tax dollars going to pay a poet laureate when nobody reads poetry? - Jeff Kawabata, Omaha, Nebraska
A “It is difficult/ to get the news from poems/ yet men die miserably every day/ for lack/ of what is found there,” wrote the great American poet William Carlos Williams. (We hope you’ll look him up!) While it’s true that not many people read poetry, they’d probably get a lot out of it if they gave it a try. The current U.S. Poet Laureate, Californian Kay Ryan, earns all of $35,000. But fret not: Her stipend is funded from a private endowment, not tax revenues.
The weather has been fresh and new these past few days, with temps at night around 45f and days no higher than 75. What a sweet blessing.
Up to the Huntington, Ryan and I arrived at streamside to this sight.
Frost on the sweet peas; my toes were a bit nipped as my breath coalesced into steam in front of my face.
The fish were fair resplendent as we fished and reflected on the fast approaching fall and still steadfast summer.

Friday, August 7, 2009

John Hughes, the icon of eighties iconoclastism and conflicting materialism, died of a heart attack yesterday morning. There is a mountain of articles by often maudlin and always reminiscent soon-to-be middleagers like me available on the web, but I really liked this one in its analyses of his film's allure and lasting influence on many of my generation.