Archive for March 2014
Where Is It: The Park is 5 miles north of Moab, Utah, and 360 miles southwest of Denver, CO.
The Birth: From Wikipedia:
Designation of the area as a national monument was supported by the Park Service from 1926, but was resisted by President Calvin Coolidge’s Interior Secretary, Hubert Work. Finally in April 1929, shortly after his inauguration, President Herbert Hoover signed a presidential proclamation creating Arches National Monument, consisting of two comparatively small, disconnected sections. The purpose of the reservation under the 1906 Antiquities Act was to protect the arches, spires, balanced rocks, and other sandstone formations for their scientific and educational value. The name “Arches” was suggested by Frank Pinkely, superintendent of the Park Service’s southwestern national monuments, following a visit to the Windows section in 1925.
In late 1938, President Franklin D Roosevelt signed a proclamation which enlarged Arches to protect additional scenic features and permit development of facilities to promote tourism. A small adjustment was made by President Dwight Eisenhower in 1960 to accommodate a new road alignment.
In early 1969, just before leaving office, President Lyndon B Johnson signed a proclamation substantially enlarging Arches. Two years later, President Richard Nixon signed legislation enacted by Congress which significantly reduced the total area enclosed, but changed its status to a National Park.
It Happened Here: From NationalGeographic.com:
There are more than 2,000 arches in the park; to be classified as an arch, the opening must measure at least three feet across. The largest arch in the park, Landscape Arch, spans 306 feet (longer than a football field) base to base. New arches are constantly forming, while old ones occasionally collapse—most recently Wall Arch, which fell in 2008.
Size: 76,679 acres
# Visitors: 1,082,866 visitors in 2013. Attendance peaks in June/July, and is at a minimum in January.
Fees: $5 for individuals for 7 days; $10 for vehicles for 7 days. $20 for campsites at the Devils Garden campsite, per nite.
Staying There: There is only one campsite in the Park, and it’s located well for exploration of the Park. There is no backcountry camping allowed.
Contact Info:
PO Box 907
Moab, UT 84532-0907(435) 719-2299
Current Issues: From Wikipedia:
Climbing on named arches within the park has long been banned by park regulations. Following Dean Potter’s successful free climb on the Delicate Arch in May 2006, however, the wording of the regulations was deemed unenforceable by the park attorney. The park revised its regulations as follows in response:
All rock climbing or similar activities on any arch or natural bridge named on the United States Geological Survey 7.5 minute topographical maps covering Arches National Park are prohibited.
Climbing on other features in the park is allowed, but regulated. The revised regulations also prohibit slacklining parkwide. Approved recreational activities include auto touring, backpacking, biking, camping, and hiking, some of which require permits. Guided commercial tours and ranger programs are also available.
Photo: Forrest Mankins. Posted by the US Department of the Interior on 3/10/14.
Sunrise photo by Jacob W. Frank. Posted by the US Department of the Interior on Tumblr, 2/7/14.
Some photos from America’s public lands are beyond words like this one @ArchesNPS by Jacob W. Frank. Tweeted by US Dept of the Interior, 1/15/14.
Photo by Jacob Frank. Tweeted by the US Department of the Interior, 12/26/13.
Tweeted by the US Department of the Interior, 12/10/13.
A nighttime photographer captured while they were photographing the splendor of the Milky Way through an arch. Tweeted by the US Department of the Interior 10/27/13.
Photo: Jacob W. Frank. Tweeted by the US Department of the Interior 11/14/13
Tweeted by the US Department of the Interior, 11/18/13.
Photo by Neal Herbert. Drum scan from a 4×5 transparency. From the Park website.
Double O Arch. Photo by Neal Herbert. From the Park website.
Landscape Arch. Photo by Neal Herbert. From the Park website.
Skyline Arch. Photo by Neal Herbert. From the Park website.
Eye of the Whale Arch. Photo by Neal Herbert. From the Park website.
Sunset at the Windows. Photo by Neal Herbert. From the Park website.
First Light on Turret Arch Framed by North Window. Photo by Jacob W. Frank. From the Park website.
La Sals Framed by Turret Arch. NPS Photo by Jacob W. Frank. From the Park website.
North & South Windows. Photo by Neal Herbert. From the Park website.
Navajo Arch. Photo by Neal Herbert. Photo from the Park Website.
Lomatium latilobum, a.k.a. Canyonlands biscuitroot. From the Park’s Facebook page.
Park Avenue. From the Park’s Facebook page.
Utah Juniper. From the Park’s Facebook page.
Photo by David McBride. From the Park’s Facebook page.
Turret Arch. Photo by Sarah Dolliver. Photo from the Park’s Facebook page.
Arches National Park at dusk. Photo by Jonathan Backin. Tweeted by the US Department of the Interior, 3/21/14.
More
National Park Service: Arches National Park
EveryTrail.com: Hiking In Arches National Park
National Parks Traveler: Hiking In Arches
TerraGalleria.com: Arches
LiveLaughRV: Exfoliation Nature’s Way
Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub: Something About A Campfire In Arches National Park
Wags Wild Adventure: Arches
The LA Dodgers were sold in 2012 by the hated Frank McCourt for $2 Billion. LA rejoiced.
In 2012 and then again in 2013, the new management of the Dodgers spent and spent on payroll to build a better team … at least, that was what LA hoped. The Dodgers now have the highest payroll in baseball.
The team got better. They went to the playoffs in 2013, and made it to the National League Championship, which the beat up team did lose. But the run was exciting, and LA couldn’t wait for 2014, when the team is favored to win the World Series by the oddsmakers in Vegas.
And that is when I learned what this team would cost me.
I’m a Dish Network subscriber. They’ve got the best HD channel line up (IMHO). They’ve got the Pac 12 Network. They’ve got the SEC Network this fall … so I get to follow all of UCLA sports, and all of Mizzou sports.
Wonderful.
But now, I find out, Dish doesn’t carry SportsNet LA – owned by Time Warner Cable – which will carry the Dodgers in 2014.
Dish won’t do a deal with Time Warner Cable (TWC). You see, TWC agreed to pay the Dodgers over $7 Billion over 25 years (yes, almost 4 times the purchase price of the team!) to secure the exclusive TV rights.
According to news accounts, TWC is now asking other cable/satellite companies to pay $4/month for every subscriber in order to secure the rights to SportsNetLA.
Which I would gladly pay. But Dish won’t, apparently. I’m sure there are many, many Dish subscribers in LA that wouldn’t want to pay that much, which I understand.
So I have a choice: take Dish, and watch UCLA and Mizzou. Or, switch to TWC, and miss every UCLA and Mizzou game. And watch the Dodgers. My three favorite teams are the Dodgers, the UCLA Bruins and the Mizzou Tigers. How do I get them from one cable/satellite/online provider? I can’t.
That’s my choice, and that’s what the Dodger deal will cost me.
More
ESPN: Sale Of Dodgers Finalized
Yahoo Sports: Dodgers Are Favorites To Win The World Series
Another annoying trend of news sites these days is finding tricky ways to get you to click on sponsored links … and get paid for tricking you.
I appreciate that journalists need to get paid, I truly do. However, publishers need to pay them using revenue from real journalistic work … not thinly disguised ploys to get you to click on sponsored content. In some cases, sponsored content is almost impossible to discern from normal content. That is always a case of a publisher getting greedy – they are willing to sully their brand by associating with poor content, all in the name of getting your click. That’s just bad curation … like we see here:
1. Don’t read “Around The Web” sections. These are mass-produced articles … made to get you interested enough to click through. When you do, you’ll find almost no content, surrounded by ads.
I was reading about the inauguration of President Wilson in The Atlantic … and these are the ads that accompanied that historical article on my computer. For the record, I don’t drink wine, I don’t buy bikinis, I don’t have a fuel efficient car and I am not looking for a job. The Rockler ad makes sense … but I’m not interested in any of the pictured products. All in all, an advertising FAIL.
2. Don’t read Facebook’s “answer 10 questions and find out what kind of a _________ you are.” Or find out where you belong. Or what character you are like. These are simple things, yes, but they are asking you to spend time answering a survey to find out what some faceless dweeb has determined that your answers qualify you to be. No thank you.
3. Don’t read anything on Facebook that’s sourced from BuzzFeed. Or Thrillist. See # 1. Solution: click on the carrot in the upper right hand corner of an offending story, and select “Hide everything from BuzzFeed,” and Facebook will remove it from your feed, permanently.
This is exactly the kind of FB advertiser I’m talking about. I don’t know who Mike the copywriter is … but I’m pretty sure this isn’t his picture.
4. I respect Facebook advertisers … but those idiots that pair their message with a picture of a pretty young lady that has nothing to do with their product (like a “start a new career with woodworking” site I saw this week) are beneath contempt.
5. “You Might Also Like” … no, no, I won’t. This so-called feature runs below news and sports stories on several sites. In light gray type to the right of that headline, you’ll see “Promoted Content By Taboola.” This is simply pay-for-play from all of these “news” sources. The content is not good, no matter how interesting the pictures and how intriguing the headlines.
6. Bleacher Report, one of my sports sites, has a habit of producing stories that gather quick summaries on just about any topic, and then packages them for every team in the league. Or every team in college football. Or every Top 25 team. Whatever. In each case, the coverage is brief, to be kind, and the result is you click though 10 or 15 or 25 pages just to find a small nugget of information on the 2 or 3 teams or players that you’re interested in. Waste. Of. My. Time.
7. Here’s my new rule of thumb with Facebook videos. When a friend shares them, I check out the displayed link. If I am familiar with the website, I may click through. If I don’t know the website … I probably won’t click, unless my friend explains why I should in their post. But I probably won’t click if I don’t know the host site … because it’s probably another “pay for click” type presentation, and I just don’t have time to watch another cute animal video. Or see what the policeman’s dance moves are like during Mardi Gras.
8. Pop-overs & pop-unders are those annoying new web pages that open on your browser without warning when you enter or exit a site. The former opens on top of the content you’re trying to read and is, of course, the most annoying and the highest compensated by the annoying insurance and home loan companies that seem to always buy them. The pop-unders are actually more insidious, as you often don’t know the source of the ad … you don’t even see it until you start closing down your browser. There’s only one solution: close them quickly & don’t support the sponsors’ annoying marketing practices with your business.
I’m probably getting my curmudgeon on here. Sorry about that.
Simply, I don’t have time to wade through all of the low-quality content attempting to masquerade as journalism … I have little enough time for the good stuff.
Journalism, I mourn for thee.
Where Is It: The Park is 109 miles east of Flagstaff, AZ, just off I-40.
It Happened Here: From NationalGeographic.com:
Much of the quartz that replaced the wood tissue 200 million years ago is tinted in rainbow hues. Many visitors cannot resist taking rocks, despite strict regulations and stiff fines against removing any material. To see if the petrified wood was actually disappearing at an alarming rate, resource managers established survey plots with a specific number of pieces of wood; some were nearly barren in less than a week.
The problem is not new. Military survey parties passing through the region in the 1850s filled their saddlebags with the petrified wood. As word of these remarkable deposits spread, fossil logs were hauled off by the wagonload for tabletops, lamps, and mantels. In the 1890s gem collectors began dynamiting logs searching for amethyst and quartz crystals. To prevent further destruction of its unique bounty, the area was designated a national monument in 1906 and a national park more than a half century later.
Size: 221,552 acres
# Visitors: 644,648 in 2013. Attendance peaks in July, and is least in December.
Choices:Â From NationalParkTraveler.com:
(T)he park road runs just 28 miles through its 93,532 acres, so unless you exhibit some discipline you’ll cruise down the pavement, stop momentarily at the 22 overlooks, and be gone in a very small number of hours.
But if you prepare for a visit by studying a primer on the Late Triassic Period and the ensuing 200+ million years, and familiarize yourself with what’s to see and where to see it, you’ll arrive not only with a rudimentary knowledge of the wonders that exist within Petrified Forest’s borders, but also with a game plan for exploring this wondrous landscape.
Fees: Private vehicles are $10 for a 7 day pass.
Staying There: There are no developed campsites in the Park … perhaps to protect the natural resources that seem to walk out all too easily.
Contact Info:
1 Park Road
P.O. Box 2217
Petrified Forest, AZ 86028
(928) 524-6228
From the Park’s Facebook page.
From the Park’s Facebook page.
From the Park’s Facebook page.
From the Park’s Facebook page.
From the Park’s Facebook page.
From the Park’s website.
From the Park’s website.
Collared lizard. From the Park’s website.
American pronghorn. From the Park’s website.
Long-eared owl. From the Park’s website.
More
National Park Service: Petrified Forest National Park
JasonsTravels: A Drive Through The Petrified Forest National Park
The rock formations are called Hoo Doos in Bryce Canyon National Park. Photo by Kuang-Yu Jen. Tweeted by the US Department of the Interior, 3/3/14.
Sacramento Wildlife Reserve. Tweeted by the US Department of the Interior, 3/4/14.
Dear Do-It-Yourself Store,
I shop at your store.
I do stuff at home. Building. Lighting. Home repair.
I shop at your store.
I just bought some 2x4s for a local junior high drama production. I was making a bed for a princess.
I shop at your store.
Here’s my question: what Spawn of Satan employee decided it was a good idea to put 12 staples in a 2×4? What, you need my blood on your floor to seal our deal from across the river Styx?
In the future, control the hordes of devils that pretend to represent your interests while seeking to wound your loyal customers.
Get behind me, Satan.
Oh, and good news. I overcame your metallic trap. The bed is almost ready for the princess. Temporary modeling by MrsMowry.
All boards must be inspected on all 6 sides (think about it) before they can go into the lumber pile.
2-6′ sides, 4-4′ stretchers, and 6-30″ legs.
The braces for the legs have to be cut on a 45* angle. Don’t tell Velda that I cut these with the blade guard out of the way.
Here’s why: cutting these triangular pieces didn’t work with the blade guard in place. So, yes, I was very careful.
See? All 10 pieces cut. No blood shed in my shop … after avoiding the staples put in the lumber by the Spawns Of Satan, I wasn’t going to have a problem in the workshop.
The bed is now ready for the set decorator. Modeling by the Musical Director, MrsMowry.
It’s one of the rarest things in sales.
2005. When renting space in a hotel lobby – and not getting thanked – was something I did.
Today, I received a handwritten thank you note from a client … because I did my job. She wanted ads to run, and I made that happen. And I was paid to do that … it is what an ad salesperson does, after all.
So the ads ran, and the client was happy. She took the time to write a note and mail it to me at my home.
I’ve been selling stuff since I was 22. I’ve done door-to-door, briefly. I’ve done big ticket out-of-the-box promotional sales. I’ve had people give me money to put their logo on a roller coaster.
I know sales.
To be thanked by a client, just for doing your job? That’s a rare and wonderful thing.
A wolf tracks a fox in the snow covered White Mountains in Alaska. Tweeted by the US Department of the Interior, 2/28/14.
It’s time!
The boys of summer are back in uniform. They’re playing. There’s actual media coverage of actual games. Well, spring training games, anyway.
Very, very soon, we’ll hear Vin Scully’s immortal, “It’s Time For Dodger Baseball!”
I enjoy watching sports. I don’t consider myself very serious about it: I’m not in any fantasy leagues. I really don’t follow the NFL. I ignore the NBA, NHL and NASCAR.
I know some guys that can quote players, stats and histories in multiple sports. Their knowledge of their favorite teams and players will make your head swim. That’s great … I just can’t get there.
So I’m not a serious sports fan … but I am dedicated!
I do enjoy following my Mizzou Tigers in football (we had a great year!) and basketball (we’re not having a great year, but we’re close to going to March Madness for the 6th straight season. If we make it, we’ll be the only SEC team with that record). I follow UCLA in the same sports, and have even gone to Jackie Robinson Stadium to see the Bruins play baseball. The family has gone on campus to see the men’s & women’s soccer teams play. We all enjoy sports.
But baseball is my first love, the Dodgers my adopted team, and I usually get to watch at least parts of about 150 of their regular season’s 162 games.
This year, I hope to watch more games as the Dodgers go beyond the regular season into the playoffs. The new owners of the Dodgers (with Magic Johnson out front) have stepped up to buy a team of proven winners … they have the highest payroll in Major League Baseball.
Now, we get to see if those rich players can actually play together, win together and then go to the World Series.
I need some peanuts. It’s time for Dodger baseball!
More
SarahAngleton.com: Peanuts, Cracker Jack, And The Most Important Political Movement Of Our Time
Sports Illustrated: Top 10 Predictions For The 2014 Baseball Season
Where Is It: The Park is 5 miles north of Moab, Utah, and 360 miles southwest of Denver, CO.
