Painted-Bone Dry and A Short Throw

ENCHANTED EVENING

   Marvelous summer sunsets are a California positive, helping us to survive historic drought.

IT HAPPENED BEFORE

    By 1863 the drought on the central California coast was so severe, ranchers drove starving and dehydrated cattle off bluffs into the Pacific. 

    Today ranchers have alternatives, including thinning herds. A recent walk brought all of this to mind

  It's difficult to see what the cattle may be grazing on.

DRY CREEK BEDS

   San Simeon Creek should be rushing through this. Now only traces of a flow.

  So now all of us, quadrupeds and bipeds adopt the attitude of the above lady-what's up?  In the meantime we wait for El Nino.

A FIVE YEAR THROW

    Five years ago this summer-the Journalism Hall of Fame induction. The ceremony was in a magnificent Tudor hall in one of the historic buildings on the campus of Indiana University which now houses the Hall of Fame in the Ernie Pyle Center.

  You can link here to learn more about the particulars.

  This summer my thoughts are with former president Ray Moscowitz who presented me with the Crystal plaque. A great newspaper editor who oversaw operations for 14 papers in his career, Ray is battling a brain tumor. He faces the challenge with the same zeal and forthrightness that he practiced journalism. Ray is a 2002 inductee.

  Also proud of my former colleague and longtime friend Kevin Finch. Kevin is now a professor at Washington and Lee University. You can link to his blog in the Rich Blogs column to the right of this post.
   Time certainly does fly!

   See you down the trail.

A THRILL OF THE COAST

SUN TO FOG

     This evening shot captures the foggy edge of a day

that ranged from the extremes available at the coast. A very warm and bright sunrise, warm morning, brilliantly sunny mid day and the rolling in of a massive bank of marine clouds and haze, pre sunset, strings together a series of micro climates and clothing adjustments.  Shorts and short sleeves, give way to jeans and fleece.  The cool marine fog fills the valleys, obscures the mountains and shrouds the trees that just a couple of hours before were brilliantly green under a cobalt blue sky.  Living near the Pacific brings these changes and diversity.

PERPETUALLY SUNNY

      Though I'm a little dubious about these things, I'm happy

to note that a fellow blogger has awarded me the Sunshine Award.

       I appreciate the sentiment, and certainly appreciate the awarding blogger Bruce Tayor's Oddball Observations, but as an old journalist I'm suspect of these awards that form a kind of mutual admiration society.  Boy, do I sound like a cynic at the Banquet of the Sunshine Society, or what?!  

      This kind of mutual support in the blogosphere is actually a wonderful thing.  It is kind and generous, and of that I am appreciative. I think it is nice that people pass this along to 

others.  That it helps grow awareness of other bloggers and writers is fine as well.  But it reminds me a bit of kids sending secret "I like you, will you be my girl friend?" notes  on the playground.  Sweet. Cute. But my posts are often

not either.  So, Thank You Bruce.  Thank you Sunshine Award

originators and fellow recipients.  As someone who loves

the sunshine, and sunny dispositions, I accept on behalf

of those of us who take our sunshine with reality, on the rocks, shaken and not stirred.  

       So, something about me, an obligation of the award.  I love film and cinema.  I admire artists regardless of medium.  I think creativity is one of the highest achievements of the human mind. My heroes include John Muir, David Brinkley, Ernie Pyle, my father Karl and there are others.  One current hero is my friend Bob Foster some 56 days into a bone marrow transplant. My clan were Picts. The bloodline is Scots, Celt, Anglo Norman, (English), Welsh, Pennsylvania Dutch from the Palitinate.

      I have two published books, and would love to add to that number if I can get a deal for #3.  #4 is a work in progress.
       Another obligation of the award is to nominate another blogger.  I think Mollie, who I have known since her birth,
is a very deserving recipient.  She is an enormously talented
young writer who has shown a gift as she plumbs what it 
means to be a young Christian in the 21st Century.
Mollies lightbymorning blog.  
        See you down the trail.


        

HERE COMES THE SUN & THE MYSTERY FLIGHT

SUN STORMS

Photo from Solar Dynamics Observatory

     The solar flare depicted above is striking Earth today and is the largest flare in 5 years.  Power grids and communication could be affected.  We are in he midst of a period of increased sun storm.
      In February 2011 I posted an extraordinary video of a solar flare and detailed potential problems. 

Photo from NASA Satellite

       Most nations have been slow in developing contingency

plans.  So, as the old saying goes, we have to just wait and see.

SEEING FROM ABOVE

Photo from US Air Force

      This is the Air Force space plane the X-37B before launch.
W.J. Hennigan of the Los Angeles Times reports that after a year in space, the drone continues its mystery mission.
       The X-37B it was scheduled to land before the end of 2011.  The craft is only 9 feet tall, 29 feet long with a wing span of about 125 feet.

Image from NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center

        There is a lot of speculation about the nature of its mission.  The Pentagon says only it is a "test bed" for technology.  It was built by Boeings Phantom Works in Southern California-the Space and Intelligence Systems Division in Huntington Beach.

DAY BOOK

CATCHING THE SUN
AND SHADOW PLAY 

See you down the trail.