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I've become used to the idea that roads designated as state highways are paved and generally well-maintained.

On my recent trip I was reminded that there are exceptions. Like New Mexico State Route 575, which started as nice pavement and devolved into dirt. It got rough enough that I needed to keep both hands on the wheel.

Little surprises like this keep travel interesting!

S

Littlefield, Texas, is a small town with about 20 thin-shell structures/features. They are along three blocks of one street that used to be the main shopping district. Now, some of the stores are still open but some of the buildings are vacant and even falling apart. Kind of sad.

You guys know I'm a fan of TV/movie backlots and locations, well this view (from the above street) reminded me of a backlot because of the angle of the intersection.

I mentioned seeing some wild horses last week, here are a few distant shots. It took me a few seconds to regain my composure enough to pull out my phone. :-)

Here is the sign where I turned off the paved highway onto the dirt road of the reservation.

Here are some of the horses that crossed the road in front of me.

And here is a random shot of the scenery on the reservation. I was on the proprty for about an hour, and it was a pleasant detour.

I know its early in the year, but I washed winter coats, caps, and gloves and put them away for the next few months.

*eyes forecast nervously*

Recently I went to Kansas Speedway and drove a racecar for eight minutes! My top speed was 141.96 miles per hour in this car:

This is a NASCAR 4th Generation chassis, so it could have raced as recently as 2007 (in the Cup series) or 2010 (in the Nationwide series). They wrap these cars based on what current sponsors want to pay for; In reality the number 80 was never on a Ford and the Mustang badge wasn't in use until after this chassis was retired from active racing.

The track is a 1.5 mile, D-shaped oval with progressive banking of 17 to 20 degrees in the turns. NASCAR had just raced at Kansas the weekend prior, so the track layout and appearance was fresh in my mind.

Although I hadn't driven a stick in many years (since Homestead-Miami Speedway in 2010!) I shifted fairly smoothly up to fourth gear right at the marker. Eight minutes goes quick, and I drove six laps before shutting it back down on pit road.

It was very fun and slightly terrifying. Hitting the turns made me dizzy, so I had to back down my speed through the corners and then floor it on the backstretch to make up time. It cost a ridiculous amount of money but I justify it as a late retirement gift!

Scott

The Arizona trip was good. I put eyes on 60 buildings, confirming 46 as thin-shell concrete. There are over 600 photos in my editing queue. I stayed in Albuquerque on the way out and back, 3 nights in Tucson, and 5 nights in Scottsdale. (Scottsdale is part of the Phoenix metroplex.)

I took a flight in this WWII aircraft, a C-47 cargo plane. This is the military version of the Douglas DC-3 airliner.

That aircraft has been on my bucket list for many years. The flight was a bit bumpy, and that old aeroplane definitely moved around a lot on all axis -- pitch, roll, and yaw. This particular plane had been fitted as a corporate airplane for Hoover Vacuum after the war, and retains the 1940s cabin. I would have prefered a more authentic military interior but you take what you can find with these old planes. The ride was bumpy enough that I didn't unbuckle and walk up to the cockpit for a peek.

The flight was at Falcon Field, a bustling general aviation airport that started as a WWII training airfield. The Commemorative Air Force owns and operates the C-47 and they have a nice museum there as well.

In Tucson, I was surprised and slightly terrified to see this creature walking across the parking lot while I was out of the car photographing a building.

It's probably a coyote with mange but the first thing that came to mind was chupacabra!

While in Tucson I walked the massive Pima Air & Space Museum. It's quite extensive and I had regretted not getting there on my prior Tucson trip. At most museums you might ask "Where is the ?" but at Pima the answer would be "Well, depends which one you want, we have a few of those!"

Ten nights away was a bit longer than I like, but I had active schools to photograph in three cities so I wanted two weekends for that purpose. In fact that may be the longest solo research trip I've done, at least recently.

In three weeks I'll be on my next, much shorter trip. Three nights in Kansas, with the highlight being a brief NASCAR driving experience at Kansas Speedway, a 1.5-mile tri-oval intermediate track. I'm excited for this, and I just hope I don't screw up manual shifting. The last manual transmission car I drove was the racecar at Miami-Homestead back in 2010!

Fred was certainly glad to see me return home. We've been for several long walks, with small bits of running, since I got home. He even slept with me in the guest room twice, when we came in from midnight potty breaks! (Usually, he bounds straight up the stairs to Debbie's bed.)

Scott

Looking forward to a few laps.

https://www.nascarracingexperience.com/

S

Do you still receive hard-copy telephone books?

They were still a thing when I moved to Denver in 2007. I had a stack nearly a foot high. Yellow Pages, White Pages; large ones for Denver proper and others for the surrounding 'burbs.

Within a few years phone books had gone by the wayside and no longer took up space in a kitchen cabinet. We certainly didn't expect or receive them when we moved to this house in late 2020.

But... last week we were quite surprised to find a phone book on our front doorstep! It's a trim volume, maybe a centimeter thick, titled "The Real Yellow Pages: The Original Search Engine."

We'll keep it around, but I doubt it will get as much use as they did back in the day.

S

I was in the garage this morning, taking something out of the back of my car. I heard what sounded like the small Shark vacuum which was sitting on the workbench at the back of the garage. It lasted a couple of seconds, went quiet, then sounded for several more seconds. I thought that seemed odd, so I stepped inside to see if by chance Debbie had been running the large vacuum cleaner. Nope. Either the small Shark vacuum can activate itself without a finger on the switch... or our garage ghost wanted me to tidy up the shop!

I don't use Facebook all that much, so I was kind of surprised when one of my rare posts received almost 15,000 "reactions" (likes, thumbs up, hearts) and comments. I think I also had a peek at how Facebook's famous algorithm works. The post received a steady flow of reactions for a week; at the seven-day mark, almost to the hour, the reactions slowed to a crawl. In the most recent 48 hours the total only increased from 14,949 to 14,981. Strange, I would have anticipated a more gradual tapering off of interest. I doubt I'll ever see that much response to a FB post again!

Today I purchased, measured, and cut the shelves and supports to add an L-shaped shelf in our pantry, matching the others and making use of the upper space. A bit of sanding, priming, painting, and a few days to dry and I'll assemble it. I also cut three shelves that will go in the open spaces under the bench in our mud room, allowing two layers of shoe storage. I ran out of ~~shoulder strength~~ time before cutting the shelf for the laundry room.

Fred and I also walked to the clubhouse and back. One mile, about 115 feet of elevation, and we speedwalked most of it with one stretch of running on the way home. I was too tired after that to do my planned hike!

S

I spent the night in these places on 5 trips:

Liberal, KS
Oklahoma City, OK (x2)
Wichita, KS
Hays, KS

Colorado Springs, CO

Pratt, KS
Springfield, MO
Columbia, MO (x2)
Hiawatha, KS
Grand Island, NE

Chadron, NE

Westminster, CO

That makes 14 nights away from home, sleeping in 12 other beds.

I spent a night in 4 other states (KS, OK, MO, NE) for a total of 4 states visited.

Four out-of-town road trips put 5,587 miles on my 2011 Subaru Outback.

S

Wednesday: A lovely 51 degrees (F) at 4pm, I had a nice dry walk with Fred after work.

Thursday: Approx 5am, it was -24 F and we had about 3 inches of snow on the ground and a wind chill of -42 F. Our high temp for the day was about -5 F.

Friday (today): The overnight low was only -12 F and we got up to about 15 F.

Saturday (tomorrow): We will likely get back above the freezing point!

The TV weather folks tell us that:
— The -24 is the coldest temp in Denver since 1990.
— The -42 wind chill is the 2nd-lowest wind chill on record for Denver.
— The -75 F temp swing is the 2nd-biggest next-day swing on record for Denver.
(These "official" temps are at Denver's airport; we tracked very closely here in Aurora.)

Bring on summer!

S

Yesterday at 4p.m. it was 88 degrees (31 celsius).

Today at noon it is snowing!

Nothing to see here, folks, it's just Colorado in May!

S

My room. Furnishings are not original. This room was built as an office.

Looking out my room windows, showing off the copper sun shades.

The hallway on each floor is small and irregularly shaped. Three elevators and three rooms are accessible from this central hallway. A mysterious locked door on every other floor leads to a separate tiny hallway with one elevator and one room.

The elevators are tiny and weirdly shaped. One person with one large suitcase fills it up.

This was Frank Lloyd Wright’s only built skyscraper, completed in 1956. This building stands out quite dramatically in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. Here are a few outside views.

This stairway to the second level is artistically slanted.

These chairs are in the main lobby, just inside the doors. They are NOT comfortable.

From the rooftop restaurant you can see some of the copper sun shades up close.

My childhood pal Tom is running a Kickstarter campaign to get his steampunk novel in print. If you are interested you can check it out here:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/tommfranklin/the-pterrible-pteranodon

Tom and I met at an after-school library program called Children Raving About Books (CRABS) in either 1970 or 1971, when I was in about 6th grade. We've been friends ever since although our personal visits have been few and far between. I was fortunate enough to read an early draft of this book (and two or three others in the series) some years ago, and I recently read the edited, ready-for-print manuscript. I thoroughly enjoyed it!

Anyway, it's exciting to see a friend reaching out to make a dream happen. I'm certainly glad to support him!

S

How am I just now learning that they made an album together?

I've been a fan of SRV since my Austin days. Saw him live at Austin City Coliseum in nineteen-eighty-mumble-mumble. I know Albert King mostly from the song Born Under a Bad Sign, composed by Booker T.

Imagine my delight yesterday, while painting in another room, I heard an unmistakable SRV riff behind Albert's vocal coming from my computer speakers.

Thank you Pandora, and hello iTunes store pls take my money!

S

First, some shots looking back down as I made my ascent up the Incline. Pretty much the same stuff I shared two years ago.

It is a dizzying feeling to turn around and look down. I'm lucky this was a cloudy day, as there is no escaping the sun on this climb if the sky is clear.

S

General Electric had this hangar constructed in 1946 and 1947. Roberts and Schaefer were the engineers, so it is probable that Anton Tedesko designed (or oversaw the design of) the thin-shell concrete structure. Corbetta Construction Company was the builder.

General view

Close-up view

Interior view

Interior close-up

Interior close-up

S

C.R. Maguire and Associates were the architects and Abraham I. Israel was the structural engineer for this building, which was built in 1960. The thin-shell concrete roof has multiple barrel shells, interconnected to form groined vaults. This concrete roof covers a space of 420 feet by 300 feet with only 2 interior columns!