Arena stop

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arena_church_35888_89_90_tonemappedI had the opportunity to stop by one of BIsmarck-Mandan’s nearest ghost towns recently, and although I only had a few minutes to grab some handheld photos before dashing back to town I was able to get a couple I liked.  Naturally I want to share.

The church above, I believe, is on its last legs.  Its cinder block foundation has lost its walls on the long sides, and all four corners are beginning to crumble.  Already the structure is beginning to bow in the middle.  This is such a picturesque old church, it’s sad to see its demise imminent.

 

arena_elevator_35951-3_HDRI don’t believe I have ever photographed the Arena elevator before, and as I rolled up I was given a fantastic window of light as the sun passed through a sliver in the clouds.  I took several shots from the window of my truck, but opted to go all JJ Abrams on this one and use the one with lens flare.  I don’t usually do much with lens flare, but I thought it really worked in this instance.

I’m slowly easing back into one of my favorite pastimes: sharing my love of North Dakota in pictures.  Even going back to a familiar place and revisiting it one more time presents its own new opportunity, because it seems we never have the same weather or lighting twice.  For that reason I can confidently predict that this isn’t the last time I’ll be sharing photos of Arena, ND.

Uh oh … we could have a LOT more mouths to feed

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mantie_7407My youngest boy catches the strangest things as if it’s second nature.  That’s why I was elated but not altogether surprised when he brought home Mantie the praying mantis.  She’s huge, ferocious, and entertaining.  We even let her spend a few days at the boys’ dentist’s office, where I’m told she was a big hit.  And now she’s about to have company.

As you can see in the photo above, she’s just laid an enormous egg sac.  We suspected this was coming; she’d been blimping out like crazy since we got her.  Male mantises are much smaller than Mantie, and often don’t survive the mating process, so I had no doubt that Mantie was a girl.  Whether or not she was going to lay eggs was another matter.  Finding a praying mantis in North Dakota is rare enough; what are the odds of that mantis getting a date?

I’m told that there could be upwards of 200 little Manties in there.  While I’m okay with keeping a cricket farm for Mantie’s nutritional needs, I have no idea where I can get aphids – especially enough to feed a dinner part of 200 – so I’m planning on stashing the egg sac out by the water behind our house.  It should ride out just fine until Spring, and then maybe I’ll have an army of mantises to take care of mosquitoes.  Wouldn’t that be cool?

The trick now is to get the egg sac outside in the cold so it doesn’t hatch.  Otherwise the warm indoor air will trigger something for which we’re entirely unprepared.  Yikes!

Hard to consider them “Badlands” when they look like this in the morning

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badlands_22466

 

I understand that traversing this region in a horse-drawn wagon during any number of inclement North Dakota weather situations could lead one to term the Badlands as such, but in this era of modern convenience I can only conjure words such as beautiful, breathtaking, and the like.  At no time is that more evident than at sunrise or sunset, of course.

 

 

 

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One other thing: critters.  That word may seem too diminutive for something as enormous as a North American Bison, but what the heck.  Thankfully they’re docile and don’t mind photographers.  I choose to use a long telephoto lens for my bison shots, thank you very much.

 

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The herd is always on the move, and during this particular shot we got that lesson in frightening fashion.  While snapping away with the telephoto and allowing myself to get too wrapped up in the action, I pulled my eye away from the viewfinder to discover that the herd had all but enveloped our immediate area – car and all.  We hopped in the vehicle and made a slow, steady retreat.

 

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I’m a city kid, so I don’t understand horses…other than that they are special, empathetic creatures.  I followed a couple of packs of wild horses and watched them interact.  Once they realized I wasn’t advancing on them, they got back to doin’ their lazy horse thang, and it was calming to watch them at leisure and play.

I am still busy with “new homeowner” stuff, but would like to get a couple of Badlands trips in yet this year.  You can bet that I’ll share the fruits of such journeying should my wish come to pass.

Apparently we really could use around $35 million right now…

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commish_thanksFeeling spunky from ramming through the FiveSouth project, the City Commission (with Commissioner Marquardt dissenting) is starting to talk about another sales tax. According to the Bismarck Tribune reported that the commission is examining the idea of taxing us even more to pay for road improvements.

If we need money for roads so badly, why were we throwing $35 million into a TIF district for the pet project of the Commission and their downtown cronies?

When that issue was brought up, Mayor Seminary (who I like personally, even though his policies drive me bat-scat crazy) simply said, “they were separate issues” (according to the Tribune).

Really?  If I tell my wife that I’m going to spend $1000 on a new big screen TV instead of replacing a leaky house roof or an ailing vehicle, do you think she’s going to consider them “separate issues” as the Mayor said?  Heck, no…and she’d be right (as usual).

Perhaps by “separate issues” Mayor Seminary means “we’ll just dip into the pockets of the citizens for the additional money”.  That’s something you and I can’t do; if we have financial responsibilities, we own up to them before recklessly spending money on foolish luxuries.  This is a concept that has completely eluded Mayor Seminary and the Commission.

If the City doesn’t have money to repair the roads it has, then it certainly doesn’t have the money to make some cronies’ pie-in-the-sky pet project a reality.

The lone voice of sanity, Commissioner Marquardt, can’t quell the stupidity on his own.  We need to get him some company on the City Commission.  Our city needs some responsible leadership from a Commission that will obey the will of the people and act in a fiscally responsible manner on our behalf.

Room With a View II

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gray_house_34154-8_hdrA while back I had an afternoon to play with, so I took a trip to Morton County for some photos.  I wanted to check in on the Gray House, a great photo stop in the little town of Sims.  Treasures like this don’t stand forever, so I wanted to see if anything had changed and exercise the cameras for a little while.

 

gray_house_34074-89_hdrI wanted to take another crack at this shot in particular.  I’d done it from the other side, against the wall that’s in the right of this photo, shooting over the back of the chair.  That photo was in portrait format, tall instead of wide.  I wanted to get one that would work for a calendar or other horizontal use, and so I grabbed some lighting and made my way westward.  I’m pretty pleased with the result.

 

sims_gray_house_34143Normally I don’t approach the structures in my Fallen Farms series of photos, much less enter them, but this one’s special.  It isn’t posted, it seems relatively stable, and that view!  Oh my goodness, the view.

I hope this home stays intact for many years to come, but the years are not kind to old structures like this…especially near the end.  Click here to view a PDF with more history about Sims and this old house.

UND wants it both ways on the “Hostile an Abusive™” Fighting Sioux logo

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new_siouxI saw in this Bismarck Tribune article that the University of North Dakota wants to send a “cease and desist” message to designer Karl Larson for his parody t-shirts depicting a Fighting Sioux logo sticking out its tongue.  Brilliant, by the way.  That’s essentially what the NCAA did to us, after all. I may have to place my order.

Apparently UND spokesman Peter Johnson said, “there are legal protections that come into play, so we’re looking to protect our image. That’s why we want to have this conversation.”

Now, hold on just a second there.  I’m no lawyer, but I’ve been threatened by one…so take this with a grain of salt.  Unless one actually uses a trademark they wish to protect, they cannot enforce it.

UND has been firm in their insistence that they must not use the logo or nickname anymore, because the NCAA has selectively declared them “hostile and abusive”™ and forbidden their use.  Never mind the Alcorn State University Braves, Catawba College Indians, Central Michigan Chippewas, Florida State Seminoles, Mississippi College Choctaws, University of Illinois Fighting Illini, or University of Utah Utes, as brilliantly pointed out in this Letter to the Editor by Alan O’Neil of Grand Forks.

While UND claims that former Bismarck Mayor Haakenson cannot block them from using any of the atrocious proposed replacement nicknames, saying “A nickname is not a trade name, unless the nickname serves as the identity of the individual or organization…This will not be the case for us. We do business under the ‘University of North Dakota.”

Right.

Well, then, why try to get someone to “cease and desist” in parodying a trademark that UND is unwilling to use, doesn’t serve as the identity of the University, and at this point has nothing officially to do with the University of North Dakota?

You’d think a school that churns out so many lawyers would get this right…but then again, this whole Fighting Sioux nonsense has defied logic from the beginning.  It’s just another case of pointy-headed liberals deciding what everyone else must do or say.

Ruthless killer apprehended in northwest Bismarck

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mantis_35617I have never seen one of these in the wild before, and certainly not in North Dakota, yet my littlest boy brought one home from a nature walk today!  I shouldn’t be surprised, since he caught a four-inch “walking stick” bug at the sandbar a couple of weekends ago.  He catches toads and frogs, flies, and any manner of bug.  I don’t think he got that talent from me, although I did “catch” him a fuzzy caterpillar on the way home from work today.  This mantis is one majestic insect, let me tell you.  But it’s got a mean streak.

 

mantis_35622“If I could do this, I’d never leave the house…” 

In addition to being a talented climber, this bug is a diligent preener as well.  It spent plenty of time tending to its legs and feet while I snapped away in an impromptu dining room photo shoot.

 

mantis_35599“Say it isn’t so!”

I don’t have any photos to post, but once we put this critter back into its habitat with a grasshopper from the yard it showed its true colors.  I looked over to see how it was doing, and it had gnawed the head off the grasshopper and going to town on its body like it was an ice cream cone.  Before long, nothing was left except a few bits of wing and forelegs.  Yikes.

After I’d tucked the little ones to bed and was sitting in my recliner, I heard a spooky scratching.  The mantis was trying to escape its bug hut (good luck, pal).  I went to the next room and peered at it through the plastic wall.  Its antennae constantly swayed back and forth in a nearly hypnotic motion, and it stared at me with an unwavering “I’ll chew your face off, wise guy” glare.

We’re going to go the extra mile to prepare a happy habitat for this predator.  Grasshoppers and crickets abound right now, and are available year round.  I think I may lock my bedroom door at night, though…

 

 

City Magazine uses Hostile & Abusive™ language on its September cover

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citymag_sept2015I like to pick up City Magazine, usually for my friend Tom Regan’s feature articles.  The rest is thinly veiled advertising that doesn’t really interest me, but the cover story is usually pretty interesting and features a noteworthy local figure.  The new issue is no different, but it sure is insensitive (if you’re inclined toward political correctness, that is).

For years we’ve been told that the term “Sioux” is “Hostile and Abusive™” and that anyone who wants to see it continue as the nickname / mascot for the University of North Dakota’s athletic programs is deemed a Racist™ by activists tied to the race industry.  Then why is it being used to describe the Standing Rock Sioux (oops, I said it) Tribe?

Let’s not forget, that Standing Rock is the tribe that did not allow its members to vote on whether the nickname and logo should be kept or abandoned.  By doing so, deadlines passed which allowed the opponents of it to win an administrative victory toward the demise of the logo.

You’d think that the tribe responsible (to the dismay of many of its members) for putting a fork in the Fighting Sioux logo would be among the last to smear themselves with such a vile slur.  Nope.  I suppose it’s the same standard that hip hop artists hide behind with their Grammy-winning vernacular.  Lame.

Hijinks at the capitol?

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capitol_lawn_ipt6_0106I mentioned on my blog’s Facebook and Twitter feeds the other day that I’d hiked up to the 18th floor of the state capitol. It was an urge that struck me as I was about to head to the elevator on a visit to one of my favorite local buildings.  I had my helmet and my work backpack, which weighs in at a spry 21 pounds, and I have to say I was dragging by the time I got to the top.  I kept motivating myself by saying “You’re 1/6th of the way there…you’re one third of the way there…halfway there…” and so on.  After looking around for a few, I also walked back down.  Much easier.  But while looking down at the mall, I noticed something peculiar.

 

capitol_lawn_ipt6_0107From the look of things, someone drove out onto the lawn over by the State Library somewhere, then headed south before doing some sort of J-turn or other aggro maneuver.  Groundskeepers didn’t do this…the marks in the grass look pretty deep.

 

capitol_lawn_ipt6_0114I’ve watched guys meticulously mow that crosshatch pattern into the grass on the capitol lawn, and I doubt the equipment they drive would even make marks like these.  Go figure.  I don’t know who you are, but whoever ripped up the lawn at the capitol: STOP.  This is the only capitol we’ve got here in North Dakota, and I’m rather fond of it!