From Wikipedia:

Labyrinth

In Greek mythology, the Labyrinth (Greek λαβύρινθος labyrinthos) was an elaborate structure designed and built by the legendary artificer Daedalus for King Minos of Crete at Knossos. Its function was to hold theMinotaur, a creature that was half man and half bull and was eventually killed by the Athenian hero Theseus. Daedalus had made the Labyrinth so cunningly that he himself could barely escape it after he built it.^[1]Theseus was aided by Ariadne, who provided him with a skein of thread, literally the "clew", or "clue", so he could find his way out again.

In colloquial English labyrinth is generally synonymous with maze, but many contemporary scholars observe a distinction between the two: maze refers to a complex branching (multicursal) puzzle with choices of path and direction; while a single-path (unicursal) labyrinth has only a single, non-branching path, which leads to the center. A labyrinth in this sense has an unambiguous route to the center and back and is not designed to be difficult to navigate.^[2]

Labyrinths appeared as designs on pottery or basketry, as body art, and etched on walls of caves or churches. The Romans built many primarily decorative labyrinth designs on walls and floors in tile or mosaic. Many labyrinths set in floors or on the ground are large enough that the path to the center and back can be walked. They have historically been used both in group ritual and for private meditation.

During Oktoberfest Laura Moore Fine Art collected over 400 pairs of shoes from the community, which were turned into a huge labyrinth on Tennessee Street...At the conclusion of Oktoberfest these shoes will be donated to the Samaritan Inn...but during Oktoberfest the kids had a great time trying to make their way thru it on Saturday afternoon...

Its not everyday you see a woman out shooting a press camera...especially not one this old!...

Oktoberfest is on in McKinney!...Come join us for some serious fun!

Despite the threat of rain a bunch of folks braved the elements to come out and enjoy themselves tonight...

...Depression strengthens into Tropical Storm Matthew over the
southwestern Caribbean Sea...

 

 
summary of 500 PM EDT...2100 UTC...information
----------------------------------------------
location...14.0n 76.9w
about 435 mi...700 km E of Puerto Cabezas Nicaragua
maximum sustained winds...40 mph...65 km/hr
present movement...W or 280 degrees at 16 mph...26 km/hr
minimum central pressure...1006 mb...29.71 inches
 
Summary of watches and warnings in effect...

 
a Hurricane Watch is in effect for...
* Puerto Cabezas Nicaragua to Limon Honduras...including the
offshore islands.

 
A Tropical Storm Warning is in effect for...
* Puerto Cabezas Nicaragua to Limon Honduras...including the
offshore islands.

 
A Tropical Storm Warning means that tropical storm conditions are
expected somewhere within the warning area within 36 hours.

 
A Hurricane Watch means that hurricane conditions are possible
within the watch area.  A watch is typically issued 48 hours
before the anticipated first occurrence of tropical-storm-force
winds...conditions that make outside preparations difficult or
dangerous.

For storm information specific to your area ...please monitor
products issued by your National meteorological service.

 

 
Discussion and 48-hour outlook
------------------------------
at 500 PM EDT...2100 UTC...the center of Tropical Storm Matthew was
located near latitude 14.0 north...longitude 76.9 west. Matthew is
moving toward the west near 16 mph...26 km/hr...this general motion
is expected to continue for the next 48 hours. On the forecast
track...the center of the Matthew is expected to be near the
Nicaragua/Honduras border late Friday or early Saturday morning.

 
Reports from an Air Force Reserve reconnaissance aircraft indicate
that maximum sustained winds have increased to near 40 mph...65
km/hr...with higher gusts.  Additional strengthening is forecast
during the next 48 hours...and Matthew could become a hurricane by
Saturday.

 
Tropical-storm-force winds extend outward up to 35 miles...55 km
from the center.

 
Estimated minimum central pressure is 1006 mb...29.71 inches.



 

Little bit of East Texas...

New Panoramics

Here is Jim's Monday morning rant...
Posted for fair use...
http://kunstler.com/blog/2010/09/sca...imes.html#more

Scary People, Scary Times
by James Howard Kunstler
on September 13, 2010 7:24 AM

In that order. The scary people have already started coming out of the woodwork. The times lately have been mostly uncertain, but soon they'll turn scary, too, as it becomes clearer that the people running things in the USA have no idea what's going on or what they're going to do about it -- and what's going on is an involuntary permanent re-set of the terms of everyday life, from a wet-dream robotic "consumer" techtopia to something more like the first chapter of Tobacco Road, with a family of half-wits reduced by hard times to fighting over a sack of turnips in a roadside ditch. That's the story-arc anyway, and lots of people won't like it. But the theme of dwindling resources is not a pretty one.

The most striking feature of the current scene is the absence of a coherent vision of our multiple related predicaments and how they add up to a valid picture of reality. To be precise, I mean our predicaments of 1.) energy resources, 2.) vanishing capital, and 3.) ecocide. This inability to decode the clear and present dangers to civilized life is a failure of leadership and authority without precedent in the American story.

On the eve of the only other comparable national convulsion -- the lead-up to the Civil War - a strenuous public debate was able to focus on the salient question of the day, namely whether human slavery would continue in this country. Lincoln and Douglas parried for hours in the hot sun, arguing unscripted in complete sentences without the aid of teleprompters or offstage spin doctors. Yet no one above age of nine failed to understand what was at issue.

Note the diminishing returns of technology at work in our time, making it impossible for us to think straight, despite the proliferation of snazzy devices, programs, networks, blog-clouds, and the pervasive, non-stop spewage of so-called information all intended to enhance communication. What did Lincoln have to work with? A pencil.

Today, no one present in the political arena appears to have a clue and, lacking clues, any ability to articulate the terms of what we face. Both major parties are hostage to a peculiar nostalgia, a wish to return to the time when America could dream up any kind of machine or breakfast cereal or techtronic brassiere, and sell the manufactured surplus from our own happily oversold markets to the rest of the clamoring world - even lending them the cash (at interest) to buy the stuff. America makes and the world takes, was the theme song then. That earnest, upward-striving society of Eisenhower simplicity, of well-paid factory workers dreaming of a little summer place at the lake, and the Main Streets bustling in the cheerful early twilight of Christmas Eve, and the Beach Boys crooning about "fun, fun, fun," and purloined German physicists stashed in comfortably aire-kooled rooms, turning a few tossed-off equations into moon-shots, and Bob Hope cracking wise before a nationwide audience of car-dealers and self-satisfied Rotarians - well that America has imploded like a weevil-infested hubbard squash in a back pantry. And all the prayers to Moloch by the Jesus boomers in and out of congress won't make it whole again.

There is no theme song for contraction - at least not one with a hummable tune. The current background music sounds like Stockhausen run through scrap-metal shredder. No wonder everybody's so nervous.

A few hours ago I drove up the immaculately conceived highways north out of Detroit to the drear industrial outlands of Happy Motoring history, north past Flint and Saginaw where an exhausted American Dream is being hunted down by the angry ghosts of the Wyandots. The heartland these days looks like it's preparing for a return trip to the 9th century A.D. Nobody knows what's ailing it, but they're whispering of "last stands" out here around the all-you-can-eat buffet at the year 'round Christmas Shoppe.

And the Tea Party aims to fix all this, to make things right again. I listen to their blather about "freedom" and all I can imagine is the sound of boots outside the door, and men in badly-fitted camo uniforms and buzzcut hair commanding me to accept John Boehner as my personal savior. Pardon me, but I don't see how this will really improve anybody's lot in life.

You can just feel the heat of emotion rising, even as the northern hemisphere cools down. We can't speak clearly anymore; we can only beat drums. All across the land self-appointed saviors are stepping up to heroically rescue the squandered entitlements of the bygone day: Rand Paul, the Kentucky physician who (like his dad) subscribes to the idea that the earth is only about 4000 years old; Dan Maes, the Colorado Tea Party candidate for governor who believes that bicycling is a "gateway drug" to communism; Sharron Angle, the Nevada polymoron running John Birch Society scripts to the psychologically-spavined blackjack dealers crowding the unemployment lines. ("The Trilateral Commission and the Bilderburgers did this to you!"); and lonely Joe Miller, the hermit-attorney of Fairbanks, stalking out of his survivalist cave to drive a silver lance through the flaming heart of the ravening liberal windigo.

They can flap their gums with this nonsense as much as they like, bit it's not likely to clarify things. Maybe this is what death is like: a descent into the dark maw of simply unknowing. No wonder people fear it.

"Disquiet - Unsettled Suburbia"
on view at The Bath House Cultural Center in Dallas...

"New Mexico Test Drive" @ Laura Moore Fine Art in McKinney...
check it out!

@ Whiterock Lake...

Downtown was alive this evening for 2nd Saturday...

Statement as of 5:49 PM CDT on September 08, 2010

... A Tornado Warning remains in effect until 615 PM CDT for northwestern Collin and eastern Denton counties... At 549 PM CDT... National Weather Service meteorologists detected a developing tornado. This tornado was located near The Colony... moving north at 35 mph. Latest spotter reports indicate a lowering and rotation... but no tornado has been spotted yet. The tornado will be near... Frisco around 555 PM CDT... Prosper and McKinney around 610 PM CDT... Celina and Weston around 615 PM CDT... Precautionary/preparedness actions... A Tornado Watch remains in effect until 100 am CDT Thursday morning for northeastern Texas.

BULLETIN
TROPICAL STORM HERMINE ADVISORY NUMBER 3
NWS TPC/NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER MIAMI FL AL102010
1000 AM CDT MON SEP 06 2010

...HERMINE STRENGTHENS A LITTLE MORE...NEW WATCHES AND WARNINGS
ISSUED...


SUMMARY OF 1000 AM CDT...1500 UTC...INFORMATION
-----------------------------------------------
LOCATION...23.4N 95.8W
ABOUT 130 MI...210 KM ESE OF LA PESCA MEXICO
ABOUT 205 MI...325 KM SSE OF BROWNSVILLE TEXAS
MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS...50 MPH...85 KM/HR
PRESENT MOVEMENT...NNW OR 340 DEGREES AT 13 MPH...20 KM/HR
MINIMUM CENTRAL PRESSURE...998 MB...29.47 INCHES


WATCHES AND WARNINGS
--------------------
CHANGES WITH THIS ADVISORY...

THE GOVERNMENT OF MEXICO HAS ISSUED A HURRICANE WATCH FROM RIO SAN
FERNANDO NORTHWARD TO THE MOUTH OF THE RIO GRANDE...AND A HURRICANE
WATCH HAS BEEN ISSUED FROM THE MOUTH OF THE RIO GRANDE NORTHWARD TO
BAFFIN BAY TEXAS.

THE TROPICAL STORM WARNING HAS BEEN EXTENDED NORTHWARD TO PORT
OCONNOR.

THE GOVERNMENT OF MEXICO HAS DISCONTINUED THE TROPICAL STORM WARNING
SOUTH OF LA CRUZ.

SUMMARY OF WATCHES AND WARNINGS IN EFFECT...

A HURRICANE WATCH IS IN EFFECT FOR...
* RIO SAN FERNANDO MEXICO NORTHWARD TO BAFFIN BAY TEXAS

A TROPICAL STORM WARNING IS IN EFFECT FOR...
* LA CRUZ MEXICO NORTHWARD TO PORT OCONNOR TEXAS

A HURRICANE WATCH MEANS THAT HURRICANE CONDITIONS ARE POSSIBLE
WITHIN THE WATCH AREA...IN THIS CASE WITHIN ABOUT 24 HOURS.

A TROPICAL STORM WARNING MEANS THAT TROPICAL STORM CONDITIONS ARE
EXPECTED SOMEWHERE WITHIN THE WARNING AREA...IN THIS CASE WITHIN
ABOUT 24 HOURS.

FOR STORM INFORMATION SPECIFIC TO YOUR AREA IN THE UNITED
STATES...INCLUDING POSSIBLE INLAND WATCHES AND WARNINGS...PLEASE
MONITOR PRODUCTS ISSUED BY YOUR LOCAL NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE
FORECAST OFFICE. FOR STORM INFORMATION SPECIFIC TO YOUR AREA OUTSIDE
THE UNITED STATES...PLEASE MONITOR PRODUCTS ISSUED BY YOUR NATIONAL
METEOROLOGICAL SERVICE.


DISCUSSION AND 48-HOUR OUTLOOK
------------------------------
AT 1000 AM CDT...1500 UTC...THE CENTER OF TROPICAL STORM HERMINE WAS
LOCATED NEAR LATITUDE 23.4 NORTH...LONGITUDE 95.8 WEST. HERMINE IS
MOVING TOWARD THE NORTH-NORTHWEST NEAR 13 MPH...20 KM/HR...AND THIS
GENERAL MOTION IS EXPECTED TO CONTINUE FOR THE NEXT DAY OR TWO. ON
THE FORECAST TRACK...THE CENTER OF HERMINE IS EXPECTED TO APPROACH
THE COAST OF NORTHEASTERN MEXICO OR EXTREME SOUTHERN TEXAS IN THE
WARNING AREA TONIGHT.

MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS HAVE INCREASED TO NEAR 50 MPH...85
KM/HR...WITH HIGHER GUSTS. ADDITIONAL STRENGTHENING IS FORECAST
AND HERMINE COULD APPROACH HURRICANE STRENGTH PRIOR TO LANDFALL.

TROPICAL STORM FORCE WINDS EXTEND OUTWARD UP TO 105 MILES...165 KM
FROM THE CENTER.

ESTIMATED MINIMUM CENTRAL PRESSURE IS 998 MB...29.47 INCHES.


HAZARDS AFFECTING LAND
----------------------
WIND...TROPICAL STORM CONDITIONS ARE EXPECTED TO REACH THE WARNING
AREA LATER TODAY.

STORM SURGE...STORM SURGE WILL RAISE WATER LEVELS BY AS MUCH AS 2 TO
4 FEET ABOVE GROUND LEVEL ALONG THE IMMEDIATE COAST NEAR AND TO THE
NORTH OF WHERE THE CENTER MAKES LANDFALL.

RAINFALL...HERMINE IS EXPECTED TO PRODUCE RAINFALL ACCUMULATIONS OF
4 TO 8 INCHES OVER NORTHEASTERN MEXICO AND SOUTH TEXAS WITH ISOLATED
MAXIMUM AMOUNTS OF 12 INCHES POSSIBLE. THESE RAINS COULD CAUSE
LIFE-THREATENING FLASH FLOOD AND MUDSLIDES.


NEXT ADVISORY
-------------
NEXT INTERMEDIATE ADVISORY...100 PM CDT.
NEXT COMPLETE ADVISORY...400 PM CDT.

Statement as of 10:00 PM CDT on September 05, 2010

the small low pressure area in the extreme southwestern Gulf
of Mexico has developed enough organized convection to warrant
it being declared a tropical depression this evening.
Curved bands are readily apparent on the Alvarado Mexico radar
site...and a 2340 UTC windsat pass also shows a distinct curved
band signature. Satellite classifications from TAFB/SAB are both
t1.5...25 kt...and this will be used as the initial intensity.
Conditions appear quite favorable for intensification until landfall
due to very warm water and light wind shear. All of the models
except the HWRF show strengthening and the official forecast is a
little higher than most of the guidance.

The initial motion is a somewhat uncertain 005/6. The cyclone should
turn toward the north-northwest and northwest tomorrow and increase
its forward speed as middle-tropospheric ridging builds across the
northern Gulf of Mexico. The global models are in good agreement on
this scenario...although there are some differences on when the
left turn occurs. The official forecast lies near the dynamical
model consensus...and is a little north of the GFS model.

The track and intensity forecast requires the issuance of tropical
storm warnings for a portion of the Mexican coast at this time.

Testing out a new custom user function on camera...