Updated Thursday, June 11, 2020
August 31, 2007
I have been HOME for a week and am really loving it!! On Saturday I placed all of the plants back on the porches and put the irrigation system back in place, then went over to get my mail from Jim and we played chess. Sunday I went up and spent the day with Dad and Betty. Monday I met with my interior decorator Holly and her brother Jeff: they have done wonders with my home, new carpet, all painted, new accessories everywhere! I also sent off a series of photographs I was paid $100 for! On Tuesday Dad and Betty came down to stay the night. We went out to dinner and watched a movie. On Wednesday we went to the Museum of Fine Arts and napped before they left for home. On Thursday I went to the Clerks office and ran errands, then the plumber came and fixed a faucet for me. I had taken it mostly apart but did not know that all you had to do was pry the core out of the body and then replace the spring and washer. I went to collect the $35 I was paid for another photograph. Then Jim came over and we played chess.
I just enjoy the heck out of this place; sitting here at my desk I see flocks of white Ibis, great white, and great blue herons, yellow crowned night herons, hawks, pelicans, seagulls….an osprey just flew over with a fish for breakfast, WOW. The osprey’s are always calling each other their cheery “chirp, chirp”.
Today I am going to run more errands, then Bob is coming over with work he needs me to do (I will be paid for that as well!).
A great blue heron just came in for a landing, with his customary “SQUAWK, SQUAWK”..
Tomorrow I meet MaryAnn to go to the Gecko Festival here in Gulfport. Sunday I am going to Darrell’s, Monday is lunch with Holly and Jeff. Then Tuesday (early) is my trip back to Washington State to work!
White Ibis and Yellow Crowned Night Heron (above and below)
Baby hawk on the wing.
On the fence.
Tracey’s baby was named Alexander McVetty Paxton August 20, 2007; 9 pounds and 20.5 inches!
Darrell sent along pictures of the whole family riding horseback:
The below picture (Aug 24) is of 30 foot high gravel bars left over from the 1250 foot deep river that ran through Washington State 15,000 years ago, building up what was called Lewis Lake over this region. Some of my pictures were taken from the top of Badger Mountain. It was hard to imagine what it was like to have water up to almost the top of that mountain!
August 24, 2007
Airplane ride!
August 22, 2007
Tracey has had her baby, it is a boy!
Heather is moving to Norway – our ancestral home!
How time flies! I get to go home in two days! Last night I went to the Ice Harbor Dam and area. I saw the dam and lock, saw the “Queen of the West” paddle boat go up through the lock there, saw the Indian monument and went to the marina. On the way back I stopped on the side of the road and took pictures of the grapes growing there and took a sample. They are concord grapes, they just burst with flavor when you bite into them! Today I have a lot of work checking a database, then a meeting in the afternoon – Fluor (the contractor at Hanford) is responding to my comments on their electronic schedule. Then at 6:30 PM i am scheduled to go up in an airplane and tour the area – taking pictures!!! Hopefully they will come out well!
Continuing from Aug 17:
The wind turbines generate power at 1.3 megawatts each (as long as the wind is 35 miles per hour or more). For the month I have been here, the turbines have been stock still most of the time! The turbines also cost $1.5 million each according to their website.
To match Coolee Dam (6,809 MW) you would need 6,000 wind turbines.
To match their own nuclear reactor (Columbia Generating Station is a 1250-megawatt boiling water reactor that uses nuclear fission to produce heat) you would need 1,000 wind turbines.
At 49 wind turbines, they have a long way to go. Up close they are beautiful though!
(PS: My hotel is in Kennewick, just a few minutes from the turbines, the nuclear reactor is on the Hanford site where I am working and Grand Coolee Dam was a 3 hour drive north!).
Pictures:
Irrigation rig.
Grapes on the vine.
The dam.
Indian monument.
Fish ladder.
“Queen of the West”
Day at the lake.
“Queen” going through the lock.
Marina on the lake.
Quail.
August 17, 2007
Work, Work, Work
That is all I seem to have time for lately.
I switch from South Carolina to Oak Ridge, Tennessee then to Richland in Washington State…i.e. from SRS where they produce Tritium for nuclear triggers to Oak ridge where the U235 came from for the first atomic bomb, now to Hanford where the P238 came from for the second atomic weapon. I had a great tour of the plutonium storage facility, and hope to tour the reactor which made it sometime. I have spent time with Amy and Sarah, drove 4000 miles last month being a tourist here in Washington State and worked a lot. I will be going home August 24 for a week’s rest – having been on the go and on the road since July 4.
I missed the August 4 get together, thus Darrell, Don and I did not make it, but I hear a great time was had by those who did! My plane got delayed so much that I would have missed the party, I would have been left with spending a couple of hours in Maine, then flying out again!
I have missed my home, it is now painted outside and inside, I have new wall to wall carpet, a new mural in the bathroom, new photographs on the walls, and many other improvements I have yet to see!
out here i have traveled to Walla-Walla, to the dry falls, to the Grand Coolee dam, to Leavenworth (a fun place in the mountains), to Snoqualmie Falls, to Pelouse Falls, and wherever else I have a mind to. I scheduled an airplane ride yesterday, but it was the first cloudy day they have had in six months! The windmills are spectacular, they cost a $million a piece, and they are huge!!
Pictures I have taken in the last few weeks.:
Columbia River near here:
Hawk by the hotel where I stay:
Oak Ridge building where uranium was purified for the first atomic bomb:
Mt. Rainier on the way from here to visit Amy:
Mountains on a trip from Amy’s home to here:
Boat from races on Columbia river (my hotel in background):
Sunset on Hanford (F Reactor to my left):
Amy and Sarah ROCK CLIMBING, Sarah got 10 feet up!
Salmon going up the lock in Seattle:
Amy and Sarah at the lock watching the salmon going up the ladder:
A view of the river bank on the Columbia River:
The mountains along the Columbia River:
The basalt cliffs along the river banks:
The trees planted by the settlers of the original Hanford have died as there is no one to water them in this desert.
The old Hanford High School, the only structure left:
Someone started a fire and it raced up the mountain, then north for 15 miles burning 70,000 acres of Preserve:
Airplane fighting the fire (a flying tanker – converted from a crop duster):
Point on the side of the road where the fire started:
The fire raced east to Rattlesnake Mountain, then up to the top of the mountain:
Ten miles north, the fire got 95% of the mountain in the background and 80% of the plains here.
I came up over a rise and…..ahead was a herd of 40 ELK! I wished that I had a telephoto then!!
They were not watching me at first, but then took flight when their scouts got them going.
One bird that returned!
These guys are huge, they make quite a ‘swooshing” sound as they rotate. The blades are 6 feet wide!
That is me at the base of a windmill!
| Existing Project or Area | Owner | Date Online | MW | Power Purchaser/ User | Turbines/ (Units) |
| Nine Canyon Wind Farm | Energy Northwest | Sep 2002 | 48.0 | Public Power Members of Energy Northwest | Bonus 1300 (37) |
| Nine Canyon Phase II | Energy Northwest | 4th Q 2003 | 15.6 | Energy Northwest | Bonus 1300 (12) |
Grand Coolee Dam
Grand Coulee Dam (kū‘lē) , 550 ft (168 m) high and 4,173 ft (1,272 m) long, on the Columbia River, N central Wash., NW of Spokane; built 1933–42 as a key unit in the Columbia basin project of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. Grand Coulee Dam, one of the world’s largest concrete dams, is used for flood control, river navigation, irrigation, and power production that services the varied manufacturing in the area. The dam has the largest power-producing capacity (6,809 MW) in the United States.
Weekend trip weather:
Amy and Darren’s weather:
Dad and Betty’s weather:
Susan and Al’s weather:
David’ and jeans weather:
Donald and jeanne’s weather:
Daniel and candy’s weather:
Heather and michael’s weather:
Rod and jill’s weather:
See you in Vermont : 2008!
| 1998 | John’s Boat | ||
| 2002 | |||
| 2008 | Sue and Al | 2005 | David and Jean’s Housewarming party, Pocomoonshine Lake, Princeton, Maine |
| 2009 | John | 2006 | Darrell & Marilyn |
| 2010 | Donald | 2007 | Dan & Candy |
| 2011 | John’s refurbished home |