Paradise ponders...

Paradise ponders...  I'm working away at setting up my office today.  As I write, I have 8 of 14 panels mounted.  They look (and work) great!  I'll get 10 done today, probably in just an hour or so – then I have to wait for hardware to arrive on Monday or Tuesday before I can mount the 4 ceiling panels.

Called my mom this morning, for Mother's Day.  Even though she wasn't feeling well, it was still nice even just to say “Hi!” on Mother's Day.  Debbie is kind of blue today, because she can't call her mom – between her failing hearing and her dementia, there would be no point.  She and her mom used to talk almost every day...

Something I forgot to mention yesterday: the Hyrum Canal folks “started up” the canal.  By “start up”, I mean that they started running water through it again.  It's been dry since late last fall.  All the irrigation systems that run from Porcupine Reservoir shut down for all the months where no irrigation is needed, to let the reservoir fill up again.  Starting up the canal is more involved than one might think; it takes several weeks of hard work by a crew of 6 to 10 people.  First a crew comes through clearing any visible debris from the canal bottom – fallen branches, trash thrown in by someone inconsiderate, dead animals, etc.  Then they cut encroaching brush and branches, or even take out entire trees – whatever it takes to keep the canal clear.  The resulting brush piles are burned.  All that takes a couple of weeks.  Then they start the water up, which causes more debris – and a surprising amount of it! – to float up and threaten to clog up under bridges, in culverts, or where the canal takes a sharp bend.  A crew sloshes around in the rising water, using pitchforks to toss this floating debris up onto the shores, gather it into piles – to be burned the next week.  This is the step completed yesterday, so now the canal running down the east side of our property is flowing.  Shortly, when the rain stops, we'll see irrigation systems running up in Hyrum.  I expect the Paradise Irrigation company water that we use to be pressurized sometime this coming week...

Tornado in Colorado...

Tornado in Colorado...  Sent along by friend, former colleague, and Idaho mogul-of-everything Doug S. 

For some reason the default camera orientation is to the rear of the car, but the tornado is in front of it.  That means you need to adjust the camera orientation (using the four arrows visible in the upper left hand corner of the screen once you run it) before you'll see anything at all.  Once you get the camera looking forward, you'll see the funnel form, touch down, cross the road in front of them, and then pass by on their right.  Very impressive, and these guys are totally nuts!

Question for anyone with tornado experience: the funnel, near the ground, is distinctly brown.  Why is that?  Is it just dirt and dust being thrown around?  Or is their something else going on?