However, I took a series of photographs of the couple as we talked and made them into a video slide show for this final segment.

Watch...

13 minutes

in QuickTime...

in Windows Media Player...

I pay attention to compliments; makes me feel like my work is worthwhile.

Came to find out that Alice is working with photographer M.L. Bolton on a photographic project called

When I saw some of his work, I knew we needed to chat; and chat we did.

Watch...

in Quicktime...

in Windows Media Player...

11 minutes

Comments?  Click here...

This video has been making the rounds lately, and I'm here to tell you, it's an attention-grabber.

I've added a little to it and I wish I knew who took the video, but the scuttlebutt is that the videographer has gone missing.

As one of my buddies said in an email, "all they found was the camera."

Watch in Windows Media Player...

36 seconds

If you haven't spent much time in West Texas, you're welcome to visit and sample the fresh air.

Or you can watch the short piece linked below.

Best wishes from a city boy with a cowboy hat...

Watch...
in QuickTime...
in Windows Media Player...
3 minutes

That movement is to nurture the endangered Texas Indigo snake.

"Why?" you may ask.

Because those of us who tromp around the countryside for whatever reason - work or play - understand how a rattlesnake bite can ruin our day.

As it turns out (and is absolutely fine with me!), the Texas Indigo considers rattlesnake a delicacy, as you'll see in this short slideshow.

If you're squeamish, I suggest you NOT watch this!

If not, watch...

in QuickTime...

in Windows Media Player...

99 seconds

If you don't think the warm weather has made our Texas rattlesnakes happy, have a look at this!

Watch...

in QuickTime...

in Windows Media Player...

52 seconds

(Click once to activate, again to play. Double click on screen to enlarge)

Yesterday I was hard at work on some audio files for the San Angelo Review when the propane truck exploded about 12:30 p.m.  I had actually planned to be driving into San Angelo on 208 about that time from my studio outside Robert Lee.  Things might have been different had I been keeping a strict schedule.

Anyway, I ended up making my trip around 2 p.m.  I never made it to San Angelo. 

The truck's crash site was about ten miles south of my property and 208 was closed both ways at the time.  I thought it was a pasture fire until two troopers waved me down and told me what had happened.

I drove a couple of hundred yards further amidst the smoke from smoldering mesquites and reached the site.  I took off my landowner's hat and put on my journalist's hat and took a few pictures and talked to DPS about what had happened.  Here's a little video from that effort.

For more hard news about this story, check out www.gosangelo.com.  Photographer Cynthia Esparza made some stunning photographs of the actual explosion.  And Maribel Salazar reports the story.

(This was originally posted to the San Angelo Review December 7, 2007)

(Click once to activate, again to play. Double click on screen to enlarge)

I arrived safely at the ranch in Coke County north of San Angelo last week, exhausted from all the packing, loading the truck and drive from Houston.  But soon as I stepped out of the truck's cab, I breathed in a large breath of west Texas air that extinguished my fatigue.

Although I still have stacks of boxes all around and my studio is a disaster, the boxes and organization will have to wait so I can ramp up The Texana Review again.

Yesterday, after working through several of my files, I stepped into the kitchen for a beverage.  I glanced out the window and, lo and behold, there were a couple of whitetail bucks sizing each other up. I know the rutting season is just about to begin, so I watched as these two circled one another, then started sparring.

I leapt to the box where I thought my video camera was and sure enough found it.  Here's what I watched through my kitchen window from about 40 yards.

(Click once to activate, again to play. Double click on screen to enlarge)

I was sleeping late that Saturday morning when I heard the big diesel fire up on the street outside my studio. Peeking through the window blinds, I saw the big backhoe from Houston Demolition easing off its trailer next door.  I dressed rapidly, grabbed a Red Bull and my video camera and watched this machine make matchsticks out of the house next door in less than 30 minutes. Awesome!

8:30 minutes

(Vidcast - click once to activate, then Play to start. Right click to change volume or screen size)

In 1900, Galveston was one of the state's most important centers of commerce and culture and was well-positioned to continue to lead Texas into the 20th century.  September 8th was a Saturday and the morning broke with cloudy skies and blustery winds from the north.  As the day wore on, the winds grew in velocity and the waters of the Gulf turned dark and ugly.

Little did the Galvestonians know that they were about to endure such an incrediably ferocious hurricane that it would be called the worst national disaster in America and would nearly wipe their city off the map.

This is my reading of a report in the Wednesday, September 12 edition of The Galveston Daily News reviewing the situation in Galveston, four days after the storm.

16:52 minutes