Stooping to Murder

If Donald Trump pulls U.S. troops out of Syria so that troops of our ally Turkey can march in unobstructed and slaughter the fighters of our Kurdish allies, it will be the greatest betrayal perpetrated by the United States in its history: a betrayal not only of the Kurdish fighters who have done so much of our dirty work in both Syria and Iraq, but of our most cherished beliefs about ourselves. We will never live down the deserved shame that we will earn.

2018: Bellingham & Glacier Trip

The pictures from the trip out to Washington & Montana have actually been up in the Cloud for a while now, but I never got around to putting up a blog post. I'm doing that now.

Horton, Who-Hearer

The Cat in the Hat

Carly shows the Wolf how it's done

the Tooth Fairy

a big flamingo checks out Carly

We started the journey with a side-trip to Abilene, to see the city's wonderful collection of sculptures around the downtown area. Along the railroad tracks that delineate the city-center's southern edge, there's a garden of statues representing characters from Dr Seuss, along with a few others; and at the convention center, a few blocks north, is a children's literature sculpture garden. And there are a few other statues scattered around between those two spots. Even though I don't know a number of the stories represented (having been a child back before the printing press was truly established), I enjoyed them all.

for scale, note the passing 18-wheeler

While we were in Colorado, where Carly would spend her vacation partly at Rancho Mojón and partly at Golden Pound, I took a day-trip up to Nebraska, where my sister is working in a clinic. Along the way, I stopped to see a fairly extreme example of religious fervour, in Pine Bluffs, Wyoming: a collection of statues, including a gigantic one of the Virgin Mary.










Then we went up to Bellingham, Washington, for a soccer tournament, and a little hiking at Whatcom Falls, Mount Baker and Stimpson Preserve.

at Whatcom Falls Park

Stimpson Family Nature Preserve

snow field, Mt Baker

some random waterfall

Picture Lake

 After the tournament, we drove east to Glacier National Park, making stops at places along the way.

another random waterfall

Kootenai swinging bridge

Kootenai Falls

At Glacier, we spent a couple of nights in one of the old lodges built by the railroad to coax visitors to become customers, and the day between exploring Going to the Sun Road.

view from The Loop

400' waterfall

Jackson Creek

Goose Island

Jackson glacier

 

Construction of that road was an engineering marvel, back when it was built. It's the park's only through route, and it's where everybody goes. It wasn't as crowded as I'd feared, but there were a lot of people.

Next time I go to the park, I'll visit one of the other areas, north or south of Going to the Sun. (By then, there probably won't be any glaciers left, but I'm sure the park will still be there, and worth seeing again. Even though, as I write this, I see that the Going to the Sun Road is currently closed because of wildfires.)

There are lots more pictures from the trip; if Google is to be believe, you can see them by clicking on this link.

Enjoy.