Photo Index
is an easy to use, index web page listing links to hundreds of my original photos. Clicking the link
will send you to a page of photos decorated by unique captioning that has been capturing the attention
of the entire WWW .
My most popular pages are at:
Recent Buys and Bedstand Books of Mr.Wonderful where I list the most recent books I've bought, with their Barnes & Noble sales ranking, along with the publishers' comments.
The MW Review of Books is where I issue eloquent and frank book reviews the everyday reader can comprehend and use as a factor as to whether to purchase the book or not. Go figure, a book reviewer you can believe.
The I-17 aka: The Black Canyon Freeway ('freeway,' remember, no Mafia in Arizona ... well they make their money other ways ... like with resorts in the Red Rock Country, oops, there goes my kneecaps) out of and into northern Phoenix, the fifth largest city in the U.S.A., on a typical early June, 100F degree, Sunday afternoon.
In Scottsdale, no one can hear you scream . . . about your speeding ticket. Because
from May 1st to October 1st, their car windows are rolled-up tight to keep the 100F plus
degree heat (a dry heat) in the desert, where it belongs.
Yet another accident at the City of Phoenix intersection of Shea Boulevard and Tatum. The hazy red and blue blinking emergency lights appear as if I were in dream while cruising home on the tail-end of a thirty-seven mile trek from a workday that began seventeen hours earlier.
Being faced with finding no church key in the drawers of the multi-million dollar manse I'm taking care of this summer, I improvised and used my belt mounted Leatherman® multi-purpose tool to pry the lid off of a bottle of Fat Tire New Belgium Beer. Glug, glug.
Okay, think about it. When have you ever seen a Heineken Bottling or Canning plant in the U.S.A? Never. Right? So your Mr. Wonderful, while fearlessly wandering the desert long before most people were awake, risking bites from rattlesnakes and chuckawallas, witnessed a can of Heineken being birthed within a prickly pear cactus. And photographed the miracle for you.
Okay, I admit it, I actually took this photo in February of 2005. But the Yugoslav government paid me a truckload of grobnicks (their currency) to postpone posting the photo until now. I only recently found out that a truckload of grobnicks is worth just a little bit more than a thimble full of Marlon Brando's belly button lint. God rest his dear soul.
Took this photo of an H2 Hummer SUT that has a tiny truck bed six feet off the ground. Useful for keeping groceries and stuff away from midget thieves. (I mean the 'little people'. And not 'Lucky Charm' little people but the dwarves and ... forget it!) Many of the men who drive these vehicles are, let's face it, closet homosexuals <grin>. Looking up and seeing the power lines, since many are buried at great cost in the desert dirt these days, reminds me of old 1960s Phoenix when the birds had a place to sit and drop surprises and yap and get shot at by little boys with marble-flinging slingshots and pellet-zinging air rifles.
Summer comes to Scottsdale, Arizona, USA. 112F degrees and that's just the start. In the middle of our summer season it is not unusual for the twenty-hour temperature to never drop below 100F degrees for days at a stretch.
"Doing jobs American's won't do" is what government officials and disingenuous businessmen tell us so that they can pay 'illegal immigrants' in cash (no FICA or Medicare withholding) offer no benefits, and knowing they won't complain, fire them at will. Of course these 'illegals' can afford to live like this because they do . . . shall we say, with less?
Here Mr. Lizard, sans tail, in an attempt to hide from Mr. Wonderful, hits the bricks. If you've ever wondered how they can take the 140F degree heat of the surfaces they run on, check out how he holds his feet.
A June 21st lightning-strike-caused Cave Creek Complex Fire eats up the tinder-dry flatland flora of the Tonto National Forest. I understand the folks in Desert Mountain (Madonna and such) are shaking in their Gucci's.
The Cave Creek Complex Fire continues. This photo was taken about 2:00PM Thursday looking south from
Pima Road above Dynamite. I understand that the 30,000 acre blaze threatens the Tonto Hills area and Desert Mountain.
Well, here it is. The super secret Dean Kamen creation code named "IT". The Segway the invention that, in the civilized world at least, was going to change life as we know it. Yawn.
Well, here it is. The replacement for the Chevrolet Camaro, the SSR truck, car, thingie. At $40,000 plus one
doesn't see that many of them even in trendy north Scottsdale, Arizona. It's so sad to see General Motors (for whom
my nephew Brian, is a chief designer, after having sketched out the PT Cruiser over at Da Fuhrer's place) make so many
missteps.
My red arrows point to the latest versions of the Scottsdale photo radar arsenal that detect both speed and red light violations. In an effort to enforce our seatbelt laws, there are rumors that they will soon be set to flash randomly and those driver's not wearing their Detroit designed harnesses will receive a fine via the Post Office. Cynical citizens may say this is just another way for the City of Scottsdale to get in the pocket books of anyone driving through the 'West's Most Western Town'. In any case, it doesn't matter to the 'Undocumented Alien' illegally driving this tractor without any escorts through one of the busiest intersections in town. Understand that 'Illegal/Undocumented Aliens' are not only favored by our flat-sole-shoe-wearing governor, and adored, (and may I say almost worshipped?) by our moronic news media, but due to the immense (and wasted) paperwork involved, they also escape virtually all attempts at traffic enforcement. Unless they get in an accident, and then they just run off in the Nike's they just lifted at Ross. That's why The Valley of the Sun has the highest hit and run rates outside of Mexico City . . . and private security guards, plastic walls near exits and glass bubbled cameras in virtually all retail establishments.
