Site of the Day

Wow, my blog was just named Salt Lake Site of the Day for December 12, 2007. Can you believe it? I must know somebody.

The SoD program was not intended to be an award. Here is the evolution of the idea.

Salt Lake Sites was intended to be an all inclusive directory. No matter how bad the site; I will list it if it is from or about the Salt Lake Valley.

The directory lists over 5000 sites. I wanted a way to point out some of the better designs. I also wanted to figure out a way to get people to realize the diversity of the local web.

The other idea in my brain at the time was that I wanted changing content on the front page. I decided to do a site of the day program so that something new would show up on the front page every day.

This changing content idea proved problematic for Google. Google would cache the page and put it in the index. Since the front page was changing every day, the data Google had about my site's front page was always wrong.

This was problematic; So, I pulled the SoD program from the front page and left the reviews on stand alone pages.

In choosing the SoDs, I was trying to concentrate on design and not content. For that reason, only a few blogs are SoDs. A blogger uses a design from a third party. Also bloggers tend to link to each other. The SoD program gives a bias to artists, musicians, environmental and social organizations. These organizations are often link starved. Not to burst bubbles, but your typical non-profit social organization does more for the community than your typical blogger.

I occasionally throw in an advertiser. Actually I do so because I think some of the Advertisers are doing SoD worthy things. Of course, being a capitalist, I put the advertisers in Q4. I figure that if I am morally compromised; I should be morally compromised effectively.

Having created a SoD program, I was trying to figure out a way to monetize the calendar. I had tried putting affiliate ads on the calendar, but that didn't get a sale for some 300,000 page views; So, I decide to make a Store of the Day program. The Store of the day is pure commercialism. My thought was that all of the calendar events would have a link to the store of the day. When you add a calendar event, the event page would have a link to your event and one to the store of the day.

The store of the day is a money making ad, pure and simple.

he, he, he. I am so evil.

Actually the design lets me show local stuff with a minimal intrusion. I am trying to find ways to have ads that is less intrusive.

I think that the site of the day program does give extra exposure to the quality sites in the directory. The reviews have been viewed some 200,000 times.

Being a Site of the Day gets you about an extra 50 links a year.

If a web designer was smart, they would link to their SoD. Just like I am linking to my SoD in this post. Boy, I wonder what I did to deserve being called Site of the Day?

The rules for the Site of the Day is that a site can only be a SoD one day a year. I recycle the sites each year.

I thought about trying to make the SoD a wiki type thing where the public at large selects the site and writes the review. If you think something should be a SoD, you can drop me a note.

I just made a report that shows all of the SoDs. I do this silliness for Salt Lake (all SoDs), Provo (all SoDs), Moab (all SoDs), Park City (all SoDs) and Denver (all SoDs).

So, For all of you who you think all I do nothing but complain about Utah. Well, the truth is that I spent 95% of my time praising Utah, then grumble on this blog as a counter balance.

BTW: I don't put a lot of links on this blog, because I went link silly with the directories.

For Social Justice

This is important.

Yesterday I received a call from a frantic activist opposed to initiative one. It was a bit difficult to figure out what she was saying, after all she was a product of the Utah public school system and was neither articulate nor well learned.

Anyway, she was adamant that people who are voting against initiative one vote via an absentee ballot. I told her that I would put this important information on a web site.

If the people who are opposed to the measure vote via absentee ballot, then there will be a sizeable difference between the absentee vote and those at the polling place. If just a few thousand people who are against the measure transfer their votes from the general election to absentee ballots, then there will be a very large gap in the the two voting samples.

A really large gap in the samples will help bulster the claim that the voting system is compromised. The political left has invested a great deal of effort and capital into undermining confidence in the integrity of the voting system.

Initiative One is most likely going down. The ideal situation, however, would be one where the initiative wins at the polling booths, but is cut down by the absentee vote. Imagine the unease that would occur if there was an announcement that the vote won, but was overturned on completion of counting the absentee vote.

Since this is an off year election, it should be possible to accomplish this slight of hand with just a few thousand nay voters switching their voting method.

If just a few thousand lefties vote via absentee ballots, it should be possible to generate data sufficent to prove that the right uses underhanded means to manipulate elections.

I am likely to vote for initiative one. So, I will vote at the polls. If you are against the initiative then, for social justice, vote via absentee ballot.

Lights Out, Me Maties

This one has me puzzled: There is a Lights Out Utah program that asks everyone to turn their lights off as part of an educational project on conservation. That makes sense.

The thing that puzzles me is that the organizers scheduled the event on September 19th which, as everybody knows, is Talk Like a Pirate Day.

It is also the day of the The Chili Affair. The Chili Affair is a big fundraising event for the local food bank.

This means that September 19th will be a really bizarre event where people swagger around in the dark with an occasional discharge from the chili saying "Arrrggghhhh."

I hope you all can see why I find this triple threat of events disconcerting.

Buckhorn Wash

The bravery of rescue workers is astounding. I am thinking both of the people in Huntington and those in Peru. Rescue so often entails going into unstable conditions.

While watching the news stories on the mine collapse, I realized that I wasn't seeing much about the geology of the area. Huntington, Utah is one of the most geologically interesting areas in the United States. To the West is the Wasatch Mountains. The Wasatch defines the Eastern edge of the Great Basin. The Great Basin stretches from the Wasatch in Utah to the Sierra Nevada in California.

To the East of Huntington is the Colorado Plateau. If you take a nondescript dirt road heading West out of Huntington, you end up in a desolate part of the world called Buckhorn Wash. This wash cuts through the heart of a thing called the San Rafael Swell.

The San Rafael is one of the most bizarre places on the face of the Earth. The area is a anticline dome of standstone (with a very thick layer of Navajo Sandstone). Imagine a bubble in the earth that is 75 miles long, 45 miles wide and a thousand feet high. This sandstone has been eroded away through the ages into massive sandstone towers and deep chasms. A few areas, like Little Wild Horse Canyon, are slit canyons that are just a few feet wide but hundreds of feet deep. The canyons include arches, ancient petroglyphs and other cool stuff.

Currently, the Swell is administered by the Bureau of Land Management. Politically, the there is big battle between those who wish to make the Swell a National Monument and the locals who want to keep the secret to themselves.

Anyway, if you start at this page, you can take a quick tour through Buckhorn Wash. I really need to redo this gallery with my new camera.

Utah's Big Powwow

I think that there should be some taxpayer financed public support of the art. The problem is that when the public financing of the arts gets too large, that financing starts to dominate the arts. This is what I was trying to hint at with my last snide post. When public financing of the arts dominates the arts, the arts will tend to move from artistic statements to political statements.

I was extremely supportive of the first years of the Twilight Music series and other public concerts. These concerts were accomplishing the goal of extending the spirit of the 2002 Olympics by pulling people into an otherwise vacant downtown. Five years down the line, I find myself looking at a very slick tax subsidized business with an unfair competitive advantage. All of the other arts related businesses have to pay higher taxes so that they can be dominated by a state run business.

What gives?

I intentionally juxtaposed the concert series with the "Mormon Day" celebrations. Readers of this blog have probably noticed that I have a distinct distaste for Brigham Young. The first Pioneer Day in 1847 was clearly a staged event. I have more reason to dislike Pioneer Days than the Twilight Concert series. So, I find it it strange when I find myself feeling that Pioneer Days is more of an authentic cultural event than the concert series.

Even though I don't like Brigham Young, Pioneer Days has evolved into Utah's State. This makes the day transcend its original message. The celebration encapsulates both the original message and the reaction to the message as the people who rejected Brigham Young were also pioneers.

Mankind has a long history of staging community events to deliver a propaganda message. Because we are human, we can't simply squirm out of a history filled with humans. As we will never be able to liberate ourselves from history, we might as well celebrate it.

Pioneer Day is the recognized state holiday for Utah. And I love the fact that the state is filled with community events. Even though something starts as a staged event does prevent it from gaining authenticity with time. I think that a gathering of communities throughout Utah on a recognized state Holiday is a great thing, especially since there have been a concerted effort to make the events inclusive. Pioneer Day includes a marathon, a rodeo and a ton of other events.

One of the most interesting Pioneer Days events is a thing called The Native American Celebration in Liberty Park. This celebration starts with a Powwow at 10:00AM. It includes storytelling, drum competitions and other cool things.

The Mountain Rendezvous, powwows and other community gatherings have always been an important part of our pioneer heritage. Part of The Spirit of Powwow is that people put aside their differences to communicate with eachother and simply celebrate community.

From my perspective, the state funded free concerts seem to be loosing its authencity as it grows, while Pioneer Days has gained in authenticity.

Slow Foods

One of the really cool ideas that is taking off on in the information is the idea of Community Supported Agriculture. CSA is a way to get fresh locally produced foods from the farm onto kitchen tables. Rather than shopping at a store for vegetables, you buy a share of a farmer's crop. You pick up your portion of the crop throughout the year.

CSAs are a bit information intensive. The farms that engage in this practice need to send out newsletters and harvesting schedules so that their customers can have some idea of what to expect. Farms are also wise to share recipes.

The site Slow Food Utah has information on CSAs, Farmers Markets and other techniques to reacquaint people with food. I've had food from East Farms.

The only real problem with slow foods is that you end up needing to schedule yourself around the food. IMHO, the effort needed to sync one's life to the harvesting cycle of the land has all sorts of benefits. It saves a great deal of engery. You get better food and probably live a healthier life.

Since this is a political blog. I guess I need to say something political. When I was a kid big agriculture and processed foods were seen as progressive. Small farms were seen as quaint, old fashioned relics. Preserving such farms was a Conservative issue. Today, it things seem to have flipped flopped and the progressive community has embraced the idea.

I think that supporting small farms and encouraging the consumption of local produce is a good idea regardless of one's personal's political perspective. Here are some Salt Lake Agriculture Links.

Big T

The Big T Blog says that former Jazz player and current jazz musician Thurl Bailey is visiting Iraq. The only post so far on the trip was dated June 9.

Mr. Bailey could provide us a bird's eye view of events in Iraq. I just hope he realizes that he stands out in a crowd and stays safe.

The first post was just a comic piece about why he and his 7'6" friend chose to fly first class. ;).

Memory Grove Park

I decided to take a short walk through Memory Grove Park. The park is on City Creek between downtown Salt Lake City and City Creek Canyon. My favorite hike is Salt Lake City is to start at the Trax station at Cottonwood Canyon then to hike past Temple Square then to follow the sidewalk adjacent to City Creek through Memory Grove and into the canyon.

The ability to walk from downtown into the wilderness of the Wasatch is, in my opinion, the single biggest selling point of the city. This pleasant walk includes a variety of scenery with skyscrapers, church buildings, a ritzy neighborhood, public art followed by a long mountain trail that climbs into one of the most remote regions of the Wasatch Mountains. The road up City Creek Canyon is popular with hikers, joggers and cyclists. Bicycles are allowed only on odd days. Cars are allowed on even days, but I think you have to have additional permission to drive up the canyon. The lower portions of the canyon are a little bit trampled. The upper stretches are remarkably pristine.

While adding labels to the pictures, I discovered that Ottinger Hall is being rennovated by the Salt Lake Rotary as some sort of youth center. I also learned that Salt Lake will be the host of the 2007 Rotary International Convention this upcoming week. See the sites Rocky Mountain Rendezvous or Salt Lake Rotary for more information. Rotary Clubs tend to construct really cool things.

As for Memory Grove itself, I admit to being inspired by the monuments for the people who gave their lives defending this country. Monuments are important. They are both worth building and preserving. For example the World War monument was constructed in 1932 by people who may have been hoping that they would live in an era of peace, not knowing that worst things lay ahead. I was also impressed with Gold Star Hill which recognizes the pain of the Gold Star Moms who lost a child serving this nation.

In my book, the efforts to build parks and memorials are quiet important as they provide a valuable perspective of the events that shape the world. Above all, the monuments of the past serve as backdrops for the photos of the present.

Quality Photo Blog

This was unexpected: Ann Torrence dropped a note on my Lake Blanche post. It is intimidating when an exceptional photographer drops a note on an amateur photographer's site. I follow both Ann Torrence's photo blog and check in on her galleries on a regular basis. She is one of those photographers who've elevated the craft beyond snapshots to true storytelling.

I admit, my photo site exists primarily for database design experiments. This blog exists simply because blogging is the in-thing-to-do.

Theoretically, the value of my type of mindfart blog is that it can help point out quality sites. I hope that this posts directs some traffic in Ms. Torrence's direction.

Lake Blanche

Shhhh! Don't tell Coco.

While Coco was on a trip with her owners, I took advantage of a free afternoon to hike up the Mill B South Fork Trail to Lake Blanche. The hike provides some killer views of Sundial and Dromedary Peaks. If you have a full day, you can hike to the tops of the peaks and see the other side. Being a good weboholic, I took my camera and shot photos. There's over a hundred pictures in this set that includes both wildflowers and scenic views. You can skip to the middle pages to get to the alpine scenes. The Cottonwood Ridge of the Wasatch is one of those areas that would be a national park if it were in any other state.

Wisely, the state does not allow dogs in the canyon.

The trail follows a little creek labeled Mill B. The name is a bit confusing as there is another Mill B Creek on the other side of Big Cottonwood Canyon. The literature refers to them as North and South Forks of Mill B Creek. This is even more confusing since both creeks drain directly into Big Cottonwood Creek. There are also creeks called Mill A, C and D.

The trail is relatively steep. It climbs 2700 feet in about three miles. I wore a shirt sleave shirt, no hat and no sunscreen. I was having a worse time with the high altitude sun than the steep grade. I ended up camping out in the shade of an SPF 40 pine tree to let my skin cool down. Because the air is cooler at high altitudes, people like me tend to forget that the sun is more intense.

Because I took a long siesta on the way up, I found I was pressed for time to invest walking around the lakes. I ended up walking the last mile of the trail back to the car in the dark. The tips for the trail: Bring a hat. Wear a long sleave shirt. Bring sun sreen. Don't bring a dog. Above every, be prepared to enjoy wildflowers and scenery.

More Salt Lake Photos

Due to global warming, we've had some unexpectedly pleasant days this past week. Being a crass capitalist, I decided to exploit the unseasonable weather to take a few more pictures of downtown. (I know, I should have spent the day weeping and poking my Bush voodoo doll with pins).

I already have a ton of Salt Lake Photos. Most of them were from my older camera; So I figure that there would be no harm in adding new photos.

The Salt Palace featured some funky interior building drapes for the Novell Brainshare event. This is a leading event for open source and networking software. I also added pictures Salt Lake Gallery, and South Temple. I also added a few more pictures of Temple Square (which was in full bloom).

Adding labels to the pictures takes longer than taking the pictures. To make matters worse, in my first iteration of Protophoto.com, the program added all new pictures to the end of the gallery. I changed the program so I could chose to add photos to both the front and back of the gallery. The next step is to make a page that lets me reorganize a full gallery.

BTW, the intention of Protophoto.com was quite modest. A few years ago, I was working with someone to create a visual directory for towns (TownState.com). The basic ideas was that we would make two directories. The main directory would be a pay for inclusion visual representation of a town. There would also be a graphics free, all inclusive directory of everyone in town. A town has to have a free directory, because there's a ton of great sites that don't have an advertising budget.

Anyway, since I was trying to create a visual respresentation of an area, I needed photos; so I figure I would drop the photos in a gallery.

The funny thing, of course, is that the photo gallery gets about the same amount of traffic as the community directories. Protophoto has two types of pages. Each photo gets a page. I then group the photos into subjects, a picture can be on more than one subject page. The site has 534 subjects (some of these are empty) and 9364 pictures. I decided to split the subjects into groups that I called Context. Since I have all these pictures, I am slowly creating a visual database that shows how things are connected in the mountain west.

I did not have a grand plan for ProtoPhoto.com. It just feeds traffic into other stats. Last July, I decide to track what the site does; so I added a hit counter on the photo page. This counter just went over the 1,000,000 hit mark a few minutes ago; So, the picture page had a million views since 6/26/06. That is average of 3,790 times a day. The subject pages get viewed 1,580 times a day. In comparison, this blog logs 24 hits a day.

I don't put ads on the picture pages because there are enough ads in world. I do put ads on the subject pages. I currently get a dollar for every 1000 page views. Protophoto makes about $1.5 per day ($550 a year). It costs $100 in web hosting; So, I get $350 to spend on camera equipment. Whenever you have a process that makes a tiny amount of income it is worthwhile to ask if there is a way to turn it into a real source or income.

It is impossible to say from the statistics if there is any interest in this system of interlinked galleries, or if hits are all accidents or from people who really didn't find what they wanted in the site. BTW, the most popular picture on the site is of the Sacred Heart Statue on I70 outside Denver.

Curly cup gumweed

This one floored me.

The USU Weed Web (See Letter E) lists Grindelia squarrosa as an invasive weed, but does not include Euphorbia myrsinites. I am simply bowled over by this.

Curlycup gumweed (Grindelia squarrosa) is a native plant that grows well in the dry soils of the mountain west. The plant is used in some medicines, but it really is not good for the kidney. Livestock don't eat it. Since lifestock avoid the plant, the plant displaces desirable feed in overgrazed areas.

Yes, the BLM and other landowners are wise to take measures to cut back curlycup gumweed, but it doesn't belong on a list of invasive weeds of the Mountain West. As the plant is native and is not noxious like poison ivy, there should not be a concerted government action to irradicate it.

Donkey Spurge, on the other hand, is noxious and invasive in every way. The plant was imported from Turkey. The white sap of the plant is both harmful to humans and livestock. It is flourishing in the Wasatch, and appears to be displacing native species. It also appears to be extremely harmful to native animals. (I assume that native animals are adapted to curlycup gumweed.)

The USU Weed Web includes the statement:

Of the 6,741 plant species that are recognized as weeds in the world, 2,063 are currently present in the United States.

This implies that USU is determining that a plant is invasive based on a global list. This is bad science. It seems to me that a plant is not invasive in its native ecosystem. It still might be a weed, but not invasive. Yes, there are ecosystems where gumweed should be considered an invasive weed ... just not in Utah. Conversely, I believe that we should actively work to irradicate Donkey Spurge in Utah. Turkey, the native habitat of donkey spurge, should not irradicate the plant.

Curly cup gumweed is a really cool plant. I think it is an ideal plant for native rock gardens as it blooms later in the year. I actually gathered seeds and planted them last year. Damn, I am now in violation of Utah's invasive species law for planting a native plant.

Stansbury Island

Stansbury Island near the south shore of the Great Salt Lake is a popular place to mountain bike in the winter. The mountains, of course, are covered with snow in the winter. Although most of the island is private property, the island does sport a 9.8 mile mountain bike trail. The Wasatch Rock Garden Society generally does an April trip out to Stansbury Island as it is one of the first places to bloom each year. The trip is popular since it gets people geared up for gardening in the months to come.

Unfortunately the area is also popular with people who like to go out in the the desert to shoot guns. Over the weekend we decided to take Coco on a walk out in the desert. Unfortunately, all the side canyons were occupied up by people doing target practice. We tried hiking up the ridge. We found ourselves on a ridge with a joker shooting a high powered rifle on the right and some clown with an automatic weapon shooting off rounds to the left. It really wasn't shaping up as pleasant hike. So we decided to hike on one of the muddy roads near Grantsville.

The picture shows a skeet that was sitting on the Mack Canyon Road. What someone was doing shooting skeet on a public road is anyone's guess. Counting the beer bottles near the pile of empty casings makes me think that the shooter was getting a bit loopy by the time it got around to shooting this particular skeet.

Anyway, I need to get back to the truck for another beer and some more ammo; so I will just cut this post short.

To Logan

This first picture shows the footprints and tire tracks left by the person who stole my 78-year-old parent's snowblower. There are two sets of tracks: big feet and small feet. Perhaps it is a father and son theft operation.

Yes, Mr. Gore, I know that snowblowers are evironmentally immoral as they emit greenhouse gasses. My folks often get 2 and 3 feet thick snows that they cannot shovel. They love walking up and down the driveway on heavy snow days blowing the snow away. I would like to get them a new snowblower. My experience is that theives come back to the same house because they like to steal the replacements items. Anyway, now that the nation has taken a leap to the left, we can all expect to be robbed more often. They are down two snow shovels and a snowblower this year. The last time they were robbed was the late 70s.

Anyway, yesterday, March 1st, I chauffered one of the folks up to Logan to meet a professor at USU. I took a small number of pictures of Logan, the Logan Temple and Historic Center Street. I was also hoping to get a few shots of USU, but it was too snowy and foggy. A guide at the Logan Visitor Center said that the Tony Grove Trail is the best place in the state to catch Spring wildflowers. So, I will plan a Spring Trip to Logan Canyon.

One of the highlights of the trip was a visit to the Old Cache County Courthouse that was recently converted into a Visitor Center. Apparently, there was recently a move to tear the old Courthouse down as it is really not a good construction for an area prone to earthquakes. The people of Logan chose to restore the building in 2005, and did a great job.

Enterprise Photos

Since I have photo gallery site, I decided I should read a couple of books on photography. The Digital Photography Book by Scott Kelby does an excellent job describing methods to get the SHARP AS TACK photos that professional photographers and photo viewing public crave.

I know that this will sound a little bit odd. But I have never been too terribly fond of the sharp as tack photos. There are times when you want texture and detail to stand out in a photo. For the most part, I am interested in composition and prefer softer images. Of course, one should learn to take photos the way the public desires. The book convinced me to start taking photos in Raw format; so that I will be able to use the light balancing features of Adobe Photoshop (assuming I ever become rich enough to get Photoshop). Photoshop costs $650 bucks!

Anyway, I decided to do a quick round of picture labeling. The new galleries include shots of the new Mountain Meadows Massacre Memorial, The Enterprise Reservoir, Honeycomb Rocks, and The Pinto Road.

Startup Princess

I've been reading posts on Start Up Princess. This site from Provo is putting together a network of women entrepreneurs.

Yes, I know, I am not supposed to be there. I was actually harvesting links from the site. That's where I found Raw Melissa. Anyway, I think groups like this show entrepreneurship at its finest. The basic metaphor for the site is that the market is a magic kingdom. The goal of the start up princess is to help motivate startups by providing resources including access to venture capital and a to a network of fairy godmothers. A fairy godmothers is a successful entrepreneur willing to help other women achieve their entrepreneurial dreams.

It is a fun metaphor, and people are putting together some really worthwhile ventures such as the Now I Can Therapy Center.

Unfortunately, many of the start ups listed on the site seem to be in marginal industries like scrapbooking. One thing that I worry about is that, since so many of the primary industries in our society are dominated by a few well financed conglomerate, we end up burning our entrepreneurial spirit on on low margin markets.

Again, I was on the site to do link harvesting, and a large number of the links are already broken as people's stab at marginal markets failed to manifest. Anyway, I thought I would blog on this resource because it might add more power to the Start Up Princess's magic wand.

Raw Melissa

I wonder if this young lady has a hard time finding a date? I worry about her having to sit at home eating alone on a Friday night, Munching on carrots. The Raw Melissa Blog talks about her cooking classes and the joy of small green plants peeking out from under the snow.

Raw Melissa reminds me a bit of that poor Rachael Ray girl on the food network ... You know, the girl who has to travel around with only $40 a day to spend on food. Every show ends up with poor Rachel Ray dining alone with no-one to talk to.

Anyway, this Raw Melissa stands out as a gem. The site is working on perfecting healthy desserts and cuisine made from whole organic foods. It looks yummy indeeed. I think this type of site is much more interesting than this blabber about politics site. It has great photography and promotes healthy food.

Glorification of Crimes

One of the primary reasons that I am against the death penalty is that the death penalty all but begs for politicizing the enforcement of law. Michelle Malkin has been reporting on the glorification of American murderers in France. On the right, you find people campaigning for the death penalty. The William Andrews case is a good example. Andrews was the accomplice in a horrible murder, he left the room right before the murders. Andrews had a viable case that he was bullied by his friend Selby into committing the murders. Executing Andrews was a borderline decision.

The primary reason Andrews was executed was because the family of the victims spent years actively campaigning for the execution. I do feel for the family. I hope that the closure of the execution brought them some comfort.

Andrews was not local, and he was black. This meant that there was not a local political base to campaign for a stay of execution. Andrew was a horrible person who enabled a terrible crime spree. His case, however, was borderline. The combination of a pro-execution campaign with no balancing counter-execution campaign tipped the scales.

The reason I turned against the death penalty during this execution was the observation that political campaigns for or against a criminal determines the life or death of the prisoner.

The international glorification of murderer Mumia Abu-Jamal shows the opposite side of this coin. In the political campaign for staying the execution of this cop-killer, the left has turned Mumia Abu-Jamal into a cultural icon. He is a revolutionary hero who kills policemen for social justice.

Michelle Malkin is right to point out that this campaign to glorify Mumia Abu-Jamal is a prime example of the extent to which the left is willing to undermine society the grub for power; however, we are faced with the problem that the death penalty creates a venue for such political moves.

Despite the fact that the death penalty gives solace to the families of the victims, the high road is to take the issue off the table.

This situation, where every border line death penalty case turns into a political campaign, will always tear our society apart and simply results in unnecessary damage the families of the victims involved in crimes. In cases where the political campaign stays the execution, the victim's family is left wondering why their loved one was not important enough to receive justice. In the cases where the execution occurs, the families and supporters of the murderer will fall into the belief that they are unjustly persecuted. In too many cases, the death penalty seems to magnify the horror of the crime. Too often it results in glorifying the murderers.

Yes, the progressives of the world are a sickening lot. They advocate creating and destroying millions of innocent lives in laboratories for experimental purposes, then go ballistic at the idea of executing guilty people.

In such a politically charged environment, it is always best to take the high road. Taking execution off the tables is costly, but it saves our society the damage done for and against the execution of prisoners.

Everything and Nothing to do with Cedar

I decided to spend the day labeling photos. In the last several days I've labeled pictures from the Canyon Glen Park near . Most of the pictures, however, are from the Cedar City Area. The gallery which I suspect will get the most traffic is the Cedar Breaks gallery which includes images of the awe inspiring Cedar Breaks National Monument.


Labeling pictures from Cedar City is difficult as there are no cedars near Cedar City. The town and things around the town were named for the Juniper trees that grow in abundance around the town. Most of the stories on the name of Cedar City hold that the early pioneers were too stupid to properly identify plants. Personally, I think the reason for the names is more complex. The Mormon Pioneers were out to build a new Zion and loved naming the features in the area with a biblical motif. Since there has always been a great deal of latitude in common plant names, the pioneers took to calling the local Junipers "cedar" with the hope that the name would stick. The name "cedar" probably would have stuck except the taxonomists developing the scientific classification system chose to distinguish between the Pinaceae (pine) and Cupressaceae (cypress) families. The scientific naming system is having the same crisis with plant classifications with the current push to classify plants with phylogentic system.

I was duly impressed with Southern Utah University. SUU seems to be evolving from a small regional community college into a true world class university. This makes sense as the school is in a good location and a fun town. SUU is the home of the Utah Shakespeare Festival, which has a stellar reputation in theatrical circles.

One of the most prominent features of SUU is the Eccles Coliseum and Harris Center. The coliseum and event center were built with a Greek theme. The site has obelisks, columns, etc..

Kolob Canyon

Here is a set of pictures of Kolob Canyon near Cedar City. The Kolob Canyon region is just off I15 (exit 40). If you are driving across Utah and really only have time for a quick stop, this is the place to do that stop. The canyon features some spectacular views of Navajo Sandstone. I was lucky to visit the canyon at the end of October when the leaves were turning color.