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Source: Weather Underground

In 2004 E and her mom read about the Ballunar Liftoff Festival, an annual hot air balloon/race/get-together, down at the NASA Johnson Space Center (about 45 minutes’ drive southeast of here on I-45). On a whim, the three of us got up early on a Sunday morning, got drive-thru coffee and breakfast, and drove down to Nassau Bay to see the sky full of balloons.

We drove up and down Nasa Road 1 to chase them. Not knowing where they were headed, we ducked into some subdivision (which we have since been unable to find on the map—Brigadoon Estates, maybe?) just in time to see a few of them passing low—including this guy:

We offered him coffee; he said he’d really love some, but if he touched (anything in contact with) the ground he’d be disqualified.

2005’s Sunday morning launch was cancelled due to a storm that tore through the balloon crew camps. Weather wasn’t a problem the following year, as you can see from my roll of photos from the 2006 event.

This year, however, commitments with family and friends took priority. We’ll be back in ‘08, for sure, but in the meantime here are some of the best photos already posted to Flickr by other photographers (who made it to yesterday’s launch):

More in the Ballunar Flickr group’s photo pool.

The temperature in Houston should drop nearly 20° in the next couple of hours:

Today’s news is equally welcome and surprising. Mas, y mas.

“The first thing you have to do when remediating a gas station,†the daughter of an environmental lawyer said to me, “is take out the underground gas tanks.â€

I think it looks like a hatch out of “Lost.†Or a breaching sandworm.

[taken at the defunct Conoco, San Jacinto at Alabama]

(Weather forecast for the next few days, courtesy the Weather Underground.)