Elliot´s Trackside Diner February 2011

[Heartland Division CB&Q]

The message said "Service not vailble for hours and hors. Can't post when that happens.

Flip ... Good to see you. Glad you can do train watching, but wish it pertained to a better situation. Hope you can find more time for this diner.

Der John ... Waht was that remark about parking all about. Also, that container ship must have made a wrong turn.

Lee .... The billboard logos look good. Really like the one for my railroad a lot!  Could you round up some MIA's. Bridge Tom, OJ Ed, etc? ... IS "Toddland" included? Johnboy's layout? Brakie's layout? There may be several others.

Where is Jim CG .?..

I'm headed back to AL tomorrow to work on that situation.

 

 

[Cederstrand]

Sausage & eggs with onion packed hashbrowns, please. Diner seemed temporarily closed earlier, Nice to find it open again tonight.

***Flip, sounds like some terrific (and most convenient) rail fanning there.

***Johnboy, Congrats on the track laying progress. And those "little ladies" sound like some fun entertainment for you folks. No train wrecks?

***Larry, you sound serious allright. Doubt I'll even be ballesting my layout. Wife's was enough work.

***Todd, good luck in court. Sure hope it works out OK.

Here's a link to the latest pics from wife's (HO) layout: http://mods.homestead.com/Trainroom7.html I know there are spots that are not up to snuff, but as long as she's happy with it, I'm not going to beat myself up to get it all right. For us, this is strictly for "fun".

Seems the new simplified (N) track plan is growing on me. I'll post a link to the re-do here: http://mods.homestead.com/RobsLayout.html Going to pick up a can of spray foam next week and try fixing the grade business.

Have a good one y'all. Rob

 

[fireman216]

Bbbrrrrrr....Good late evening gang!! Since it's late I will just take a fresh cup of decaf please. I will be laying on top of the stove for awhile thawing out. Not sure where my brains went tonight but I took out the snowmobile tonight and went riding with some guys from the firehouse. I was all nice and warm down in the layout room working...wife and daughter over to her moms...just me and the dog. Man was it freezing tonight!!! I don't care how much money I have spent on the latest and greatest snow gear to wear when I go riding...you still will get cold. Of course don't even think of complaining. Anyone that has ever been in a Fire Dept will tell you the "brotherhood" side of it can be very humorous as far as practical jokes and general nut busting goes. Complaining I was cold probably would have got me duct taped to my truck or something to that nature. Heck we had a probie mouth off one day and got some chicken Alpo dog food in his stew. He LOVED it!!!. Anyways...I am back home now...everyone is asleep...and I am relaxing. This morning was NUTS with 40mph+ winds and heavy lake effect snow. Everyone on my street played the "is this your garbage can"?? Stuff was blowing everywhere!!! My daughter had to bowl in a city tournament this morning and bowled a great series...not bad for a 9 year old. I then went up to the Carrier Dome with my brother to watch our beloved Syracuse Orange beat Rutgers in over time. Nothing like college hoops on a cold snowy day. Bring on March Madness!!! We were fortunate to have seats near the bench. It's amazing to here all the swearing from not only the coaches...but the players as well. Some serious smack talking going on that you never can hear or see when it's on TV. All in all a great day and tomorrow should be pretty easy again. I will most likely have the boys over to watch the Daytona while we do a small ops session. I need to run the new yards and make sure everything runs smooth. Good night gang!!...Tim

[jeffrey-wimberly]

cudaken

Jeffery Would crutches (no spell check at work) help? I have a set I hope to never need again.

              Ken

I have a pair but they're of absolutely no use in my trailer. The hall is too narrow (18-20") and the rooms are very cramped with most of the available space taken up with train stuff, video cassettes, DVD's the TV, a few very small pieces of furniture, my rather small bed, locomotive display rack on the wall, gunrack, some wall mounted DVD racks, a big 4' wide, 4 foot high, 1' deep book shelf that holds the aforementioned VHS tapes and DVD's plus my Kalmbach books, home theater system, my rice box, emergency lights and that's only the bedroom! The front room is taken up mostly by a large HO layout in somewhat of a U shape and is attached to three walls and has several supports underneath. Every square inch of floor space that's not absolutely critical for standing or walking and whatever goes into making up a kitchen is crammed with train stuff, paint cans, computer equipment, several gallon bottles of white glue and some other stuff. There's no place to keep a pair of crutches without tripping over them all the time. Plus they make moving something like a box or carrying a plate of food quite difficult. Nope, that's not an answer. I tried them indoors once and ended up hurting myself quite badly.

[Cederstrand]

***Tim, you aren't kidding about the pranks played. My wife was a firefighter before driving ambulance, medic, etc... and the stories she tells of those days are absolutely hilarious. Pretty creative goup of guys, except my wife who was the lone young woman and slight of build back then.

Going to bring Cold Mountain into the barn tomorrow to better treat her bad eye. Sure hope we can prevent blindness in that eye.

Good night y'all. Rob

[wetidlerjr]

 

Good Morning ! from Tipton IN.

 

[LSWrr]

Good Morning all,

I think someone tripped over the power cord last night.

Garry, I would be happy to do layout work for personal freelance layouts or billboards.  All they have to do is ask and provide me with a little background and direction for their layout.  I didn’t use it on this project but I have the full COREL draw Suite on this computer and I can do some interesting stuff.  Not to mention I have catalogs upon catalogs of royalty free images and fonts.

I ordered 14 containers of Woodland Scenics ground cover last week from my neighbor who is a Walther’s dealer.  $7/shaker for ground cover or static grass and $8.75 for ballast after sales tax.

[blownout cylinder]

Yeb'm...definitely someone tripped over the power cord...Wade said something about a hardware crash that led to no notice for several hours after the initial occurence.. real useful that...

Good Morning...I'll have a boot coffee and a breakfast bagel please and thank ye..I'll be at the RC for this one...

I'm going to see about how my layout will actually function today..I've a few friends come down to run some trains...see how that goes...

[jeffrey-wimberly]

Good morning. It's 56° and cloudy. The high today will be 72° and it will be somewhat cloudy.

Laundry day today. I'll get the laundry done this morning and have it out of the way before noon. About mid afternoon I'll be heading off to a friends home for a steak dinner. Afterward (depending on whether he survives my special hot sauce) we'll do some planning for a layout he wants to get started on. Other than that I have no plans for today.

[fireman216]

Morning everybody!!...Big stack of pancakes please...some NY maple syrup and a mug of breakfast blend in a NYC mug please. It's a balmy 13 degrees outside with a windchill of 5 degrees...a heat wave!!! An easy day today...my daughter has to bowl again in her regular Sunday morning league. No school this week for her as winter break is here. The boys are coming over this afternoon for a small ops session and to watch the Daytona today. Go Junior!!...Catch ya all later!!!.....Tim

[cudaken]

 Well I see the dinner back open, good morning.

 Flo, just a Diet Dew Please.

 Work Front Yesterday was odd, only 3 customers in the first 5 hours. Then around 2:00 to 4:00 I was slammed. After 5:00 till the new closing time of 7:00 not a soul came in. Still had a fair day with $3217.00 in sales.

 Bank of Stupid sent me a letter dated 02-11-11. They are now saying they our willing to work with me? They want a hardship letter, W-2's, bank statements and such. I still do not trust them! 4 weeks ago I was told not to send any money, it will not help and now they say they will work with me? I am going to keep my appointment with the Attorney! I no longer believe anything I hear or read from Bank Of America. 

  Time to get ready for work, have a lot of customers picking up mattress today. Delivery was messed up Saturday and did not get my shipment till 6:45 last night.

        Ken

   

[howmus]

Mornin' everyone!

Zoe I'll have a couple pieces of Raisin Bread French Toast, bacon, and leave the Maple Syrup....  Oh. and a mug or two (or 3) of dark roast coffee in a FGLK mug.  Thanks!

I see the place was closed most of yesterday....  Health Dept.??   OSHA???  Wonder what happened. 

I will be going over to Hammondsport for an operating session this afternoon.  Going to try my best to get back before the  latest sn*w storm hits the area.  They are saying 4 to 7" of the white stuff with just enough wind to pile it mostly across roads and on my front porch.  We had a blustery day yesterday that produce a little over 3" of the stuff and left about 16" piled on my deck...

Ken.....  Keep the appointment with the attorney!!!

Tim, check your "Conversations..."

Barry, is that photo of an old racetrack?  Interesting!

OK, gotta get going!

73

[PA&ERR]

Morning all! Hotcakes and sausage, please, Flo.

Well, it is in the high 20's here this moring and has been snowing all night. Doesn't look like it will let up anytime soon. Good day for model railroading!

I've just about finished with my Morrisville interlocking. All the switch motors and linkages are mounted and work. Just have to run wires for them and install the power feeders for the track, then I will be able to mount the whole assy to the layout.

Brakie- I'm using C100 on my new layout to accommodate some GG1s I own which have those pizza cutter flanges. C100 doesn't look bad if you paint it and weather it properly. Lee Nicholas' Utah Colorado Western was originally built with C100 and it looked pretty good. Check out his site and look at the older pictures.

-George

 

 

[Anonymous]

Good Afternoon Folks,

again, only a short visit. Things are not looking too good with my mother. She is suffereing from a complete kidney failure, which adds up to a serious condition, given her heart issue. I was shocked to see her this morning, when I took my father to see her. She had problems recognizing us and was unable to speak.

Please include my mother in your prayers.

 

[PA&ERR]

Sir Madog

Good Afternoon Folks,

again, only a short visit. Things are not looking too good with my mother. She is suffereing from a complete kidney failure, which adds up to a serious condition, given her heart issue. I was shocked to see her this morning, when I took my father to see her. She had problems recognizing us and was unable to speak.

Please include my mother in your prayers.

Of course we will!

-George

[fec153]

Of course we will. Flip and Debbie.

You didn't need to ask.

Flip

Prayers for all.

 Oh,Oh. T O P . Hope they take cash as my credit cards are maxed out..

 

[AmanaMedic]

Goooooooooooooooooooooooooooood Afternoon and Happy Daytona!!!

Go KENSETH!!!!

Well, I stepped out the door yesterday to look at LEE's awesome billboards, tried to get back in and found the door locked with "service not availible!" I thought maybe POTUS had flipped his internet kill switch until I discovered everything else worked.

So the Diner railroads are Everywhere Lost and have an MT promise THAT they'll get there sooner or later... funny! Almost makes me want to try (and probably epic-fail miserably) and come up with something for the Cedarcrapids Industrial Branch of the CNW's East Iowa Subdivsion. I don't know, "proudly serving the City of Five Smells," or "Doing the job the Rock used to do," or "Moving yesterday's Crunch Berries tomorrow..." Any thoughts?

Continued thoughts, prayers and best wishes for those in need. Too many to list...you know who you are and we're with you.

 

Chris

 

[Cederstrand]

Strong coffee in a UNION PACIFIC mug, please.

***Ken, I would not send them any info until after seeing your lawyer. They "might" be looking to further build their case!?! 

With our farrier to be represented on the wife's (HO) layout, I thought it would be cute to have our miniature dwarf horse with him. To create such a tiny fluffball for HO, I'm thinking of taking an N scale sheep, cutting off it's head & tail, then replacing those with a N scale pony head, neck and tail. Add some white paint and it might just work!

Healing thoughts to those in need.

Cheers! Rob

[teen steam fan]

YESS!! Victory! I'm back in the diner.

Anyone else have problems with getting onto the forums? I've been getting a notice that service to this site is not possible.  

Happy 500 guys. GO STEWART!!! 

[jeffrey-wimberly]

teen steam fan

YESS!! Victory! I'm back in the diner.

Anyone else have problems with getting onto the forums? I've been getting a notice that service to this site is not possible.  

Happy 500 guys. GO STEWART!!! 

You're not alone. The site was down for twelve hours yesterday.

[TMarsh]

The forum folks must have seen this long dude a comin! As I tried to get to this page this morning, the site went down again! Ha! I’ve got all day to wait to post this! They can’t outwait me!!! Boohoo waha haaaa!!!! OH! Hi there!….. (ahem)

From this morning:

Good Morning!! Bacon, eggs over easy and fried potatoes with gravy please. Coffee too thanks.

Well, yesterday went well. Long, but very well. We got Mom’s garage gone through and separated into trash, stuff we want, garage sale stuff and Goodwill stuff. Plus all the folks who bought furniture came yesterday as they said they would with help and trucks. They have made my job a whole lot easier. Except for the weird feeling I have about getting rid of my Mothers things. Like…..can’t explain it.

Ray- I concur with the opinion Canon prints at least among the best. But alas, like yours, one day I went to turn it on and …..nothing. Yup, me too, I believe there is a self destruct timer built in electronics these days also.

Jeff- Gun rack YES! I knew you'd have one. Seriously though, keep an eye on your Mothers progress. My Mom was in and out of Nursing Homes for the same reason. Problem is the PT she got was a half hour to an hour a day of sitting in a chair and stretching a rubber band or a walk around the room or lift her leg ten times. The rest of the day she just lay around the room and watched TV getting weaker. She would have had more activity and exercise at home, unfortunately she needed the 24 hour care also and that was impossible.

Ulrich- Prayers for you Mother.

Galaxy- Actually this dealing with Chase is on a current balance. It all started over a closed account due to interest rates. She closed her account after Chase raised interest rates and she decided she did not want to pay that high of interest rate so she closed her account. According to the terms, if you do not agree with a interest rate change do not use your card. If you charge to your card you are agreeing. Problem is, they raised the rate anyway and said it doesn’t matter what the terms are, they can do it any way. The next month they raised it again on a closed account. So, she settled with them. They wanted 4 LARGE monthly payments, $850 a month. We swallowed, found some tasty recipe’s for saltine crackers and water and said OK. Just to get rid of these crooks. They would accept payment no other way than them doing an electronic withdrawal from her account. No check, no electronic payment to them, no bank issued transfer, but THEM withdrawing from her account on a specified day of each month. Why? You’ll see… The last payment due in December, they did not take nor did they according to our bank, even attempt. (we are not alone in this) Instead, they took her to court saying she defaulted by not paying the last payment and owes them the interest they wrote off and late fees and attorney’s fees, the whole sheebang. They have refused payment twice and have a check in their possession they refuse to cash or return that was given to their attorney at the hearing last month. To which they claim the right to do. In fact we can not even get a return call from anyone and have been unable to since she settled with them the first time. We have documentation and the AG-IL’s office, though they can’t represent us says they are wrong and can’t do what they are doing. It’ll be a waiting game as they try to wait us out and hopefully we will just give them more money than we owe. What they have done is, say you are paying off your bill or even mortgage with them, have sent the final payment in even early, they feel they can just hold the check until it’s late and then take you to court over late fees and interest and expect you to pay up because they are Chase and can afford bigger attorney’s than you. Google Chase bank problems sometime. We are not alone.

Daytona get together at a friend of mines today, if we make it that is. (update: Cancelled due to the hosts having a battle of the family stomach flu) Gotta go back and meet the same people who were there last night so they can get the two book shelves they bought last night but didn’t have any room. That was the last two items that needed disposed of. And the guy that bought it brought his Mother with him and she just had to have those bookshelves. Sold. Hooray! I’ve only two small pieces, a coffee table and a drum table to move as Brenda wanted those and Mom will come back and punch me if I say she can’t have them.

Ya’ll have a Great Day!!!

[DrgnTrappr]

Good After Noon All, Coffee to go please!

Hoping to see a Petty car back in the winners circle this season!

Got alot done on the bench work then the Oldest Daughter and all the Grandkids showed up so have not made it back up to the studio.

Got to go.

Ron

[TMarsh]

Lee- Billboards look great.

Garry- Unfortunately, my layout is using the actual Texas & Pacific logo because in my world it still exists. I also have yet to nail down the supposed route other than the Hill country of central Texas, or as is better referred to as God's country. I will more than likely continue with my theme of made up name towns so it can't be corn-fused with real prototypes.  Anyway, it would take me more time to come up with a scheme than Lee has.

Missy is snoring. I think I will follow suit. Then maybe a trip to Toddland(of which I'm king) will be in order.

[DrgnTrappr]

Well it looks like another disappointing season for my team, but I am not much of a fan of this modern NASCAR, give me the days when what won on Sunday sold on Monday. But I will finish watching the race and see where the Petty cars end up, then its out to the studio to cut some legs for the lay out.

Ulrich; Sending thoughts and prayers your way for your your Mom.

Jeff; I am happy to see some better news coming from your situations both with Mom and your own health.

Rob; I hope you did not take any offense to my N scale remark, there have been several times in the last couple of years when I have given serious thought to switching to N, because of space issues. I have had all this HO stuff for decades now and had thought it would never again come out of the boxes.

I have a question for you all out there, the closest club to me is about 60 miles. Is there someplace I can get info on just how someone would go about starting a Model Railway club. I have been watching the magazine racks at the two local places that carry railroading magazines and have noticed that they sell out after about a week so there is a following here. I thought about placing an ad in the weekly paper to see if there is any interest but from there I have no clue, and I am also a little daunted by what kind of financing it would take to get something going.

Well back to the race.

Ron

[Robby P.]

 Good afternoon.

 Finally got in, but I see everybody else has had trouble.

 I'm watching some of the race, and its been pretty good.  Go Dale Jr!!!!

 I will pop back in later.

[Packer]

Hey guys

Not a whole lot going on. Just watching the race.

Last night I made an older BB kit a bit less of a foob. It's a CB&Q high cube. The stirrups were broke, and I used that as an opertunity to change to a style that matches the type used on the CB&Q one. Just the doors are wrong as far as I can tell. Dunno what was up with the forum last night.

[Cederstrand]

Coffee refill, please.

***Ron, I do not recall any desparaging remark regarding N-visible scale. If my eyes ever reach the point where I can no longer spot N trains moving down the tracks, maybe then I'll finally make the switch to Hugely Oversized mrring. I sure do enjoy being able to see the wife's "stuff" around her HO layout. Not sure what the heck I'm going to do when it comes time to scenic my N layout.

Shaved a layer from in front of the barn (about an hour on the tractor), cleaned the barn, prepared a stall for Cold Mountain, brought her in, treated her eye and gave her something for inflamation. Cleaned cat carriers to take a couple cats to be snipped, and now I'm beat. Seems extra taxing on med treatment days, which today was. Will be in a corner booth resting a bit.

Rob

[GMTRacing]

Good Evening All,

      More cleaning and such in the basement plus a double birthday dinner for CFO and oldest son. Saw the end of the Daytona race - probably won't watch much this year again if they don't fix the cars. Was good to see the Woods Brothers win even if it's only Leonard these days. Figure NASCAR should just get them all trailers to tow around if it's all going to be like that.

   Rob - if you haven't gotten the foam spray yet, it comes two ways one of which is for applications where it needs to squeeze out without warping/bllowing out trims and windows. Cuts ok with a serrated steak or bread knife, collapses if it comes in contact with most solvents and adhesives.

   Barry - nice pic of the old Brooklands banking. First banked course in Europe but lost forever when the Brits used the course for  an aircraft factory during WWII and tore out most of the race track.

   Back to the basement. CUL, J.R.

[blownout cylinder]

Yep...Brooklands it was..wonderful old course..

I'm glad that I did not go out today..it be snowing and blowing out there now...almost white out conditions now...

Ulrich: We got you covered...

Another shot of the course..different view...

[Cederstrand]

***J.R., yup! I like the basic Great Stuff (red can) for most things. When insulating our home I used the (blue can) for windows & doors and the (black can) for filling where the pros missed in the attic. I know there is another major brand that makes the same kind of stuff, but I got used to using G.S.. Didn't know about the solvent contact melting it, but not surprised at all.

Rob