morning coffee in the diner..
Quotable Quote:
Cut these words and they would bleed; they are vascular and alive; they walk and run. -Ralph Waldo Emerson, writer and philosopher (1803-1882)
-G .
Just my thoughts, ideas, opinions and experiences. Others may vary.
HO and N Scale.
After long and careful thought, they have convinced me. I have come to the conclusion that they are right. The aliens did it.
Watched a movie today. Nothing major, something called 'Josie and The Pussycats'. In my opinion mildly entertaining so not a complete waste of time. It also gave me a chance to pull my Atlas H24-66 and Atlas SD27J off the display rack and give them much needed attention. The SD27J was badly damaged in the tree mishap. It's back together now but still looks like it's been through the mill. The H24-66 took hardly any damage. It just required a cleaning. It's a dual decoder loco. A Bachmann decoder for motor control and a Digitrax DZ125 (burned out motor circuit) for lighting.Time for me to call it a night. See y'all tomorrow.
Dr. Frankendiesel aka Scott Running BearSpace Mouse for president!15 year veteran fire fighterCollector of Apple //e'sRunning Bear EnterprisesHistory Channel Club life member.beatus homo qui invenit sapientiam
Iiiiiiiiiii'mmmmm Baaaaaaaaaaacccck!
Great weekend, great Convention. I'll tell a bit about it tomorrow!
I'm just catching up on my reading for the moment, and will need to get a good nights sleep toninght!
73
Ray Seneca Lake, Ontario, and Western R.R. (S.L.O.&W.) in HO
We'll get there sooner or later!
Evening guys,
Nice out today, sunny but with a cool wind. Spent most of the morning do maintenance on my monuain bike as I am planning a ride for Tuesday morning ( usually set out about 5:45am ) cleaned out my hydration pack and got it ready to go, all I have to do is fill the water bladder on Tuesday morning. Got the bike all ready to go also with a chain cleaning and lubing as well as cleaning and lubing of cables and derailleuers. I put the bike away clean so its just a qucik go over before the riding season.
Watch the Jays game before going over to my parenst for dinner and may sneak a quick game of strat o matic in while watching the sunday night game.
Well I got the grocery shopping done. As I don't trust my van to get me there and back especially where perishables are concerned I called my sister and asked her if she was going shopping today. That's like asking a frog if it hops. There's always something she wants to go shopping for. Turns out she and her daughter were going to Wal-Mart so we made a threesome of it. As an added benefit they brought my groceries to my door. Very nice of them.This morning I stripped some junk computer boards of any usable parts and I took three repowered Varney F3B's off the layout and cleaned and serviced them whether they needed it or not then put them right back where I got them on the layout. One has an Athearn/Stewart/Kato drive, another has a Proto 2000/Athearn/A-Line drive and the third has a Bowser frame with a junk box special drive made of whatever parts I could make or scrounge up. All three are DCC with Digitrax decoders. Other than that I haven't gotten anything else done today.
Hi everybody. I hope you all had a nice weekend. I sure did. We went railfanning as usual and I got a good chance to try out my new camera. All I can say is I am more than pleased. In fact I'm happy as all get out with it. There's still a lot about this camera that I have to learn, so a class somewhere is definately in order. But I got somewhat comfortable with the basics. Even tried out the 55-300 mm zoom lens. Definately need a tripod for that one though.
We caught 7 trains in 2 hours on Saturday, and 15 trains in 3 hours today. 1 denatured alcohol, 6 intermodal, 4 mixed freight, 2 crude oil, 1 string of empty gons, and 1 coal train. I had a nice surprise on the very 1st train we saw today. A nice set of locomotives with the New York Central Heritage unit leading, followed by a BNSF & a CSX.
There were numerous meets today which are always nice to watch. If fact, a couple of times today all 3 tracks of the main line were occupied. It sounded on the scanner that Conway Yard was sort of busy. I think everyone there was earning their pay today.
We didn't get over to the other side of town this morning to catch any CSX traffic, as a lot of the streets I would use to get there were closed for the running of the Pittsburgh Marathon. I had no interest in fighting all the closures and traffic jams. We just had a nice Sunday dinner and finished off a bottle of Reisling, so I think it may be nap time. Take care and have a great week.
Tom
Pittsburgh, PA
Back again!
Cutting those lengths of stripwood into 500+ pieces of various shapes and sizes was done in no time at all. It sure adds to the fun when you can w*rk with proper tools. The job wasn´t messy at all, as I could connect the vac to it. Tomorrow will be assembly day
What else did I do today? Marked the texture of the stonework onto the foundation, using a felt tip pen. Engraving it is going to be an awkward and messy job, for which I will have to select a day when Petra is not around
I missed to say hello to Jerry - good to see you, now and then!
Good morning
We returned from southern Arizona late last night. It's very good to see all the Diners again. I'll read your recent posts later. Scanning through the May DIner I saw Jerry posted again, and was happy to se him with everybody elese.
Here is a picture from our hotel window in Casa Granda, AZ in the Sonoran Desert. The UP double track main line is about a block away. I used a cell phone for the pictures and quality was not good.
Numerous stack trains pass thorough town daily along with other freight trains. It is hard to photograph them as the trains are moving at about 60 mph, and buildings are in the way. I also saw the Amtrak train.
Here is a westbound stack train.
The stack train power was usually 2 to 4 units pulling and 0 to 2 units pushing. GE and EMD units were intermixed. Engines were dirty.
I'll post more photos. We followed the line going west of otwn for several miles, and I have Some to share.
One of the photos is of an old California Zephyr observation care on display in Maricopa, AZ adjacent to the UP line. You can see a stack train passing through behind it. I am not sure why decision makers decided to have a CZ car parked in the Sonoran Desert, because the CZ operated elsewhere.
GARRY
HEARTLAND DIVISION, CB&Q RR
EVERYWHERE LOST; WE HUSTLE OUR CABOOSE FOR YOU
Good morning. It's 71° with 53% humidity. The high will be 88° with some clouds.Nothing much planned for today. I'll probably be going to town later to do some grocery shopping. Other than that I'll just take it as it comes.
Hey Johnnyboy, we've got 3 inches and it's still comming down. I put the sn*w shovels away when I was getting the yard cleaned up. Should have known better. Supposed to get down to -6 tonignt. I think it just may be too early to plant the sweet peas.
Around here, bedding plants don''t get put out till the end of May or early June because we are bound to get frost. You know about that too living in Regina.
Sounds like you are starting to get better bit by bit. Glad to hear it.
Dennis
CDN Dennis
Modeling the HO scale something or other RR in the shadow of the Canadian Rockies Alberta, Canada
last mountain & eastern hoggerJeff, how long do they think you will be saddled with that wound Vac??
I was told I had to take it down, and I don't have the space to build a home layout right now (Long story, it was in a space I will no longer have access to). So yeah right now, I just have the club layout. I hope your right about it getting easier, I should be able to salvage most of the track, all the buildings and such.
(My Model Railroad, My Rules)
These are the opinions of an under 35 , from the east end of, and modeling, the same section of the Wheeling and Lake Erie railway. As well as a freelanced road (Austinville and Dynamite City railroad).
Jimmy Braum: It gets easier as you take down a layout! I assume you have been TOLD to do so? Or are you doing it to build something better in its place?
I tore my 3.5x5.1 HO layout down to expand it, a lofty goal, but really found we DON'T have the room for it! I tore it down to the tracks. I didn't want to do it, but....in building it i had torn down two others before it that had lofty high grade percentages that did not work in reality.
My FIRST layout- O/O-27 is STILL up at my father's, though he is figuring to clear it off down to the basic table to use it as a flat horizontal surface..which he will promptly fill up with meaningless goobledy-gook like every other flat horizontal surface he has! For a small while, he was playing with the trains, and even re-routed the tackage to suit him, but lost interest in it again.
I have toyed with converting the HO to N and even toyed with building a Z scale layout so I can get A LOT in the small space! I would do it in an under-bed container, if not in the space I had for the HO.
So, buck up, and take some pictures to remember it by, and salvage what ever you reasonably can!
The next pleasure will be in building something new!
I placed an order for some model railroad stuff this morning- a weathering pastel kit, a fishbelly kit(Data only-owned by the fuel company on my eventual layout), some more couplers (Why does it seem like they always go first?), and some decal paper/spray. I may get my consolidation tomorrow and strip off the WM lettering on it for my freelanced railroad. I'll say that micromark is really cheap for their stuff and I like it. I also decidedI think I am going to build a diorama to use for photographing my stuff. Oh yeah, I don't have a layout anymore, I have to take down my first 4X8 layout
Johnboy: good to see you again!
Sorry, I changed the month, sometimes the old month get stuck in my head! Sometimes I do It just to see who is paying attention! Obviously Ulrich wasn't!
I get up so early as that is when i wake up to use the fcilities for the second time during the night and usually cannot get back to sleep!Of course, I go to bed around 9pm too! Plus after about 4-5.5 hours, i usually wake up anyway, but never fear, I usually get a nap of about 2 hours + somewhere during the day or evening unless i am in a "non-sleeping mode", in which case it doesn't matter as I won't sleep much or at all regardless of what I do. Around the solstices that happens! I DO take a med to help me sleep! It doesn't always work!
SOunds like you have a full house! and yes. I understand little kids/grandkids can be a handfull...parents seem to forget how rambunctious their own little ones were by the time they get to grandkids, plus they are {sad to say} oldER!
Johnboy, it IS May, not summer, yet, so we have to still think of cooler days. We seem to forget the middle temps when we are exhausted from the cold and cannot wait till the warm months get here! The furnace was running this early AM, and later I MAY have the AC on, its just that way this time of year. I went out at 6:15 to get the local free paper with store inserts, and to go to Wally WOrld to get a few items {$125 later!}, and had to warm up the vehicle to clear the windows! I am very thankful we DID NOT get the snow the N mid-west got, the wildfires out west, OR the rains down south got! I am sure we will have our share of weather disappointments coming! Let us be thankful if they are managable!
good luck and healing with everything you have going! I have you and your neighbor on the list! Johnboy, I thought of you a LOT recently as I was so sick, eating was not possible, and when it was it was hard to choke something down once a day. And then my sytem rejected solid foods so I had nearly a week of not eating. I thought of you and swallowing and eating and not being able too, that helped me get through what i was dealing with. I knew I could recover fairly quickly, but you would still have a long row to hoe. GOod luck relearning how to do that again.
have a GREAT day everyone!
[quote user="galaxy"]
morning coffee in the diner...
Good Morning Galaxy and all the rest of the Crew,
Galaxy, you really did get up too early today as if you didn't know, it is May not April.
I'm only up because the dogs woke me up and now I can't get back to sleep. I am tired though, we have been babysitting our Grandson this week and for the next two weeks as his Mother is in Vancouver on a training course for the Feds. His Dad comes and gets him after workand in the morninng takes him to a day care till around 3:30 and then we pick him up. He slept over here on Friday night and we had him all day Saturday and again today as my son has previous commitments. These little guys, no matter how good they are, sure play you out. But we love him dearly.
Weather has really cooled off here again this week end. I sure hope Dennis doesn't send any more snow this way even though he has his fountain running in the snow.
All our Neighbors family has arrived for the funeral, a Son from Scotland, Daughters from Arizona and New Mexico, BILs from California ( they are staying with us in our spare bedroom.) The funeral will be on Wednesday. Thanks again for all the kind thoughts on this.
No work on the LM&E yesterday and doubtful if any today, should make some headway this month as I am now feeling a little stronger and have somewhat more stamina. If I could only heal enough to get back swallowing and eating properly I know I would get back to normal in a flash.
Prayers and best wishes for all who stand in need this day.
It was great to see Jerry swing by the Diner, hope that becomes more of a regular occurance.
Ulrich, you really do quality work, I am always impressed.
Jeff, how long do they think you will be saddled with that wound Vac??
Rob, so glad you have come up with some good help for the spring work on thr ranch. Hope you get back to running that new Steamer soon.
Well. I will try a little shut eye again now and see if it cuts in or not.
You all have a great Sabbath day and I hope it is springlike for everyone where ever you are.
Johnboy out...................................and tired if only the eyes would close. maybe
from Saskatchewan, in the Great White North..
We have met the enemy, and he is us............ (Pogo)
Good Afternoon!
Zoe, strong coffee, please, I can hardly keep my eyes open. The weather has changed - it´s ra*ning and quite cold. The nighttime temps were below freezing.
Today´s sawdust day. I´ll be busy cutting the stripwood for the dock. That should occupy me for quite some time. I hope that table saw I bought a year and a half a go does a good job. I´ll watch my fingers!
Ken - the track spikes I was taking about are from MicroEngineering. Part # is 30-106.
CUL
Have a good one!
A randy old fellow named GrayDidn't shave for a year and a dayBut he said that the GirlsQuite enjoyed his new curlsWhen his tongue didn't get in the way
Found an offer in the mailbox today from the company I have my satellite TV with. EPIX at half price for six months. I can live it at $3.50 a month. I just gotta remember to have it taken off my service in October. For now it makes a nice addition to my current HBO. Next month I'll change that to Starz, Cinemax or Showtime. Haven't made my mind up yet. Depends on which on is showing more of the movies I like.Nothing more today. Time to call it a night. See y'all tomorrow.
Thanks Galaxy. It wasn't anyone at work,but a family member. Work went okay tonight, but got SUPER slow after about 6PM (I was there until 9:00PM). Well at least my register balanced tonight, so there is that. Plus I am going to spend tomorrow figuring out what undecorated locomotive I want for a project (OLD NS logo locomotives, and a few sheets of letters for my fictional railroad-the NS is to model the Local train here,right after Conrail was split up so no Dash 8;s or anything like that lol), But yeah, I need to get in contact with Bachman to get my parie locomotive fixed (fried decoder when I tried programming it), If I can get that fixed I will have my two locomotives (And a Consolidation I still need to purchase)>
Got the wound vac dressing put on today. Different nurse did it as my usual nurse was on weekend call and was swamped. So far it's holding up well.Apparently my Apple Image-writer II printer will be brought to me sometime this coming week. It's costing me a whole $25. It's supposed to be in working condition. We'll see.The motherboard I picked up cheap yesterday should be here the sixth or seventh.Haven't done anything else today.
Jimmy_Braum I've got work tonight for 5 hours, thankfully I don't have a social life outside of my trains lol. I am glad I work tonight because otherwise I would be still stunned about how bad some people can be to you, and how some intentionally try to hurt/drive you away.
I've got work tonight for 5 hours, thankfully I don't have a social life outside of my trains lol. I am glad I work tonight because otherwise I would be still stunned about how bad some people can be to you, and how some intentionally try to hurt/drive you away.
Jimmy: hope you have a good night at the grocery!
Unless you are talking about a friend who has turned sour, then:
MOH ALWAYS comes home complaining about how customers are! They are the worst, rudest people MOH claims! WISh MOH could quit that second job.
I have worked retail {non-grocery} and restaurant cooking all my working life.
The retail customers often expected you to solve their problems of getting larger purchases home from a "cash and carry" enterprise! The worst place is the returns counter! you would not believe what some would try to pull!
Restaurant customers: some were NEVER going to be happy with their food, no matter what! WE often suggested they try another dish if they didn't like something about it. Some idiots would actually eat 3/4 or more of a plate and THEN complain and expect it to be comped...thereby effectively giving them a free meal! On the rare ocassions I have had bad food at a restaurant {stone cold food for example}, I try to be pleasant and turn it back immediately! I don't like to complain, but not right is not right. We stopped going to our favorite restaurant after 3 episodes of cold or wrong food, Their cooking staff just could not get it right. Part of a chain, we found the one in Scranton worse than our location. SO they are off our list of places to eat anymore.
well, I have busied myself today and it has gone by... MY will be out of work at the grocery store in about an hour and home soon after that! I'd better on to dinner, it may be early, but MOH will be hungry when getting home!
MOH has next Saturday off from the grocery, and plans on going out the long trip to the military cemetary where MIL is buried. Taking some allowable flowers too. WE have not been out since she was interred and the weather went bad. Wants to go for Mother's DAy. wants to take flowers to my mother's grave too. Haven't been there in a few years and it is local!
Speaking of which, Mother's Day is the 11th, for those of you to whom it stilll applies! You have been warned!
later!
Lamb, corn and flavored rice is for dinner, in case you wondered.
Good afternoon. It's 77° with 38% humidity. The high will be 85°.The wound vac almost drove me nuts last night. One alarm after another! Blockage alert, low pressure warning, bad seal warning. And none of those were in evidence. At 4:15 this morning I'd had enough and removed the vac dressing and replaced it with a standard dressing. Later I'll apply a new vac dressing.No other plans for today.
Fouled Anchor Jeffrey, I remember when chip sockets came out. What a luxury. Used to have to unsolder 7400 chips using the braided wire method. I started in the U.S. Navy submarine service, and TTL was exactly that. I believe two "and" gates would fit on a six by six card. Storage was on huge magnetic drums weighing around 100 lbs. each. Graduated to medical electronics design useing the venerable PDP 11/05 with real core memory. Arghhh, that unibus backplane. Have you ever done any backplane wire wrapping. Went to work for Tallgrass Technologies designing winchester drives. We had a 20 meg drive for the IBM PC and XT before IBM had hard drives for them. Anyway dude, I feel your pain, been there done that.
Jeffrey, I remember when chip sockets came out. What a luxury. Used to have to unsolder 7400 chips using the braided wire method. I started in the U.S. Navy submarine service, and TTL was exactly that. I believe two "and" gates would fit on a six by six card. Storage was on huge magnetic drums weighing around 100 lbs. each. Graduated to medical electronics design useing the venerable PDP 11/05 with real core memory. Arghhh, that unibus backplane. Have you ever done any backplane wire wrapping. Went to work for Tallgrass Technologies designing winchester drives. We had a 20 meg drive for the IBM PC and XT before IBM had hard drives for them. Anyway dude, I feel your pain, been there done that.
Fouled Anchor Jeff, love the weathering on the Magnolia. SOP troubleshooting on the Apple II even the brand new ones that had problems was pull ALL chips, and reseat them. I believe the micro processor was a 6502, and it always had problems in the socket. I believe we started install the zero insertion socket for the 6502 when they came out with that socket. Their external 5.25 Floppy was a nightmare too. Fixed any Commodore 64 or VIC's? Ha. I have worked on many Vector Graphics S-100 systems. They were a lot better. S-100 problems? Pull all cards and break out the old pencil eraser. I just noticed the 80 column card. Wonderfull stuff.
Jeff, love the weathering on the Magnolia. SOP troubleshooting on the Apple II even the brand new ones that had problems was pull ALL chips, and reseat them. I believe the micro processor was a 6502, and it always had problems in the socket. I believe we started install the zero insertion socket for the 6502 when they came out with that socket. Their external 5.25 Floppy was a nightmare too. Fixed any Commodore 64 or VIC's? Ha. I have worked on many Vector Graphics S-100 systems. They were a lot better. S-100 problems? Pull all cards and break out the old pencil eraser. I just noticed the 80 column card. Wonderfull stuff.
I had to smile and actually chuckle a bit when I read the part about you breaking out the trusty old pencil eraser. There were many times over the years when I got scandalized stares and horrified gasps when I'd snatch up a pencil and rub the gold plated connection fingers on the boards with the eraser.
Steve
Life is tough, but it's tougher if your'e stupid.
Coffee TO GO, please.
***Johnboy, sorry about your neighbor. A good neighbor is a gem to have. Now, as others have suggested, be sure to take good care of yourself and continue healing.
***Ulrich, your work looks great to me. Heck, I just slap together leftover building materials to make the "rocks" on my layout and soemtimes it looks like it, too.
My worker didn't show this morning. I could have got much more needed sleep. Off to brushcut more pasture. Have a great day all.
Cheers! Rob
galaxyUlrich: If YOU are happy with your rocks, that is all that matters!
Galaxy - I am happy with the way they look. There is still alot to be done to get them right, but I am glad that I have a good basis to w*rk with!
I just finished the second and last batch - for today. I have run out of plaster and have to buy a new box on Monday (or later). Will be watching some steam vids now ...
Ken - eine guten Morgen to you to and have a pleasant day! I sent you a PM, please check your inbox.
Have fun!
Morning Folks, and Good Morining Ulrich!
Flo, Diest Dew to go please.
Johnboy sorry about your lost.
Well got to get going, off to work I go again.
Ken
I hate Rust