Welcome aboard Jeffrey´s Trackside Diner for the month of July 2015!
This is your informal place to meet with friends, share your day, talk on topic and off topic, but always within the rules of the forum policy.
Jeffrey´s Trackside Dines was formerly Elliot´s Trackside Diner, but was renamed to honor our friend Jeffrey "Running Bear" Wimberly, who passed away in December 2014. Jeffrey was an outstanding personality, a gifted and creative model railroader and a true friend.
We miss him very much!
The location for this month is Germany. We will visit a number of railroads, most of them steam powered.
We start our tour in northern Germany, with a ride on "Molli" - the nick name for the 900mm narrow gauge line connecting Bad Doberan with Kühlungsborn on the Baltic Sea coast.
Enjoy!
Hmm, I guess Ulrich IS still around.
I WAS going to open the new diner if he hadn't, bad wasn't going to post when I saw he did, but now I am still awake {for now} and so I will post now I guess.
I HATe the fact that my sleep streak is now getting interrupted by no-sleep!
This COULD be political so all I will say is: Too bad about Greece. One of these days I would LOVE to go explore the ruins of Greece and see the ancient sites! Ancient Greek History, and to a lesser degree the Ancient Romans is a time period I wish I could visit and has always fascinated me. Ancient Pompeii has always been a situation i would Love to visit,and i Even have some pompeiian volcanic rocks that may be a couple thousand yeas old, perhaps from that time period of explosion of Vesuvius. that I cannot explain how i have or I'd get someone{s?} into major trouble {perhaps including me?}. IF i knew where to look for them.
well, what time period/place/race would YOU like to visit???
see you later
-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.
... yes, I am still around, but mostly just lurking.
My days are filled with the same routine, dominated by the PT, which leaves hardly any room for other activities. Still, progress comes in tiny steps - I´d not notice them if my Drill Sergeant wouldn´t tell me.
Not much to report otherwise. I seem to have lost interest in MRRing for the time being, as I need to concentrate on getting better. Unfortunately, my heart is giving me issues again, as another set of meds is not kicking in the way it should. Does that sound familiar to you, Galaxy?
Good morning everyone !! Coffee and pancakes on me. Flo set em up and stack em high ! Oh and real maple syrup if you dont mind and all of the coffee they can drink.
Ulrich - Glad you are still "kicking around". I must apologize. Spent the last month or so moving and remodeling our old home to sell. Hopefully everything is done at teh old place and the new home owners settle on the 30th of July. If I may what happened to you ? What are the doctors saying ?
Loved the video of "Mollie". I was fasinated by a couple of shots like the one at 8:07 minutes in where the engine came through the S curve. From the angle of the video I expected the engine to loose some cars in the S curve ! Beautiful country ! The shot of the engine coming down hill through the town was awsome also. It was interesting to see that no matter where you are there are rail fans across borders : )
Galaxy - What is distrubing your sleep ?
Well I am off this week taking a break from w**k to baby sit the kids. Using this time to put moving boxes in the correct room, unpack, set up and fix up. We bought the house "as is" and the former owners sold us the house at about 300k under market value. We knew we had some fixing to do. Already we have replaced the garage door opener, rebuilt a toilet, rebuilt two sinks, changed out all of the shower heads, serviced the AC, taken the dishwasher out to have it repaired.....
Oh if anyone is looking for a career, the appliance repair shop told me that they are booked out six weeks !!!! Cant find help !! Amazing.
Train front - nothing concrete yet. Just found the last of the crated boxes of train equipment and moved them into the new infinished train room. But there is a lot of planning and dreaming going on for the new space
TTYL
Will post some subjects in the forum and check in later after everyone has had some pancakes Eat up !
Guten Morgan Leute,
Good Morning Diners,
Flo, I'll have a gigantor cup of coffee with extra generous amounts of cream, please.
I've always wanted to go back to Germany and spend a year or two there. Hopefully I could become fluent in German. Maybe I could be like President Kennedy and say, "Ich bin ein Berliner," which is to say, "I'm a jelly donut." Something similar to that actually happened to me in Frankfurt many years ago. I could say I know just enough German to get myself into trouble.
Good to see our host Ulrich is alive if not kicking. Keep up with your PT. I've no doubt that you'll get back to MRRing before you know it.
Well, gotta go to work.
I hope everyone is OK and safe.
Jim (with a nod to Mies Van Der Rohe)
Morning guys
its a holiday here ( Canada day ) and again it rained last night. We have had close to a 100mm + over the last three days. I have kind of slowed down on working on the railroad,have done a lot in the last month and just feel like a break. I have been finding myself outside shooting hockey pucks a lot.
Still debating if I want to start playing pickup again in the winter like mr Beasley. I always enjoy his write ups of Tuesday night hockey
have a good one
hey there
Joe Staten Island West
The Route of the Broadway Lion The Largest Subway Layout in North Dakota.
Here there be cats. LIONS with CAMERAS
hey there again:
Ulrich: Yes, meds aare nto always the panacea they claim them to be.The unfortunate thing is that when a med WORKS, they make it so expensive thtat you cannot afford it here. Nothing political, just a truthful statement. I hadn't seen you on here, was getting concerned about you "old man"! Just like all do to me!
YGW: I always have sleep disturbances around hte changing of the seasons on the equinox/solstices anyway. BUT lately I haven't been able to sleep due to the med changes, only getting what little sleep Lunesta or Ambien induces on me, but it lasts only about 4 hours. I have been "cactching up" lately...naturally. But, you know I have to use teh facilities on occasion, and that awakens me and I don't get necessairly get back to sleep well...took about 1.5 hours after I posted last night to get back to sleep! I HAVE been "sleeping" from aobut 9-10PM to about 6 AM which is NICE for once. But I miss being up at 3 or 4 am to start the day quietly!
Gee, YGW...That is just maintenacne you are doing,,, rip out and replace is a whole nuther matter...I don't htnk rebuilding sinks/toilets quite qualify for a $300K UNDERpricing. Gee, you should come up here you can get a "Mc Mansion" here FOR LESS than $300K TOTAL!! here's an example {though it says NO BATHS, I am sufre there are at least 2 if not 2.5!} 5Br, 2 story,2 cr garage, etc for less than $300K:
http://www.johnburnsshow.com/binghamton/real_estate_buyers/property_info.php?mls_num=190560
http://www.johnburnsshow.com/binghamton/real_estate_buyers/property_info.php?mls_num=191208
http://www.johnburnsshow.com/binghamton/real_estate_buyers/property_info.php?mls_num=189732
http://www.johnburnsshow.com/binghamton/real_estate_buyers/property_info.php?mls_num=193495
heres some HALF your $300K discount:
http://www.johnburnsshow.com/binghamton/real_estate_buyers/property_info.php?mls_num=190590
http://www.johnburnsshow.com/binghamton/real_estate_buyers/property_info.php?mls_num=188692
here's a nice little {cheaper} one:
http://www.realtyusa.com/property/560-EDSON-ROAD-ENDICOTT-NY-13760/BinghamtonNY/198761/
http://www.realtyusa.com/property/428-KNIGHTLEE-AVENUE-ENDWELL-NY-13760/BinghamtonNY/199938/
http://www.realtyusa.com/property/184-CRARY-AVE-BINGHAMTON-NY-13905/BinghamtonNY/198543/
there are very NICE homes UNDER $100K here, but expect only 3 Br 1 Ba, this area was/never did really build with more tha one bath, as added baths can increase property taxes. SOme houses around here have ACREAGE too! I didn't look for those, but you can also buy Acreage,,,lots of it for a song and dance now..we are surrounded by farm lands...
ah well,
To our neighbors to the north...
Afternoon, Folks!
Today´s PT didn´t go well. Not that I am overdoing it, but there is a setback to what I have achieved so far. My Drill Sergeant tells me it´s a mental thing and that may very well be the truth. I have bebb fighting too hard to get back into a "normal" state, that I am mentally exhausted. We agreed to stop PT for the rest of the week and risk a fresh start next Monday. The docs are actually quite happy with my achievement. They say it´s more than I could ever have expected. This leaves the question open whether I will ever regain full control.
YGW - I am glad you liked the video. It´s a charming little line and a major tourist attraction in that region. Trains run daily on a regular schedule - all of them steam powered. It´s only a good two hour´s ride from my place, but I have never been there, nor will I ever be in a situation to go there.
Back to the corner booth for some coffee and a "Berliner" (Just imagine Kennedy had visited Hamburg ...).
Galaxy, My house is similiar to those in teh beginning but with more land. Fortunately and unfortunately we are heavily impacted by the Washington DC Goverenment here. There is so much demand because of the Gov. that it drives up the prices on everything. Including wages. For instance a true carpenter here can expect to earn any where from $25 dollars an hour to $35 dollars an hour depending on whether you are working in a suburb of DC or in the City itself. Go and hour and a half west of here to the West Va border and the wages drop down to around $10 an hour depending on skill level.
Our home is in a location that is very hard to purchase in. It is controled by "money folks" (for instance there is a 14k acre estate that is listed for 14.5 million) and those that have lived here since the early 1700s who own entire valleys and mountains. Neither is selling much land. In fact the local building ordinance now require 50 acres before you can build a home here. We were very fortunate in that a number of years ago a "monied owner passed away and the son had to sell some land to pay for the inheritance tax and other fees. He sold off about 200 acres +/- and developed them into 10+/- acre lots. The former owner of this property was going through a divorce and going into foreclosure and had to dump the house in order to keep from loosing it all. On zillow the property is valued at 750k. We were able to obtain it at 455k. It came with 10.5 acres, 4wd Kubato tractor, blade, finish mower, bush hog, trailer, fencing, 2.5 baths (with unfinished area roughed in for third bath) between 4 and 5k sq.ft 5 bedrooms, study, dining room etc...
The repairs do not bother me. Being in the trade I can perform most of the work myself and having literally several thousand trade contacts I can get a lot of work that I do not have the skills for performed at much lower cost than the average home owners. For instance in my old house I replaced the entire master bath with a very high grade of marble and Kohler sinks (2), my granite guy only charged me $500 installed price. Here the average Homeowner would be charged aproximately $1500 for the same.
Replacing plumber fixture parts is difficult because they are in cabinets but easy if you know what you are doing. The entire plumbing parts required at retail cost was less than $200. For 300k savings I can buy a lot of parts. One day once the house is all fixed and the girls are grown and on their own we can sell at a nice profit and have a nice retirement nest egg.
Ken I read last months post and if you need plumbing advice or any construction input we can exchange email/phone numbers at the message board and I will help any way I can.
Johnboy - thanks for the post. It is nice to have people who care about you.
Garry, Lion, V8...Good Morning
This is our new house!
We just moved!
Good morning ...
Happy Canada Day !
.. and have a happy month of July, everybody!
YGW .... Sounds like you have your work cut out for you with the model railroading. You have years of fun ahead of you building the new layout.
Ulrich ... Thanks for moving the Diner.... Looking forward to seeing German railroading. .... By any chance do you have any apple strudel available ? It would be good with my
GARRY
HEARTLAND DIVISION, CB&Q RR
EVERYWHERE LOST; WE HUSTLE OUR CABOOSE FOR YOU
Can't seem to get my pictures loaded. How do you post pictures?
Woa, what happened? I think I woke up on the east coast this morning. When I went out for my morning bike ride at 5:30am, it was 80F with 65% humidity. Wait, isn't this still Arizona?! Actually, it happens every summer about this time. The jet stream moves north, and we get moist air from the Gulf of California. We call it the "monsoon season," as we often get rain storms in the late afternoon and into the night. With all of the heat (energy) some of the storms can be quite violent, and fun to enjoy from the safety of our home.
I hope to get a little ballasting in today. We still have the twins with us. They are really good kids, most of the time, and fun to have around the house.
Richard
yougottawanta Can't seem to get my pictures loaded. How do you post pictures?
Eh? are you trying to use a server such as photo bucket. You need to do something like that. From there you get the "Share" URL and paste that in the box when you click on the photo icon above.
If you are doing that, but it is not working you need to check your provider to see what is happening.
Or just paste your URL into your reply and we will look at it. (The URL that is)
ROAR
Mornin'......
Zoe, I'll have a bowl of Nature's Path Organic Heritage Flakes cereal, and a pot of Marrakesh Express dark roast coffee in my FGLK Mug this morning.... Can I use the drier for my jacket?
Guess what it is doing outside again today? Oh, you guessed... We are getting brief sunny moments inbetween patches of precipitation. Currently 68°F here in the Finger Lakes Region of NYS with a possible high of 73°F sometime this afternoon. Welcome to July! I have to drive over to my son's house soon to change the kitty litter box... Then I should stop at the grocery store to buy a few items (may put the total over the amount needed toget anouther 10¢ off gas. I have to go to the Eye Doc. late this afternoon for the diabetic tests. I will not be reading much of anything for a few hours after that. Will get my new reading glasses too.
Ulrich, thanks for moving the diner this month. Hope it is sunnier over there than it is here. Hang in there with the PT! You will see more improvement as time goes on. Don't get discouraged. Will watch the video when I get some time. Probably later this evening.
Best get moving! Have a strict shedule to keep today. Later!
73
Ray Seneca Lake, Ontario, and Western R.R. (S.L.O.&W.) in HO
We'll get there sooner or later!
We are trying to post from the "puter" as Galaxy says. From documents/SD card.
yougottawanta We are trying to post from the "puter" as Galaxy says. From documents/SD card.
OK, well you have to post to a server such as Photo Bucket. LION of course is different. Him runs his own servers and URLs from the office of him.
howmusUlrich, thanks for moving the diner this month. Hope it is sunnier over there than it is here.
It is, indeed!
93F, not a cloud in the sky, high risk of a forest fire. Forecast says we´ll be hitting 104F by the weekend - and no A/C!
Guten Morgen! Kaffee, bitte.
JeremyB, last night wasn't my best at Tuesday Night Hockey. As one guy said after the game, I was still in "vacation mode" and didn't get into the game until a bit later. At the same time, we were facing a pair of young junior players who were way beyond our skill level, and no one on our team was really capable of playing with them. (Brownie, Ralph and The Fridge were missing from our lineup.) I've got a fill-in game on Thursday night, so hopefull I can redeem myself.
Galaxy, I've been to Greece, a very long time ago. I found it a beautiful, friendly place. I'm sure it's changed a lot. When I was there, no one spoke English and I certainly didn't understand Greek, but we got along OK with sign language and smiles.
We had some thunderstorms come through earlier. I'm hoping that the forecast is wrong and I'll get an hour or so to go for a bike ride. The roads will be wet, but the air is warm so I'll take the mountain bike and expect to come home covered in mud. While ridiing in Acadia National Park last week, I noticed that I had a dead earthworm wrapped around the axle of my right pedal. I guess I went through a puddle.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
YGW: You HAVE to use a picture posting service of some sort, Many use Photobucket to store/retrieve pics for posting here.YOU CANNOT just post from your computer.
That supposedly cuts down on "indiscrete photos" from being posted or to have someone trace your computer pics...you MUSt use a pic server of some sort, then once you post/store there, copy/paste the URL of the pic you want here to this site and it will show up.
I DON't want to use such a service, so I cannot post pics But I DON'T have much to post anyway.
we have houses with 10+ acres here too YGW. And LOTS of farm land with massive acreage to them, some broken up some not. I just picked some quick houses to post for you to view to see how "cheap they are here"...you can get a NICE 3-4 BR 1, 1 1/2, or possibly 2 BA on 3-5 acres easily for aobut $125K. IN town, you WON'T get the acreage, though, so much, but 3/4 acres is nice. up on the hills there is more land in the outlying area.
We're looking for a 3BR preferably 2Ba ranch on a 1/2-3 acres and CAN find one for about $80K-$100k, but we lack a bit onthe funding dept rihgt now.
If/when my father passes he has a nice 3BR/1Ba 1300SQFT ranch with fireplace and garage on 3/4 lot out in the country developement of about 20 homes that we like. WE might keep it. The FIL has a multi-level {5 levels including basement, 6 with attic} that is on a hillside with all those steps I can no longer use well, so IT WILL be sold when FIL passes. MOH DOES NOT want it, so it WILL be sold. I also have a duplex to deal with in a southern state we don't wish to keep to inherit, so I will probably sell it off, as as an investment it isn't a very good one as both sides are NOT usually rented at the same time!
We live in a manufactured home that is about falling apart at 33 yrs old, We are trying to figure what to do. I have NEVER lived in anything but a separate dwelling, so while we consider SR housing, we are nto sure we want to live in an apartment! I JUST hate hte mainetnace on this thing,and the houses we will inherit will cost too, as they will need maintenance too.
MOH would like to consider a new manufactured home, BUT i don't think so, it is hard to get someone to work on them as there are rules regs, and even though there are PLENTY of parks and mobile dwellings here in this area, it still is a difficult thing. Its a tough decision. We'd be in our 80s-90s when the New manufactured reaches 30 ysrs old again, and I don't really want to deal with it, but so will a house,,it will be 30+ years older too.
A brandy-new house is not built as good here as these older 50s-60s homes were, {due to cheap foreign materials and a new one will still be 30+ yrs old then too!}, teh 50s-60s which are built as good as the ones built in the 20s-30s, all built for manufactuing plants employees around here that ONCE existed...MY father worked for IBM, which actually STARTED in this area...The subcontractors paid well to in the 50s-70s, but like all areas the economy has failed since the 80s and IBM sold off all to get out of here, it's roots, to avoid cleanup of contaminants in the ground. The other major manufacturer-a shoe company-was also guilty of polution but when cheap shoes from foreign shores came here, the company could not compete and went out of buisness totally in the 80s.
Its a nice area with many services still available and a major unversity, communtiy college, off broadway Forum, etc. but manufacturing is LIMITED here now, what once supported the area nicely.
My father's house is about $100k, the FIL's MAY fetch $135k. The duplex, in a depressed area and now in a a bad neighborhood {drugs moved in form the nearby HUGE city down there} is only worth about $35K, but Ill take it IF I had to sell it, a decision when I inherit it.
We'd like to retire to Hawaii but we think we'd not really have the full funding to do so when the time comes. WE HATE Florida, but are considering S Georgia now, ATlanta is a drive away, but has good medical available, other services available, that we may then need.
In short we don't know what/when we are gonna do what we are going todo for retirement, expecting to not to until MOH is 70 in a few {short} years. Or where we will settle yet. MOH wants to be out of here, i'd ike to go back/forth for awhile when we retire "fully".
so there you have it. we, and our fathers are AMAZED at the sticker shock incurred when seeing housing prices in some areas, like yours! although we are not shocked by Hawaii's prices!
so for now our hovel is our home and we are trying to make the best of it!!
MisterBeasley Galaxy, I've been to Greece, a very long time ago. I found it a beautiful, friendly place. I'm sure it's changed a lot. When I was there, no one spoke English and I certainly didn't understand Greek, but we got along OK with sign language and smiles.
The THing IS, I DO know greek..i studied it {both ancient and modern} In order to read the {interlinear} Greek New Testament Book in hte original greek it was recorded in {No religion- just mentioning a BOOK!}
So I could get along OK. It HAS been a while since I used it,but I can order a beer for MOH and a cup of tea or water and a chicken/lamb dinner for myself & us easily enough!
I would LOVE to go, MOH is dying for a cruise, so we'd might cruise thorugh the islands and spend extra time in Athens/Santorini.....
someday...mmm?
MisterBeasley Guten Morgen! Kaffee, bitte. JeremyB, last night wasn't my best at Tuesday Night Hockey. As one guy said after the game, I was still in "vacation mode" and didn't get into the game until a bit later. At the same time, we were facing a pair of young junior players who were way beyond our skill level, and no one on our team was really capable of playing with them. (Brownie, Ralph and The Fridge were missing from our lineup.) I've got a fill-in game on Thursday night, so hopefull I can redeem myself. Galaxy, I've been to Greece, a very long time ago. I found it a beautiful, friendly place. I'm sure it's changed a lot. When I was there, no one spoke English and I certainly didn't understand Greek, but we got along OK with sign language and smiles. We had some thunderstorms come through earlier. I'm hoping that the forecast is wrong and I'll get an hour or so to go for a bike ride. The roads will be wet, but the air is warm so I'll take the mountain bike and expect to come home covered in mud. While ridiing in Acadia National Park last week, I noticed that I had a dead earthworm wrapped around the axle of my right pedal. I guess I went through a puddle.
always enjoy your write ups about hockey. i am still debating if I want to play this winter. The good thing is I have a few friends that play in the nhl and Europe ( won't drop names here though ) so I always have equipment if I need especially pro stock sticks.
I had 3 years of Ancient Greek in school, but I forgot all of it. I still can decipher some of the words when I see them, but don´t capture the meaning.
Petra and I went to Greece in our honeymoon. we spent a great time there, met a lot of friendly folks and enjoyed the easy-going life we encountered. German did not help me, but I was able to get by with English.
Today´s Greece is in a bad shape. What´s happening there is something like a reverse Robin Hood - take it from the poor and give it to the rich. Lots of young folks leave the country as there seems to be no future for them. The Greek economy relies on agriculture and tourism - there is hardly any industrial production. With joining the Eurozone, Greek products have become extraordinarily expensive and a vacation down there is out of reach for many of those folks, who enjoyed going there. They now spend their holidays only a few miles further east, under the same sun, on the shores of the same sea, with the same dose of ancient Greek ruins. Only the people there speak Turkish.
Without a massive amount of capital investments into the economy, Greece will not be able to recover, but who will invest into this country, when investments in Asia will render much higher returns?
OK, Vinnie - I was just stating facts, and I won´t comment them, promised!
Good morning diners,
Since we're in Germany I'm going to see an ICE bullet train?
Its nice to see Galaxy and Ulrich talk about Greece.
Amtrak America, 1971-Present.
V8Vega BroadwayLion yougottawanta Can't seem to get my pictures loaded. How do you post pictures? Eh? are you trying to use a server such as photo bucket. You need to do something like that. From there you get the "Share" URL and paste that in the box when you click on the photo icon above. If you are doing that, but it is not working you need to check your provider to see what is happening. Or just paste your URL into your reply and we will look at it. (The URL that is) ROAR Whats a server? Whats a URL?
BroadwayLion yougottawanta Can't seem to get my pictures loaded. How do you post pictures? Eh? are you trying to use a server such as photo bucket. You need to do something like that. From there you get the "Share" URL and paste that in the box when you click on the photo icon above. If you are doing that, but it is not working you need to check your provider to see what is happening. Or just paste your URL into your reply and we will look at it. (The URL that is) ROAR Whats a server? Whats a URL?
A server is a computer connected to the internet offer material to others. When you go to a web site, your computer (client) asks another computer (a server) to send it something.
The server computer has software that can receive and process these requests. Actually, your computer already has this software on it, but if you do not know how to use it, then do not try to use it. It is not installed by default.
Computers on the internet have IP addresses such as 123.111.24.167 . You should be able to remember lots of those! (NOT). So a URL (Uniform Resourse Locator) is used instead, such as broadwaylion.com . Your computer knows how to use the network phone directory (DNS servers) to get the IP number that the URL points to.
Once you tell your computer where you want to go, it will find the IP number and will ask that computer for the information you want to see. In the case of this forum the URL would be cs.trains.com/mrr/etc... The information before the slash is the computer that has the invormation that you want, the information after the slash tells that computer the location of the information that you want.
see the difference between broadwaylion.com and broadwaylion.com/ramu
These two websites are on my computer. LION, being a network administrator, knows what him is doing with this sort of stuff, and him has firewalls and routers to protect the equipment of him from badguys. LION also has a static IP number. That means my IP number never changes. That costs extra money. Your IP number (you probably do not know what it is) changes from time to time. Your internet service provider has more customers that he has IP numbers to give them. So he gives you a number, and when you log off, he gives the number to someone else.
It you wanted a URL such as broadwaylion.com, you have to pay for that by the year. The provider who sells you the URL needs to know what IP numbers your computer is using, so that people using that URL will be able to see your website or photographs or something.
When you go to photobucket.com and sigh up for a free account you will be able to upload your photos to that account. When you select your photo and click on the share button it will give you a complicated URL which you will paste to the photo box on this forum so that others can see your picture. That URL will be something like : photobucket.com/server6/folder351/KRJ345806.jpg
That number will be UNIQUE to your picture on the internet in the whole wide world.
You cannot upload photos the the Kalmbach/Trains servers because they do not want to be bothered with all of that overhead and stuff. Most forums will not permit you to upload stuff to their servers, that is why an account with third party is necessary.
When you go to a website, the page that your browser receives is just a simple page of code. That code includes code to go to third party servers to retreive photos, ads, and other information that theywant to show you.
Easy, isn't it!