Running Bear's Coffee Sbop LXIX


He did discuss it with me first.
Him: You have too many headaches. I'm giving you a referral to a neurologist.
Me: No, thank you. I've been poked and prodded, tested, and been subjected to more side effects than I can name. I have had it with the side effects of whatever somebody thinks I should be taking to make the headaches stop being worse than the headaches themselves, and then I still have the headaches.
Him: You should get a call in a couple of days from a neurologist to set up an appointment for tests and an exam. Your next appointment with me is in May, you can bring the test results from the neurologist with you at that time.

Terry: Somehow, I missed that point, however, you did tell him that you did not want a referral, and why. He disregarded your feedback, and went along with his program. Exactly what is wrong with the Medical Business. Their heads are so far up into the clouds (or whatever you may wish to substitute), that they really don't care what is wrong with you.

In light of the news the other night, to the effect that Medical Science has lowered the threshold, for what constitutes Hypertension. The new threshold, like the threshold for obesity, will cause them to declare a new hypertension epidemic. I'm a relatively healthy person, that has managed to avoid many of the medical problems suffered by people of my age. I have a lung condition, diagnosed as "Mild COPD" which means I sometimes have issues breathing, especially if I get bronchitis. For this I take Breo, a relatively new drug, which my physician prescribed the higher dosage, based on my previous med, which, in turn causes me additional complications. Clearly, neither he, nor any one else in his practice authorized to call in prescriptions, ever read the drug protocol, concerning dosage. I now take it on alternate days, otherwise, it causes me to have an asthma attack....:confused:. Told him about it, he advised the alternate day dosage, rather than change the Rx. I also have Osteo Arthritis, which seems to be worse this year. I take Mobic, an anti-inflammatory, and Tylenol for those complications. Now Mobic harms the liver, and Tylenol, the Kidneys, and both Mobic, and Breo, cause high blood pressure, and fatigue. So.. I take two separate blood pressure meds, that also cause fatigue, among other BS. I had a skin issue, related to the Breo, and made an appointment to a referred dermatologist. The "earliest" appointment, was two months later. I ended up cancelling, because it cleared up, and I have had no reoccurrence. Coincidently, the situation resolved itself when I cut the Breo dosage in half.

Best of luck to you Terry, as you seek a solution for your dilemma. Those headaches are really bad. I don't get many any more.
 
For the control of joint pain I take Glucosamine Sulphate Sodium Chloride Complex 1500mg Once-a-Day tablets, and Chondroitin (Shark Cartilage) 750mg 1 per day. Up to 3 can be taken. Both are seafood sorced but there are bovine and I believe vegetable based alternatives. I have taken them for years, no noticeable side affects. Take about 3 months to get into the system. Stopped them for 3 months after my major Bowel surgery because I thought they might be contributing to the problems afterward. They weren't. Pain in joints was bad, picking up a cup was difficult at best. Started them again, took 4 months to get back to where I was reasonably before. Pretty good now.
 
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Garry: Good luck with your new Buick!

Chet: You obviously like the North Coast Limited. Once you have one assembled to reroute over the Logan Valley, Walthers will finally come out with their version.

.

Joe ..... Thanks for the well wishes regarding the new SUV, So far. So good. It's exceptionally nice. ... ... Also, your comment to Chet reminds me of my Emprie Builder. I put together an Empire Builder which was mostly Rivarossi cars. I made a full length dome car out of the Bachmann Santa Fe full dome car. I made dome coaches with Con Cor Budd dome cars and sides from Brass Car Sides. After, I completed the dome cars, Walthers announced its first run of the EB. Now, my EB has the 3 domes and a mix of Walthers cars and Rivarossi cars. .... You mentioned drones, and I think they can be a nuisance in the wrong hands. There was one in the news today which crashed in a prison while attempting to deliver illegal stuff to inmates.

Ken D&J ... Your experiences standing in check out lines evidently are just like none. I have the worst luck with them. When I finally get to a cashier, there will be a problem such as the cash register running out of a roll of receipt paper. Can't win.
 
Good Morning All. A pleasant 67° and cloudy, winds currently about 10 mph from the south and will go up to 25 mph with 81° later today. Tomorrow about 0700 the wind will shift from the north up to 30 mph, dropping the temperature considerably, close to freezing Sunday morning. Roller coaster weather at it's best. Getting psyched up for the grocery/beer trek today. I am breaking with traditional Thanksgiving next week and having a small celebration at our house with our kids families only, so it means purchasing extra groceries. We normally spend the day with 35-40 other family members at my brothers house, but not this year. We will join them all for Christmas next month.
Out in the train shed, I began the arduous task of straightening things up due to the expectation of "young" visitors next Thursday. Removed extension cords from across the aisles, picked up all of the razor blades and Exacto knives, moved screwdrivers and other tools back to the tool box etc. Today or tomorrow it's the "Shop Vac" on the floor. I don't know about others, but mine is one noisy SOB. I have to wear hearing protection when using it. Got to get this all done before Monday as I have a lot of other stuff planned for next week. Sad news of a sort, ScaleTrains has moved back its ETA for the four ATSF SD40-2's that I have on preorder. Don't really need any more engines, but I liked them and couldn't resist. Must be on the slow boat from China!

Johnny - So what's the deal with the ballasting? You posted about not being "even", it's not even in the real world. Here is a short tutorial based on how I do it: I first pour it between the rails and then use a 1" soft paintbrush to spread it out. Then I pour some along the sides of the rails, enough to cover the roadbed, and brush it off the tie tops. The remainder I brush toward the roadbed edges to maintain the sloped configuration. I then mist heavily with a 40:60 isopropol alcohol:water mix. I emphasize heavy so the ballast won't float when I do the next step. I then dribble on a 40:60 mixture of Elmer's white glue:water that has a few drops of dishwashing detergent like Dawn mixed in. I make this mixture in an old Elmer's bottle that has the applicator built in. Many others use an eyedropper, but that's a lot of trouble to me. The alcohol in the water and the Dawn in the glue is a redundant step as they both provide the same benefits breaking the surface tension of the water. While I don't normally get any of the glue mixture on the rail, I follow up by wiping it down with a folded paper towel...the alcohol cleans the rail at the same time. It may take a bit of practice to control the dribble so it doesn't displace the ballast. I am not saying that this is the only way to do it, just my way. Hope that this helps.
Eric - Thanks.
Chet - No Black Friday for me. Never have, have no desire to ever participate. Not sure that the savings and hassle are worth it. Eventually the price will come down to that level or below before New Year's Day anyway.
Ken (D&J) - I encounter plenty of "line stoppers" during my normal shopping. It didn't occur to me that some might do it on purpose!:cool:
Curt - Same here regarding grocery shopping, I ONLY get what is on the list. She regards me as anal as well, because I make the list based on the route I make through the grocery store! I find that it saves time, no backtracking or searching the list.
David - Good luck with the sore joints. While I only get them when I overexert, I find that a single Advil works for 24 hours.
Toot - Thanks for the link. I know several people including my wife who heartily endorse the Glucosamine stuff. I'm sure that I will need it some day.

Everybody have a great day and a great upcoming weekend.

Willie
 
Good morning everybody .

Flo ..... Coffee and a donut, please..... What? Karl ate all of the donuts !.... Another chow hound!.... Dang.... Okay... I'll just have coffee.

Willie .... I see you have 4 SD4--2's on order... That will pull a big train. ...

Below is ho my corner project looks now. It will remain that way for at least a week.... It will be very busy through Thanksgiving weekend. ... I have the 1800-era buildings placed where I think I have room for them. (It's really a small area of my layout.) .... Next, I will install track and scenery.

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Good morning, HAPPY FRIDAY!. 43° and sunny.

Toot: Thanks for the suggestion. I do take a Glucosamine - Chondroitin, 1500 mg per day, and they do generally help, However the knees and right hand are a lot more inflamed. What is prescribed generally works, unless the weather is extremely bad, or I over exert.

Garry: That reminds me of when I tried to build a Broadway Limited, from Rivarossi, Eastern Car Works and Brass Car Sides. When Walthers started offering LW passenger cars again, I began integrating pre ww2 era lightweights into my train. I was even going to attempt to modify a Bachmann PRR D78 diner for the train...then Walthers came out with the 1948 Broadway...
 
Good morning. 32 degrees and so far the winter weather advisory have proved to be a flop.

Karl - I think I'll have one of those fresh donuts thank you.

Johnny - Ballasting is not one of my favorite model railroad projects. I have one area left where I tore up and moved tracks to make room for industries and there's still plywood showing. I got some ballast from MB Klein and set it up on the layout and still nothing has happened. Eventually it will get done.

Terry - I really feel bad for you having to put up with those headaches. We have a good friend who also has migraine problems and they can put her down for days. Recently, like you she was referred to a new doctor and finally for the first time in 25 years she was able to get some relief. Hope you would consider an second opinion.

Curt and Greg - Thanks for the info for the Miller sign. I do have power the the Chevy dealership as it does have a lit interior, but I run the lights at 9 volts, too much for the sign, but it would be very easy to pull another power source up through the building for the sign. I have a number of transformers from different electronics tht have dies plus I think I have one that has a number of different outputs. This will be on a to do list. Still have a lot of projects going on.

Garry - Nice photos. Those building look excellent and will add a lot to the layout. Well done.

Joe - I have a friend who worked on building an Empire Builder for years scratch building some cars with brass car sides, repainting cars from other railroads and he no sooner completed it and Walthers did come out with their version. Needless to say, he was bummed out, but did get one.

[video=youtube;b86VmJxdzRY]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b86VmJxdzRY&list=PLl9C2J7uwbGv44n-ogwhGMNTZ0cevd1dA&index=4[/video]

Even if Walthers did bring one out, I think I would just stick with the one I am building now. For me it will be close enough for government work. The only place that i could run it would be at the club, but due to the space restrictions, the guy with the Empire builder had to change all of the couplers because of a couple of tight curves. I ran some of my Walthers cars and had a couple of derailments and was told that because of a few tight radius curves, cars with diaphragms would have to have longer shank couplers installed to make the curves. I am not up to that because I like the look of the close coupled cars that Walthers has.

Black Friday totally turns me off. I guess I'm just getting old and grumpy, Old.gif, because I get a bit bah humbug comes Christmas now. It's not what it was years ago. Way too commercial. Spend money at retailers isn't what Christmas is for me. When I was a cop, you usually ended having to work on most holidays including Christmas. I also hate being in crowds. No way I would subject myself to the Black Friday crowds. Guess I'm not a sheeple or a lemming. We gave our kids the best Christmas we could and do the same for the grand kids. With no children in the house, we no longer put up a Christmas tree. The wife and I usually exchange on gift and the same for out kids. They understand and they don't need to spend a lot of money for gifts for us. Let them take care of their kids and not spend a lot money that is scarce for them.

On Black Friday I think our little comfort queen has the right idea. She takes getting comfortable to a new level. Not a bad idea.

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Train wise, I did get started on installing the hand rails on the B unit. Should get it done over the weekend. Jeeze, I sure hate the #78 drill bit in the pin vise. Glad I have magnifiers.

Here's a rail picture for today.

ren-cen-railroad-tracks.jpg

Later
 
Good Morning All:

Chet: Nice shot of the puppy...not too modest is she?

Terry: Dealing with your Doctor, you're the customer. I'll change MD's or just forget about the referrals and go on your way.

Garry: Great scenes and modeling work. Keep us posted with more photographs.

One more post and down to the train room.

Greg
 
Greg - You're right, not very lady like, but in this position you can rub her belly. One of her favorites. She is a bit spoiled.
 
Chet: I lost my Katie five years ago this month and she was a great, loyal dog. A mix of a Border Collie and a Chow. Short brown hair and very smart. She loved the trip to the cabin and was my companion.

I want another puppy, likely my last dog, but my wife wants a "toy, lap dog" and I want sometime a bit larger, so it doesn't get eaten by a critter the the cabin.

So a trip to the dog rescue.

Thanks for sharing.

Greg

PS: I always liked "Weiner Dogs"
 
Greg - All our dogs came from rescues. We like our wiener dogs too. We got one from a friend of my son who was a great dog. His name was Freeway. We had a little mini poodle that we picked up as a stray and they were good friends. The little poodle passed away in her sleep at 19 and he was lost. We found a woman up in Athol, Idaho who ran a rescue just for doxies and picked up another, Hank, so Freeway would have a friend. They got along great and Freeway was, as the grand kids called him, the gopher sheriff. Old Freeway had a heck of a nose on him and made the rounds of the gopher holes and knew if one was in a hold. One summer the little guy got 60 of them.

The woman who ran the rescue gave us a call and was wondering if we could take another because the county was giving her a hard time because she did not have a kennel license and were threatening to take all of the dogs. That's when we got this long hair doxie, Ginger at less than a year old. Ginger was one of a little of puppies that came from a dog that someone had turned into the rescue. Freeway and Ginger were just about joined at the hip.

Here are the three of them. Hank on the left, Ginger in her favorite upside down position and Freeway on the right.

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Hank was a dirty old man. When we first got Ginger, Freeway was about 8 and had a young chick to chase. Those two were a hoot to watch. Thay were almost always together.

Picture_079.jpg Notice that again, she is in her favorite position.

Unfortunately we had to put Freeway to sleep a couple of years ago. He was a great little guy and was 12 when he went to the great gopher hunt in the sky.
 
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Afternoon All,

Cleaned doors, baseboards and windows today. I have one more project to go but I'll do that next week. Not much else happening today other than going to supper with Mom & Dad. Tomorrow I should be picking up my next kit to be built.

On the doctor front, the thing that pisses me off the most is when they knowingly over schedule and you sit and sit and sit. They might as well tell you to your face that your time and life doesn't matter to them.

Garry- That area is going to look awesome. You should name it Willoughby:).

Chet- Cool video. I noticed the 2 passing trains in the background. Nice track photo. Your doggies look very comfortable.

Justin- Nice photo.

I hope everyone has a good night.
 
Good evening fellow Maintenance Workers and Track Gang,

Hi Flo, Francine, I hear Karl ate all the Do-nuts, what's gotten into him? Well then how about a nice slice of berry pie and coffee. He ate the last of the pie too!? Just coffee then too for me.

Checking WU - At 43 Wells Rd Station; 43 Wells rd Station;
At 6:58 PM PST on November 17, 2017 (GMT -0800) the high wa --° | 40° F Low:
43° F - Feels like 43° Winds are from the, ENE;
Hum-idity is at 90%, could be foggy tomorrow morning?;

Tomorrow is forecast to be nearly the same temperature as today.


Last night I had a little excitment on my C & S West Short Line RR. I had six shorty flat cars parked on the Whiskey Switch siding, on the East end cloest to the engine house lead as well as Horseshoe Meadow Depot. On the West end of the Whiskey Switch siding I had an Old Time Climax Loco with four old time channel frame logs car coupled to it. Two had logs on them and two were empty plus an Old Grasse River logging caboose. I pulled out from the siding and continued North to the end of the line and then backed it up to the West Side Switch and started to back onto the siding again but this time the caboose was being pushed off the track and I had to stop backing the train. I stared to move ahead again only to find the last log car had lost it trailing truck! So I lifted it off the track along with it's truck and then proceeded to look for the screw that held the truck to the channel frame body. There it was under the other cars that had backed over it about six inches prior.

So I fixed that and put the car back on the rail as well as the caboose. I found that if there is too much side to side wobble it can be just as bad as not enough.

So I then pulled the train forward beyond the West end switch and threw the switch and continued to back the
Caboose and log cars to the East end of the WS siding and beyond a bit so I could uncouple the caboose. Well this time the caboose was derailing as it was being pushed back through the larger radius but it was falling into the points and I had to correct that. Finally I steamed the Old Climax and four logs cars back beyond the West switch so I could back the train up to drop off the caboose and then move forward beyond the West switch and throw that so I could back the channel frame log cars up to the empty flats and push them back to couple onto the caboose, which I did and beyond the East Whisky switch. Then I the log cars back onto the siding, uncouple them from the loco which I then steamed to the West end witch and coupled it to the lead flat and parked it fouling the main while talking with the switchman at the tower there.

> > >

I was going to comment more but now I'm too tired.
 
...On the doctor front, the thing that pisses me off the most is when they knowingly over schedule and you sit and sit and sit. They might as well tell you to your face that your time and life doesn't matter to them. ...

Yeah, sorta like the VA clinics. I quit going there several months ago after a similar time wasting experience. I needed some pain relief for a sore hip and had an appointment with my VA primary care. I showed up half hour early and sat in the empty waiting room until about 5 minutes past my appointment time. The nurse called me and I followed her to the exam room, took my temp pulse and BP, then said the Dr. would be in shortly. After more than an hour the dr. finally showed up but had the wrong record jacket. She left then came back about 20 minutes later with my record jacket. She then commenced to go over my medical history from my early active duty days covering injuries that had long since healed. That took about 45 minutes, then she asked what I came in to see her for. I told her, "hip pain". "Oh, ok, I can give you an Rx for some Motrin". "I've been taking Motrin but it doesn't relieve the pain". "I'll give you a stronger dosage". She said the nurse would be in to wrap things up. I waited another half hour and still no nurse. I finally went to the front desk to ask were the nurse was. "Oh, she went to lunch about half hour ago". That was it. I haven't been back there and I have since established a civilian provider.
 



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