Running Bear's May 2019 Coffee Shop

[tootnkumin]

Toot .... Sorry to hear about your steel fence was damaged . What was wrong with that driver, and will he pay for the damage?

Not a hope of catching him and he wasn't hangin' around, the A'hole. Ironicly, both my wife and I saw it happen, she heard the squeal of tires as he U turned from across the other side of the roadway. She was in the end bedroom you can see the window of and jumped up to look and I had just walked into the one to it's left just in time to see the 4 wheel drive strike the fence and race off. No way either of us could see the number plate.

 

[bnsf971]

Good morning. It's mostly sunny, 70, with scattered tornadoes. So far, the closest has been about 35 miles away, in Dayton, though there were some injuries, there have been no fatalities.

 

[Patrick]

Morning all,

Vacation wasn't fun. After visiting some old folks (I forgot why we only see them every few years) we hurried home a day early due to major flooding in our area while we were gone. Fortunately, the house had no damage, but I spent several days helping our eldest repair some minor damage at her house, then more rain and a couple of migraines (they are becoming more frequent, and no chemicals sprayed on the yard) and a twisted knee, I managed to get back to work. As predicted, no trains over the LOOONNNGGG week.

Glad to be back at work. I still have over 5 weeks of time that they will be encouraging me to use.

 

[Patrick]

Patrick - Do IT guys really get a vacation? When I still worked, our guys seemed to be on-call throughout vacations. Vacations to them just meant not being in the office; they logged in from afar and fixed things remotely.
.

No, I did have to update a couple of programs and answer emails. The downside of being the only full-time IT guy. My supervisor does some IT stuff, but mostly deals with facilities as does our computer tech. 60% of his salary comes from Facilities, 40% from IT. My supervisor is lost with the IT stuff since I managed to get him to update to a Microsoft network from our old Unix and Novell based system.

 

[santafewillie]

Good Morning All. 72°, cloudy and breezy; pretty much the same pattern as the last week. Predicting "strong storms" for tomorrow around noon. Despite the humidity, it's actually been pleasant most mornings when I walk at 6:00 am. Heading out this morning to take my wife to the orthopedic surgeon to discuss the knee replacements. She already disagrees with his assessment of which one to do first. I go to help make the decision, yeah right!
Thanks Dave, Sherrel, Jerome, Phil, Curt, Garry for the likes and comments regarding the Doodlebug pictures.

Yesterday was too beautiful of a day to spend a lot of time in the train shed. I did get out there and made minor progress on the peninsula project with more ground foam, and I did get the grade crossing roadway and embankments attached in place. Today's goal will be to paint the embankments. Over on the workbench, I finished cutting out the front walls of the Masonic Lodge that I started Saturday.

As I posted yesterday, there is some fraying of the cardstock here. I was able to fix some with a sanding stick and fix an "ooops" with a bit of contour putty. Still have a bit more that I want to improve, but I ran out of time yesterday. This is quite a learning experience working with .050" cardstock, those rectangular cutouts on top of the right layer were really quite exacting and have to be repeated about twenty more times on the side and back walls! These stack on top of each other with the left one on the bottom. The door openings are of varying widths indicated by the dotted lines, that eventually provide depth to the wall recesses. Wait until you see what needs to be done with those cutouts and the rectangles on part #2. I am enjoying this so far and it is providing a neat challenge while I wait for paint/glue to dry over on the peninsula project. Listening to 60's era Pink Floyd really helps!

Dave -

I have noticed a marked contempt many Native Americans hold towards Whites.

It doesn't stop them from separating folks from their money at the casinos around here.
Curt - Warbonnet was what that paint scheme was called. I really hated seeing it disappear from the rails. The original looked better than the late eighties return, the red seemed to be deeper.
Ray - If you all drove on the right side of the road, that couldn't have happened. Seriously though, I am glad to read that there were no injuries. Might have gone through the wooden one straight into the bedroom.
Garry - That UP station looks as if it could hold one heck of a model railroad layout! Nice pictures.
Patrick - Welcome back from vacation.

Everybody have a great day.

 

[Boris]

Good morning y'all. 65° with darkening skies, and pending rain.

That must have been a bit uncomfortable to some folks!

Willie; I suppose...but they met on different nights.

I have noticed a marked contempt many Native Americans hold towards Whites. While at first I respected the native traditions, I now avoid any contact with them. I realize they are not all the same, however there is real hatred evident towards whites by many. Now that I live in a big city, I see much of the same coming from some members of the black community,

Dave: The word is resentment, and with the help of agitators (activists) the resentment grows to hostility. I' not a sociologist, but when folks limit themselves to members of their homogeneous grouping, they tend to adopt an them vs. us attitude, and believe that they are being mistreated. Multiculturalism, doesn't help, as one never has to interact with anyone else. Locally, Cablevision offers, programing packages in Spanish, Russian, Polish, Korean, Japanese, Chinese, Israeli and Farsi That's in addition to Black, Spanish and Japanese. No need to ever bother with anyone else.
Also sort of explains why Liberals and Conservatives can't get along,

spent about 90 minutes on the tank car. It sure doesn't look like I have 6 hours into the build but everything is plastic with the exception of brake lines and hand rails. I found the date on the bottom of the instructions and it is 1987! Working on the brake rigging and it looks like the directions are 180 out from the picture, so I'm following the picture.

Curt: Patience, the tank car looks real good. Plans for placement of under body detail are tricky, Remember all the Athearn Blue box boxcars and others had the under body detail reversed because Irvie Athearn misinterpreted the blueprints. FWIW, I have a LifeLike Proto Tank car kit on the bench, since last fall, all because I lack the patience (and feeling) to place the hand rails and grab irons. No wonder R-T-R is so popular.

The Union Pacific station in Salt Lake City is magnificent.

Garry: That is truly a magnificent building. Thank you for sharing the photos from your trip. I enjoyed them.

Received an e-mail from Louis, this morning. He is mostly doing better, with an occasional day where fatigue limits him. He returned to work on a limited basis, and is doing some homeowner chores.

Speaking of chores, Our spring gardening is virtually compete, and all I need to do to finish setting up the Patio, is to retreive the cushions and umbrella from the garage rafters. (Easier said than done).

Have a good (shortened) week, and be safe.

Boris

 

[logandsawman]

Good morning, 44 and cloudy. Looks like rain, must be hanging in the air from yesterday.

Curt-- the tank car is looking really nice

Toot-- must have backed into the fence square on

Garry-- I love the old depot photos

Patrick-- glad you didn't flood out

Boris-- it was nice when being American was enough


Todays powerline photo:

I have jumpers going to the buildings here, too. This line is home made from black thread and coated in glue, hung to dry. Does not hang as nice as the commercial stuff.

Everyone have a good day!

Dave

 

[Flip]

And a late good morning to all. At 9:30 it's already 83* . Not looking forward to the predicted 95* later. What the heck did we do before A/C ?? Oh, I remember, opened windows and turned on the fan.
Hope y'all stay cool and dry. Best wishes, Prayers and Blessing,
Phil

 

[Sirfoldalot]

Variably cloudy, Breezy; high today of 71 - last year 86 - record 102 in 2003. A warming trend will follow through Thursday, bringing temperatures up to near normal, then fluctuate in the 70's through next weekend. Low clouds are also expected inland each morning. At the moment there is not a cloud anywhere and the wind is calm.

Patrick - glad you are safe with all the flooding going around. I received an update from Ft Smith, AR, where the River was expected to crest at 42.5 feet - previous record was 38.1. A photo showed the water only a few feet below the former Frisco bridge - they at least have the lift section raised.

 

[Raincoat2]

Good morning everyone. Sunny and 72 out there. We keep dodging the worst of the severe weather in this specific area. Tornadoes have touched down about 5 miles south of us and 5 miles or so north east of us with major damage in both locations. So far we've just had rain, too much of it!!

Still not much progress in the train room - working on several outdoor projects, including building a gate and putting in grass seed. Both my full-time job and my home outdoor work are interfering with the most important thing: model railroading. This must stop!

Have a good day everyone.

 

[Greg@mnrr]

Overcast in this part of Wisconsin. Just returned from a stay at the cabin. Lots of rain and the area lakes are filled with water covering piers and flooding low lands which is causing damage to cabins, homes and boat houses that were once near the water's edge and now the water's edge is way pass the foundations of the structures filling the lower levels and basements. Two inches of rain last week and three inches of rain yesterday alone. Once beautiful cabins are now seriously damaged by the over flowing water. All the lakes have "No Wake Rules". We found back roads closed due to high water in marshy, low areas.

In February we had 71 inches of snow alone so the added water content of the melting snow and all the excess rainfall this spring causes the flooding problems.

Lucky our cabin is in sand country so seldom is excessive rainfall a problem. A day after heavy rainfall the top layer of sand is dry. We are located where the last glaciers stopped and melted during the Wisconsin Ice Age. The sand is deep and maybe extends several hundered feet below grade. The result is interesting terrain with hills and valleys where the melting glaciers left the deposits of sand and rocks.

Only problem I encountered was with the well system's pressure switch and tank for the well and I have a plumber coming to determine the exact problem which I believe is the pressure tank. $$$

Tomorrow trains!!! Planning working on the box cars that I started weathering with the oils and after doing some more reading on the subject I will change my techniques slightly and give the oils more drying time between applications.

The other project will be to "plant" some lily pads in one of the water features.

That's all to report for today.

Greg

########################

 

[PRR Modeler]

Afternoon All,

Trimmed the hedges this morning and hot wasn't the word for it. After lunch I worked another couple of hours on the tank car. I expect to finish the actual build tomorrow. I've decided that I'm not going to build the second kit because it's way too fragile for my typical handling. I did find a set of decals from Tichy for a tank car carrying printing ink which will be perfect for my printing business.

Toot- The drivers there sound as bad as ours do here.

Patrick- It can be a pain, but it's job security. Thankfully your family made it through the weather OK.

Joe- Patience is a 4 letter word.

Dave- Thank you. Nice layout shot.

Greg- Good luck with the well.



I hope everyone has a good night

 

[GarryCBQ]

Good afternoon .

Toot ..... It is hard to understand how somebody can do damage to property without offering to repair it. .... Maybe, next time, you should have a concrete barrier.

Willie .... You are making good progress with the building.... Thanks for commenting on my photos.

Boris .... I'm glad you heard from Louis. I have been wondering about him. Thanks for the remarks about my photos.

Phil .... I too recall before AC. It was sometimes really bad riding in cars back then, too because of heat.

Sherrel ...... The water certainly is high in Ft Smith.

Johnny ..... Yep. Model railroading is important, and I have done none of that in recent weeks.

Greg .... Glad to hear you have planned model railroad time tomorrow.

Curt .... Your tank car project is looking great.

Dave ..... That is a greet scene !

Patrick .... Sorry to hear about the flooding. What area do you live in ?.... Edit ..... Never mind. I just red you are in Wichita.

We had too much rain while driving to and from Cincinnati. ..... On the way there it was in and around Louisville. On the way back, it rained so much as we were west of Elizabethtown, we had to exit and park in a parking lot to wait it out.

Cheers !

 

[bnsf971]

Well, it was an interesting afternoon. I had to replace the nearly-new air conditioner on our trailer when the compressor failed. The new one is working well, though the old one worked well right up to the moment it went *poof*.

 

[logandsawman]

Johnny-- that is great to hear you got missed by those tornados! We helped to clean up after a couple, including the famous Siren, WIS tornado a couple decades ago. Consider yourself fortunate!

Greg-- hope your pump issue is easily resolved

THANKS all for the comments on the photos!

Will be late tomorrow as have early field work to attend to

Dave

 

[Flip]

We hit 97* today: should be the same tomorrow. Has cooled down to 92*. too hot to go on the front porch.

GARRY- Glad you got home safely


CURT- How warm is the water in the pool ???

Hope all have a good night.
Phil

 

[Flip]

Good morning . It's 4:45 a.m. and a cool 75* . Sure wish it would stay this temp. but expect the afternoon high to hit 97* again. I'll take high temps. instead of tornadoes.
Prayers for all in harms way.
Phil

 

[bnsf971]

Good morning. It's mostly clear and 67 here.

 

[Patrick]

Morning all,

Due to a quiet night on the computer front, I get to be here earlier in my day.

We had severe storms in the area last night (which included several tornado warnings). No damage or rain in my immediate area, but watching the news this morning where they are talking to storm victims describing the sound got me to wondering, "What did tornadoes sound like before we had freight trains??"

Greg@mnrr: Part of my vacation had me in North Eastern Wisconsin as I traveled to visit my folks in Iron River, MI. It rained all the way and the water was nearly over US 8 in a couple of spots (weekend before Memorial day). Glad to hear your cabin is in the dry part.

 

[kbkchooch]

68° degrees and sunny, looking for a high of 90° , I think summer may finally be here!