Running Bear's November 2018 Coffee Shop


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Good evening. It's raining rather heavily, and 36.

My wife seems to be stable-- that is, she's not getting any worse, and not getting better. We seem to have most of the glitches worked out of the dialysis machine. Until the next problem. But we'll cross that bridge when we get to it.
My service manager thinks he will be returning to work Monday, and work half-days for a while, and see how it goes.
 
Good evening.

Terry ... it is good your wife’s condition is not getting worse , and I continue to pray for her.

Johnny ... praying for Dena too.

Today .... my train friend Gus and I went to visit train friend Dan in the Hospital . Dan has been fighting cancer for a year and a half.
 
kbkchooch said:
That's good Louis, But I prefer Graham Bonnet on vocals with Rainbow.

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Sorry about that Karl, I got the singers mixed up.

Good thing I don't give out Christmas presents to you guys. The only thing worse then not getting a Christmas present, standing in-line to return the ones we don't want or feeling guilty about throwing them in the trash.
 
Good morning Everybody!

A gentle, but steady rain is falling in chilly southeast Baltimore.

Sometimes I can't win for losing. I've found a pace I can maintain. I took not one, but two days off to rest. I did not even put together the side board. I have not worked for Amazon in weeks! Yesterday, all I had planed was picking up my grandson, Ayden from school. When we got into my van to come home, it would not start. According to the date code the battery is only 4 years old, but the van had sat for almost a year before I bought it and I have not used it much lately. Lead-acid batteries don't like not being used. "Use it or lose it"

Luckily I was parked across the street from my oldest daughter's house. Luckier still, my son-in-law, Danny was home! The great thing about living in the city is everything is close. Best Battery, a wholesaler I've known for many years was only 15 blocks away. After a short ride, quick instalation and test of the alternator output we were back on the road in under 45 minutes. More "good" news was I got the battery that listed for $180 for $113.09 tax included. When did battery prices go up so much?!

The bad part was as I was pulling out the old battery (damn, that thing was heavy, my van has a 165amp alternator) to take with me to exchange for the new one I hear this tearing/poping sound. Danny looked at me and said "what was that?" I said "I think it was my right bicep muscle tearing" I recognized the sound from when I tore that same muscle playing semi-pro football over 30 years ago. Thank God we have two arms and my left arm completed the job. More good news was the new battery had a handle, making it much easier to carry and install with one arm, thank God!

On the way home Ayden and I stopped by Home Depot, of course I forgot my list. All I could remember was a toilet seat and invisible scotch tape. How is that for an eclectic list? I needed a new toilet seat after painting the bathroom bright white and realizing the old toilet seat had turned yellow. The invisible tape was for "Fortnite" posters Ayden wanted to hang in his video game area of our family room.

After leaving Home Depot the van starts easily, but the check engine light came on, more fun! It's under warranty, but the dealer, as my Nanny would say "works slower than molasses coming out of a jug in January" Now I have to find my OBDII diagnostic scanner.. My tools are way down the todo list and have not been unboxed since I moved in. My old Snap-On tool box is empty with boxes stacked in front of and on top of it. Searching heavy boxes full of tools should be fun with one good arm.

When I got home my wife noticed my bicep was noticeably tilted to the right, it looks worse than it is. She asked "what's wrong with your arm". I reluctantly told her what happened and she said "why didn't you let Danny change the battery for you?" My answer, "Honey, you know me better than that." Now she is worrying too much, my daughter-in-law Klara had stopped by to pickup bean/ham soup my wife made, began to cry, saying "I can't even look at it" upsetting my wife even more. Now they both look nauseous. Even my beagles got upset with all this needless drama. At least Ayden was calm, that's my boy!

It could be worse, it's only a partial tear of the muscle, same as before. As expected when I woke up this morning, my arm is swollen from the tips of my fingers to my shoulder, but I can move it, same as it was over 30 years ago. In 6-8 weeks it will be fine, same as before.

Now, where are my ace bandages? I have stuff to do!
 
Public Service Annocment

If you children/grandchildren are playing the latest craze, the online game Fortnite make sure somebody is monitoring them. I've been reading in the papers that there are all sorts of predators playing online with our children.
 
Flo, gonna need a nice-warm cup o'joe! We have less snow on the ground that Chet does and it is just above Zero this morning. Supposed to be Partly Sunny today tomorrow and Thursday and a chance of AM snow showers on Friday. Tomorrow and Thursday are supposed to go above freezing! The wife is in Puerto Rico with our church's operation helping repair Hurricane Maria 2017 damage. Health wise everything is good here. Been installing decoders in locomotives, not my favorite job.
 
From the Baltimore Sun on October 3, 1976
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Good morning, y'all. 52° and raining.

Louis: wow, take care of yourself. Of course, I would have done the same thing. BTW, the Earl Scheib ad was a great trip down memory lane. I remember the locations on Eastern Ave, and Enola, PA.

Most of my leaves were either in the street where the town will hopefully pick them up, plus six bags for the town dump. Today's rain will most likely cause round two of leaf fall, so there will be more to pick up. :mad:

Have a great day.

Boris
 
Boris said:
Louis: wow, take care of yourself. Of course, I would have done the same thing. BTW, the Earl Scheib ad was a great trip down memory lane. I remember the locations on Eastern Ave, and Enola, PA.
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Boris, i'm trying to take good care of myself, I really am! It really is hard to teach us old dogs new tricks.

The old Earl Scheib on Eastern Ave is the one I remember. I thought about getting one of my cars painted there, but after seeing their work up close I thought better of it. They painted over anything and everything! I still enjoyed finding the ad.
 
Good Morning All. 28° and cloudy this morning. Highs in the low-40's for the next two days, then back to the 60's on Thursday. Still have rather stiff winds out of the north that should abate somewhat around sunset. No snow here, Chet, Mark and Greg are keeping it all for themselves. Took a day of rest yesterday from all household and yard projects, instead I worked on updating my model railroading database and listening to music.
Eventually I made the trip out to the train shed with the intent to mostly run trains. All went well until I ran a pair of Kato SD40-2's that I have had since 1999 or so. These are from the run with the infamous "pick-up design flaw" that plagues many of these particular models, although I have used mine for almost 20 years without it affecting me. One of the units was not picking up power from it's rear truck at all, and only intermittently from the front truck. I think that the colder conditions caused the contact strips to contract a bit and lose contact. Messed around with them for a bit and finally got all of them firmed in place enough to run properly. The ultimate solution is to hardwire the trucks to the control board, but I don't have the proper wire or soldering skills to do this, yet! While never admitting to the design flaw, Kato used it for this model only, and abandoned it and went back to the Athearn type design until they started hardwiring everything themselves. The train shed was 62°, tolerable enough for me but maybe not for Kato SD40-2's.

Johnny - Keep your snow up there. Drive safely.
Sherrel -
Sirfoldalot said:
We have been placed on notice that our power may be shut off during the day due to the high winds and the chance of downed power lines.
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I did read that PG&E's role in reducing wildfire's caused by their lines was to simply shut off the electricity, instead of clearing brush and weeds from the utility corridors. State regulations or something like that. Seems like clearing the corridors would have the added advantage of providing fire breaks as well.
Is that you posing in the center of that loco picture?
Louis - Take care of yourself and get well soon. Christmas is coming up (as if you didn't already know), and Amazon will probably come calling for quality delivery persons.
Terry - It's not like you needed any more rain!

Everybody have a great day whatever day it is. OK, Bill Gates tells me it's Tuesday down here in the lower right corner.
 
Good morning. A cup of black coffee with a sweet roll please. 20 degrees with an expected high in the mid to upper 40's. Got all of the domestic duties done yesterday. With the bowling tournament keeping us busy over the past weekend, laundry needed to get done, house cleaning and other things were all taken care of. Hope to get down to the train room for a while later today.

Greg - Like the MR&T locomotive. A little new for the era you're modeling.

Sherrel - Like the old photos of steamers. Nice.

Willie - That bathroom project should be completed soon. More time for trains.

Louis - A torn muscle is no fun at all. Been there and done that. Hope you heal soon. Sounds like Murphy has moved to Baltimore.

Here's a rail picture for today.

1-railway-tracks-les-cunliffe.jpg


Later
 
Good morning everyone. 17 degrees and sunny out there. Wind chill of 2!! The snow did not stick in this part of the country, but just north of us they got a couple of inches on roads and ground. More snow due on Thursday.

Everyone - Thank you for your continued prayers for my wife.
Greg and Chet - thanks for the photos of the mini camera. I'm interested - what did you guys pay for yours?
Chet - the ride through at the Livingston club was enjoyable - you may have posted that before, but I don't remember it, so watched the whole thing. Nice quality with that camera.

My wife had the MRI yesterday. No problems getting through that. Now we wait to see the surgeon next Monday and we'll learn what his opinion is and what our options are.

The remodel is done - finally! I have to paint the guest bathroom ceiling and walls, but that's an afternoon job for the weekend. We've begun the move back to that side of the house!

From the train room - just some more scenicating. Ran trains for a while.

Time for more coffee. Have a good day everyone.
 
santafewillie said:
Louis - Take care of yourself and get well soon. Christmas is coming up (as if you didn't already know), and Amazon will probably come calling for quality delivery persons.
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Thank you Willie, Amazon sent me an email this morning, "How are you? We miss you." Perfect timing.
montanan said:
Louis - A torn muscle is no fun at all. Been there and done that. Hope you heal soon. Sounds like Murphy has moved to Baltimore.
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Thanks Chet, I think old Mr. Murphy makes cameo appearances in everybody's life. Must have just been my turn.

The way he gets around he certainly must have some frequent flyer miles saved up!
 
The good news, Little League baseball does not begin until April 1st. Always have to look on the bright side!
 
Morning Coffee Shop Patrons!
62 degrees going to 72 they say -- Wind woke me up several times last night and its really blowing out there this morning. We have several bouts with the Santa Annas each year, but this is the worst I can remember.

All Youse Guys back there with the colder temps come on out -- We have lots of fires to keep you warm!

WHO NEEDS THE RUSSIAN MEDDLING WHEN WE HAVE BROWARD COUNTY??
 
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