Running Bear's December 2022 Coffee Shop


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Well, howdy there internet peeps, and those driving busses that wish they were trains.

It's Troy again. In Mel's Starry buck$ location. It's 6:20 in the Big Easy. I've been awake since 3, but tried to go back to sleep.

So, it's time to word the words before getting on the cruise ship. You probably won't hear/see much from me for the next week. Maybe another update today while the internet is still cheap. Once we're sailing, it's too expensive to post much. I only have 150 minutes, and about 20% of that goes to logging into/out of the ship's network. So I'll just be checking email, and dropping an odd photo or two on FB.

Out of curiosity, does anyone on this forum collect equipment from Mexican Rail Lines?
 
Greetings all,

Yesterday, the North Metro Model Railroad Club in Coon Rapids , Minnesota held an open house and flea market. So I visited this layout. It is HUGE! They model the BNSF from the Twin Cities to Staples and Duluth. Would be a great group to join, but I spend so many evenings at meetings and other activities - just can't see it. It was a fun visit though, and well attended from what I could tell. I believe they did get at least one application for membership.

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Pic is the best I could do but does not really do it justice! Cheers all! - - - Steve J
 
Good evening,

Rgeiter: we had similar ideas today

I got my outdoor fence done (no pic) but also added to some scenes on my layout also harvested and processed 11,700 board feet of sawlogs:


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These are 16' long sawlogs, 16" to 4' in diameter HO scale.

Also got the cattle on the pasture:

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TomO - I cannot read or eat in bed myself. Wife wants to read in bed always had to hook up a special light for her. She usually only does that when she goes to bed before me (rarely).

Have a good night all!

Dave LASM
Awesome picture Dave. I have seen the cows heading out to pasture or coming in scene so often over the years. You have that so right to me!

Bedtime. I have never been able to read in bed. Bed to me is for 2 things, sleeping and something else. Terry and I have been together 50 years, married 46. 2 years ago this January we got a sleep divorce. For 48 years I put up with her coming to bed, turning her light on and reading at least for 1 hour and then grind her teeth in her sleep. She said 2 years ago, she couldnt sleep because of my snoring. My snoring. Actually, it has worked out great, we both get better nights of sleep. Now when I go to bed and she’s in my bed I try to remember what the other thing I use the bed for is…
 
Well, howdy there internet peeps, and those driving busses that wish they were trains.

It's Troy again. In Mel's Starry buck$ location. It's 6:20 in the Big Easy. I've been awake since 3, but tried to go back to sleep.

So, it's time to word the words before getting on the cruise ship. You probably won't hear/see much from me for the next week. Maybe another update today while the internet is still cheap. Once we're sailing, it's too expensive to post much. I only have 150 minutes, and about 20% of that goes to logging into/out of the ship's network. So I'll just be checking email, and dropping an odd photo or two on FB.

Out of curiosity, does anyone on this forum collect equipment from Mexican Rail Lines?
Enjoy the cruise and create lots of words

Collect Mexican, no! But over the last few years there have been pieces run on the layout. But nothing presently used. I opposed NAFTA and but especially it’s replacement package, so I weathered the pieces to sell, they did. I have started looking for a couple pieces for a through manifest train, Superior, Wi to New Orleans on the CN portion of the layout. But, so far nothing has tripped that trigger.
 
Marriage. A married couple that I know were at an event a few weeks ago. The topic of marriage came up and Jim mentioned that he and his wife had been happily married for 5 years. Sheron leaned toward him and said, "No Jim, we've been married 35 years". Without looking at her, Jim replied, "I know".
 
Good morning modelers of the world. It’s cold in Wisconsin at 19f degrees but the wind chill is at zero. The high should hit 38 but the winds will increase with gusts in the high 30’s. So it will feel cold.

No official rehab today but I will walk the 15 minutes in the pool just because I love being in the water. That I will do after we return from the grandsons 10:40am hockey game.

Saw some good, but definitely not great Volleyball as the UW Badgers advanced over TCU to the next round of the NCAA championships that they are the defending champions of. Because of my knee and uncertain Midwestern weather. We will not in 2 weeks if the Badgers keep advancing go to Omaha for the Championship. Terry said no this morning to the ticket email we got this morning. We will though go next weekend on Campus for the next 2 games as they advance.

I got some morning personal train time yesterday. Then with a hockey game on and the sound off I created a few more trees last night after volleyball. Hopefully more trees during the Packer/Bear game with the sound off this afternoon. Just forming up the branch structure and applying the tacky glue.

enjoy the day
 
Good morning all, 6 F and clear, frosty outside. Ice particles scintillating in the sun! supposed to warm up quite a bit today but will be in the deep freeze next week.

TomO - thanks for the cow comment! I worked on a few cattle farms in my youth thought the staging was appropriate. They are glued down to the grass mat so I don't have to be constantly picking them back up.

Steve - that is a huge layout! I have seen some videos of sections of it, really like it!

I loaded up a flat car last night, couldn't wait. Will have to make more logs...

logs r.JPG


I like it when the ends of the logs look somewhat realistic. These are Jack pine twigs which I scraped off the loose bark with a blade.

Should be NPR rather than just NP on the flat car, they had one at the railroad museum and thats how the markings showed,

We are getting ready for Church it is the advent season, unfortunately wife is somewhat bah humbug this year I will be making the best of it

Dave LASM
 
I love Christmas time at Amazon!

Nineteen deliveries for $210. That works out to $84/hour. All thanks to contractors who can't or won't get all their deliveries done. Amazon pays contractors as little as $18.50/hour and is surprised when they don't get the job done. I'm more than happy to come in and "clean up".

It can be like this all year long, but Christmas time is like this almost every day.
 
Good Morning All on this Second Sunday of Advent. Partly cloudy and 43°. NWS has added rain to this morning's forecast, probably because there seems to be a line of showers heading this way; although the bulk is north of the Red River in Oklahoma. Mid-50's today, upper 70's tomorrow and Tuesday. I have a chimney sweep coming out Tuesday since my regular guy cannot make it this season. It's gonna cost more.

Still doing the same old outdoor chores right now, splitting wood, finally finished the cleanup of the garden and applied some more compost to the surface, mowed and shredded leaves to add to the newer compost pile and picked up fallen twigs and branches from the tree line along the road to the east side of the yard. I got a new electric space heater from Amazon to supplement the one in the train shed. It sometimes gets too chilly to do any modeling work out there, although I can run trains. I just cannot do modeling with long sleeves on, they snag on track/scenery or drag stuff off the workbench.
Day two of home alone today. No furniture rearrangement this time, but I did exchange out a couple of pictures on the walls. Let's see if she notices. I took down one picture that my Dad painted and put up one that my wife painted. They both painted a large number of oil paintings. In another place I took down one of hers and put up one of his. I also rearranged some of those tacky copper kitchen wall hangings, and subbed in two different ones. I get tired of looking at the same old stuff every day. I'll see what other mischief I can get into today.

Thanks as always for the reactions and comments from yesterday.

Out in the train shed, I painted another 2'x8' portion of the Plywood Pacific. I also painted at least 35' of track, ties and roadbed. No pictures yet as they might be boring. I have gone as far as I intended on the ground paint for the time being, as any further will not only entail removing stuff, but also firming up what I am going to do with that corner. I am not there yet, although an additional grain elevator could be part of it. Meanwhile I can proceed with some ground cover and ballast. I usually ballast first and then bring the ground cover up to meet it. I may try the opposite approach in parts of this section to see if I like it.
Since I don't have any current progress pictures, I have to go to the archive. Maybe some flatcar and gondola loads.
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Troy - NOLA hasn't been the same since Hurricane Katrina. Given it's proximity, we have had the opportunity to visit a few times on our annual trip over to Gulf Shores AL. I also lived there for a year and a half in the late 50's-early 60's. The overall smell in the tourist areas, the lack of law enforcement against what is considered "petty crimes", and the exodus of reputable businesses has really hurt the city's image. While the French Quarter was always considered "party town" even back when I was living there, it has gotten more lawless over the years. I understand that many of the issues have been exacerbated by a combination of police corruption, police leaving the force after the hurricane, and the prevailing "de-fund the police" mood that has been prevalent there for over ten years; but I cannot definitively state that because I don't live there. But I can say that the city has gone downhill since Katrina.
That said, the cemeteries are interesting there as no one is actually buried.
Tom O - You are so right about hearing loss. I truly believe that 80% of my loss is due to rock concerts and the use of headphones when I was younger. I should have had hearing aids at least ten years before I got them in 2014, but I was too vain to check them out. The first day was amazing.
Todd - Yep! Another early riser here. After 43 years of getting up at 4:00 am mostly without an alarm clock, I still get up at that time despite some effort at changing. I don't mind, I like that time. Due to my hearing impairment, I totally sleep through the time that my wife comes to bed, lights on and reading her book for 30 minutes or so.
Curt - All of my main line curve radii are at least 30", with many at 32" and a couple at 34". As to which one that I used there, I would have to get out the template and measure since I don't have a written layout plan. Thanks for the possible ID on the signals. I'll go forward with my research now.
Hughie - No I haven't run out of blue paint yet. I won't paint the backdrop until I get the other piece of plywood sheathing for the near end. Somehow I ended up with an extra piece at 14 1/2" tall and I am one piece short at 16" tall. I use the shorter stuff on the lower level.
David - Yes, I prefer angled track, and set back so I can scenic on both sides and run trains "through" the layout.
Steve J - Impressive club layout.

Everyone have a great Sunday.
 
Good Afternoon All!
28F in snowing

Here we go again - been doing this for about an hour:

View attachment 156997
That ain't fog in the background --- snow.

Later
I put like and I do like it,the icicles the snow….however glad it is not here, although we have had the odd whiteout in previous years
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There was a person in the picture but you could not see them until they got closer
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hawfrost is thankfully rare here
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Santa visited
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And stayed a while
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evidence of angels were seen
and there was evidence of the reclusive neighbours
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badger
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Fox and little ones

ran out of photo space but deer rabbits hares are often identified
My daughter has had a "cold" for the last two weeks. This week is very mild and she even went to a swim practice yesterday -- Just a slightly scratchy throat. But the week of thanksgiving she had a lot of cough and stuff and it started the end of the week before Thanksgiving week. I think it was RSV -- Respiratory Syncytial Virus infection -- a common one especially in kids. Seems half the kids in Utah have it -- my wife said her hospital has been taking 14-17 year olds from the ICU of the associated children's hospital since that children's hospital didn't have enough beds for respiratory issues.

Anyway, Sun - Tuesday night this week I would go to sleep for a few hours, wake up and not be able to go back to sleep, and finally drift off for the last couple hours. So I was getting 4-5 hours of not great sleep. I started to feel scratchy and cough and plugged up and still am, though the last two nights I've slept much better and feel a bit better. Still coughing and scratchy chest etc.

We are planning on leaving to Japan early next Friday for our first trip since 2019 summer. One of the requirements that affects are family on trying to enter Japan is that we need to show a negative C19 test (they have a list of tests they find acceptable). These are "real" lab tests with lab signed results they require, given no more than 72 hours before the first flight.

So I was worrying in case our sickness may have been C19 related, though we didn't think so. So I got some rapid antigen tests from Amazon yesterday (ordered in the afternoon -- delivered by early evening). I took one and it came back negative. Which is a big relief. I'll do another this weekend and have the daughter do one and maybe the wife and son do the last two (5 test kit) just for the piece of mind. I still need to find a place that does travel related Covid testing around here and I expect we';;be paying $75-$100+ per person :(. It is a racket.

---

Snowed 4"-6" it appears over night. Daughter's school is canceled, which is nice as there are a lot of work pressures right now as I try and wrap up in order to be able to leave next week. Her school is on the other side of the valley and they probably got a lot more snow over there than we did on our side.

I'm trying to get all the tied rebar on the garage slab lifted, and a small amount of corner foam installed and the foam we did last weekend braced so that we can get poured. This snow didn't help for that. This is pouring of the concrete over the pre-stressed slabs that were placed a week and a half ago...

Also got word that the heat pump unit was shipped. I need to follow the track to make sure it gets here before we leave. I may also need to find someone who can store it for me as it is small but heavy and our motorized stair climbing/descending dolly can't help us get it across the dirt from the street to the house (no poured driveway yet).
give her zinc it helps infections
 
Good Morning All on this Second Sunday of Advent. Partly cloudy and 43°. NWS has added rain to this morning's forecast, probably because there seems to be a line of showers heading this way; although the bulk is north of the Red River in Oklahoma. Mid-50's today, upper 70's tomorrow and Tuesday. I have a chimney sweep coming out Tuesday since my regular guy cannot make it this season. It's gonna cost more.

Still doing the same old outdoor chores right now, splitting wood, finally finished the cleanup of the garden and applied some more compost to the surface, mowed and shredded leaves to add to the newer compost pile and picked up fallen twigs and branches from the tree line along the road to the east side of the yard. I got a new electric space heater from Amazon to supplement the one in the train shed. It sometimes gets too chilly to do any modeling work out there, although I can run trains. I just cannot do modeling with long sleeves on, they snag on track/scenery or drag stuff off the workbench.
Day two of home alone today. No furniture rearrangement this time, but I did exchange out a couple of pictures on the walls. Let's see if she notices. I took down one picture that my Dad painted and put up one that my wife painted. They both painted a large number of oil paintings. In another place I took down one of hers and put up one of his. I also rearranged some of those tacky copper kitchen wall hangings, and subbed in two different ones. I get tired of looking at the same old stuff every day. I'll see what other mischief I can get into today.

Thanks as always for the reactions and comments from yesterday.

Out in the train shed, I painted another 2'x8' portion of the Plywood Pacific. I also painted at least 35' of track, ties and roadbed. No pictures yet as they might be boring. I have gone as far as I intended on the ground paint for the time being, as any further will not only entail removing stuff, but also firming up what I am going to do with that corner. I am not there yet, although an additional grain elevator could be part of it. Meanwhile I can proceed with some ground cover and ballast. I usually ballast first and then bring the ground cover up to meet it. I may try the opposite approach in parts of this section to see if I like it.
Since I don't have any current progress pictures, I have to go to the archive. Maybe some flatcar and gondola loads.
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Troy - NOLA hasn't been the same since Hurricane Katrina. Given it's proximity, we have had the opportunity to visit a few times on our annual trip over to Gulf Shores AL. I also lived there for a year and a half in the late 50's-early 60's. The overall smell in the tourist areas, the lack of law enforcement against what is considered "petty crimes", and the exodus of reputable businesses has really hurt the city's image. While the French Quarter was always considered "party town" even back when I was living there, it has gotten more lawless over the years. I understand that many of the issues have been exacerbated by a combination of police corruption, police leaving the force after the hurricane, and the prevailing "de-fund the police" mood that has been prevalent there for over ten years; but I cannot definitively state that because I don't live there. But I can say that the city has gone downhill since Katrina.
That said, the cemeteries are interesting there as no one is actually buried.
Tom O - You are so right about hearing loss. I truly believe that 80% of my loss is due to rock concerts and the use of headphones when I was younger. I should have had hearing aids at least ten years before I got them in 2014, but I was too vain to check them out. The first day was amazing.
Todd - Yep! Another early riser here. After 43 years of getting up at 4:00 am mostly without an alarm clock, I still get up at that time despite some effort at changing. I don't mind, I like that time. Due to my hearing impairment, I totally sleep through the time that my wife comes to bed, lights on and reading her book for 30 minutes or so.
Curt - All of my main line curve radii are at least 30", with many at 32" and a couple at 34". As to which one that I used there, I would have to get out the template and measure since I don't have a written layout plan. Thanks for the possible ID on the signals. I'll go forward with my research now.
Hughie - No I haven't run out of blue paint yet. I won't paint the backdrop until I get the other piece of plywood sheathing for the near end. Somehow I ended up with an extra piece at 14 1/2" tall and I am one piece short at 16" tall. I use the shorter stuff on the lower level.
David - Yes, I prefer angled track, and set back so I can scenic on both sides and run trains "through" the layout.
Steve J - Impressive club layout.

Everyone have a great Sunday.
Oooh dip the wire in a black brown mix, when dry highlight the wire with silver,looking good as usual.
 
For people who are feeling under the weather I cannot emphasise enough, winter is hard on our bodies less sun,
take vit d the sun vitamin with k2 as it controls calcium and apparently helps stop heart attacks when both are taken together,
and if already under the weather try low doses of vita mini c and zinc, as zinc is the best for fighting off infections, you can accidentally overdose on vit c so do not go over the top.

As zinc is realatively inexpensive it should not stretch the bank balance, vit d and k2 does cost more, but I think many here will agree it is worth the expense as we have discussed vit d and k2 a couple of times.

drink plenty of liquids, and if you do not have high blood pressure consider adding more salt because despite all the guff bough low salt diets it is good for you, I personally have to add salt as I suffer from low bloood pressure. I use the pink Himalayan stuff as it comes with added minerals, and if near you sells Cerebos iodised table salt this is a way to get important iodine which men specifically should take as it helps prevent prostrate cancer. Table salt is not the best but it is a convenient way to get iodine into your diet.

see see PARAGRAPHS. And returns….smug look 👀


edit and no I am not proof reading it….pokes out tongue.
 
I have been looking at Keto food for Xmas and found a incredibly low calorie version of meringue, I will try to re her to photograph it before scoffing it.
egg white low cal
not sugar sweetner

i admit I will add lashings of cream my Keto recommends 15-20% fat in food……yeh!!!!!!!!!!
and I have home grown organic fruit from the freezer so far I have tested the redcurrants and blackcurrants and was most pleased with the results. So a nice Hungarian style Keto Pavlova seems to be on the cards.

Yesterday Xmas decor in the front hall, tree and decked the bannisters
today moved furniture in dining room so a table to eat off and a table for all the extra food.
nuts macadamias pecans walnuts almond hazelnuts brazils …check these will be cooked with butter and salt and pepper
pistatchios ready salted….check
lindt chocolate 90 percent cocoa, yum yum,
turkey breast in freezer
sirloin beef joint in freezer
large gammon ham in freezer
lamb in freezer
seafood in freezer
cream in shops remember to buy early as there was none 2 days prior to Xmas!!!!!
cheese in wax oh yeah
wykes butter
aqua libra various flavours,
non keto baileys, because I really really must, baby Cham because he may be a bloke but he loves this and you only get it at Xmas, drinks cabinet yep cocktails can and will feature,
normal chocolates for those not on Keto, eyes Ferraro rocher yum yum,
coffee fresh ginger cinnamon low sugar Sweetner and CREAM, alcohol optional. Ok not THAT optional :D
and we have some tokaji because raisins make better wine. there May still be a three year one around by]ut I am eyeing a 1992 bottle which I think is only a one year but has been stored on its side so cork is good. Once opened it will be a race to the bottom!
So meat,nuts,beuutter,cheese, chocolate,drinks inc alcohol,hey what else do you need…
oh yeah the Keto pavlova AND a Keto version of my late mother in laws chocolate trifle….I kid you not this recipe is to die for, and if you check the calories you might!
chocolate cookies, I used to use Maryland now I make them
some strong cold coffee
alchohol of choice favourites for this are 1. Rum, 2. Brandy I use cheap stuff not a good one we drink that WITH it, Tia Maria, hey it’s coffee!, or other
whipped double cream, not that horrible canned stuff full or sugar, never ever liked it yuk, and chocolate flakes for decoration

dip cookies in coffee and alcohol butter with cream and place in trifle glass, continue until all cookies used, pour any excess Coffee/alcohol if not too much to-e with more cream, points for looking pretty, sprinkle chocolate (alcohol soaked cherries are allowed at this time if you wish) put in fridge, and leave OVERNIGHT, lock fridge,lock kitchen door, put guard on door, inspect anyone wandering around with a spoon, safe guard until time to dish out, this is way way better than tiramisu (family recipes excepted from comment) and Very rarely makes it to a second day.
sit down and do not count the calories. No no. And weigh your self e days after Boxing Day to avoid a heart attack!
 
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