Running Bear’s June 2025 Coffee Shop

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Good Morning All. Partly cloudy and 72° this morning. That's a bit cooler than it's been lately. Maybe rain next Monday & Tuesday.

Busy day at the home cannery yesterday. I spent twice as long canning the Green Beans than I had planned. Canned 8 jars, my pressure canner capacity, and had to go a second round because I still had enough for 3 more jars. That's 11 yesterday, all with perfect seals. The seals fail occasionally if something isn't just right. First batch before lunch and the second after lunch and nap. It took me and my wife nearly 45 minutes to snap all of them. Processing takes about an hour a batch regardless of the number of jars.
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After sitting overnight, they're ready for the rings to be removed, date added to the top and put into the canned goods cabinet. I should be doing another and the last batch this weekend. That is unless Mother Nature intervenes and gifts me with a bumper crop!
It actually rained yesterday per the forecast, but calling it a rain is a real stretch of the imagination. It was brief, lasting no more than 2 minutes and just barely got everything wet. Didn't even register in the rain gauge. Later in the afternoon, I used the weedeater for a bit before heading for the train shed and eventually the pool.
Neighbor came by yesterday and baled the part of my hayfield that he cut Sunday. Not sure why he only cut half of it as I didn't stop him from his work either time. Might have something to do with the fact that he was using his 60 year old open John Deere tractor instead of his newer air-conditioned one. He and his late dad were never real good with proactive preventative maintenance on any of their equipment.

The weekly grocery trek is today. The list is short so it won't take long. Wife probably will not go since she has a nagging upper respiratory infection and I don't know of any other stops to be done today.

I did get to spend some time out in the train shed yesterday on a small detail project. Small but very time consuming. I have a lawn mower kit from JL Innovative Designs made from white metal castings.
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As with most of JL's metal castings, a whole lot of time is required to trim and file the flashing off the tiny parts.
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I have advanced to filing and adding the wheels to the riding mower so far.
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This will not be a foreground model! But I already knew about their metal kits as I have put together several before, mostly motorcycles.

Louis - Most all of the time, Amazon deliveries are made to our house in an Amazon vehicle. I don't know whether it's a contract delivery service or Amazon people themselves. I've never seen the same driver twice, but I don't see all of them anyway. Many don't follow the delivery instructions that I have on file with Amazon. I happened to catch one driver and asked him if he looks at them, and he commented "No, I just deliver to the first door that I see". He was however, going to the right door. Some have just left the packages laying in the yard next to the driveway. I always respond to the delivery E-Mail, but it has not done any good. My instructions are to the door closest to the driveway!
Deacon - Have a safe trip home. Hope that you have room for all of your wife's purchases!;)
Insomniville - Your weather forecasters in the Austin area might be the same ones that put out the forecast here in North Central Texas. Accuracy and timeliness are not skills that they possess.
Marlin - Those crows would have a tough fight with my vultures for that rat.

Everyone have a great Thursday.
 


What type shoes? If they are axle wipers, I don't particularly care for those as they are usually made of brass and are dissimilar metal to the axle, so they corrode and end up insulating. I tried those on my HO UP passenger cars and my N PRR passenger cars and they don't work. Even with my lighting caps, they would still flicker badly and I would have to clean the axle.

What kind of truck is on the Varney? My Athearn Consolidation uses axle end pickups that act like bearings. Part number 2428-PR03. They are wired on both sides.

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They are Tomar shoes. The Varney uses metal trucks and picks up on one track only, the locomotive picks up on the other track. I have a Bachmann that uses wipers on the axles, and works very well, I think I will be adapting the shoes to also pick up from the axle to the metal frame, where a wire attaches to the motor.

This will provide some redundancy, to help for the start from a stop.

Thanks for the reply!!
 
Good morning all!

Currently 79F heading up to 90F. Another warm humid day, but I'm not going to complain. Had another nice pop-up 'thunderstorm yesterday afternoon. Any rain at this point we will take.

Have a few things to do around the house today, but nothing hugly pressing.

Hopefully get back downstairs today and work on the layout. Have kind of stalled the last couple of weeks due to lack of motivation. I'm ready to now get back to it.

Have a safe day everyone!
 
Good Evening All. Hey Dave, or anyone else. Can you put your birdman hat on and help me identify this never before seen visitor? I was in the pool when it arrived and I used the phone to snap a few pictures, so sorry for the quality.
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Quite colorful for this neighborhood.

You may wonder why I take the phone out to the pool, since I disdain it to begin with.
1) I use the clock to know when to get out to begin supper prep.
2) I use an app (Plane Finder) on it to identify the planes flying overhead. Passing interest to me. I used to call Sherril with questions!
Looks like a Painted Bunting. Nice photograph!
 
Good evening folks. Winding down for the day, watching my HO 2-8-0 drag 5 JN coaches along with my N Ruston drag 4 box cars around the room. Watching Ancient Aliens and catching up on MRR forum news.

I probably have 20 hours on the 2-8-0 since it arrived 3 days ago. It is an awesome runner and I have ensured to refresh the oils and greases to try to keep it that way. Very glad I changed my mind and got this. May be gunning for the 2-6-0 when it finally hits the stores.
I don't even have an hour on my new 0-6-0 yet. Tested it for about 5 minutes, then went back to the project that was underway, landscaping.

It ran super smooth and quiet.

I wrapped up the landscape and ballast project at hand late yesterday afternoon and will be cleaning that section of track. Then some light weathering on the new loco,

Then...run trains.

Later, Dave LASM
 
I am so glad I write on this forum, I didn't even think of this. Thanks!!!
It's a lot easier if you buy the solid 1-2-3 blocks. They also have solid 2-4-6 blocks.

 
Good morning from So Central Wisconsin. The humidity just won’t let up. The WeatherChannel says the humidity outside is at 99% but that seems high even though I was just out there checking on the rain gauge and it is oppressive. The high for the day should be in the low 90’s with over a 50/50 chance of severe storms. They removed the hail threat but high winds and tornado threats are at level 2. The rain predictions yesterday of 1-3” and severe weather again bypassed my area and went west.

Grocery day and I am as low on diet Dr Pepper as I can remember in retirement, 10 bottles =10 days. I drink 1 caffeinated DDP at wake up. Terry mentioned it’s also get $.40 off per gallon for every $60.00 spent at HyVee today. We need maybe $30 but adding water softener salt and getting 5 or 6 bags will cover. I use maybe 1 bag per month when it’s just Terry and me. 2 bags + per month the 3 months the daughter’s family have been here. DDP is at $6.75 a 6 pack of 16.9oz. bottles or 3 packs for $18.00 for the best deal. I will be skipping that purchase.

The daughter has 100% moved her office out of here to her outbuilding. That building will be her office, studio, holds her side gig craft business and the granddaughters chicken egg business to be. Landscaping started Tuesday between the storms that other than overnight rains has not appeared during the day. That should be done today. The son in law is now thinking of moving his desk into an open office in the out building. He now has 2 full time employees and the little office he had been using in his storage/lab/everything building will be converted to an employee lounge! He did get the bids on fencing the vineyards and asked me at hockey last night what I thought. We are going to figure out costs on installing the fence ourselves. He has the post hole digging equipment and with the heat and this being just a slow growing time it can be done with his crew, him and maybe me. The cost difference of a 6’ high chain link fence and the 8’ high fence was six figures to do the area (20 acres) of just the vineyard plus installation. He’s had no vandalism though for 10 days. The cost of fencing in the whole property of 82 acres he and the daughter own to protect the vineyard was let’s say very prohibitive.

I am working on 2 paper mills for 2 layouts. One of the guys is coming over this morning as he wants to show me a spot on his layout for another papermill. The one I’m working on is 2’x30’ but he saw the design I have for the other much smaller layout 3’ x 9’ and worked from both sides. We shall see. I’ve had 2 mills on past layouts and I can tell him one of the mills generally gets ignored during OPS sessions. He also one of the guys telling me to rip out my layout and start over. Fun with trains!

Enjoy
 


Good that you keep active. So are the jobs equated to the amount of loco wheels? haha
Forgive me, sometimes I have no idea what you mean. 🤪

Many don't follow the delivery instructions that I have on file with Amazon. I happened to catch one driver and asked him if he looks at them, and he commented "No, I just deliver to the first door that I see".
Many if not most drivers don't bother with the customers' instructions. I do, but sometimes when I read them, I think WTF.

One driver told me "When I see all caps I ignore the instructions" another told me "I disregard all customers' instructions"

I try my best because I keep in mind, without the customers Amazon doesn't need me.

One customer wrote in her instructions "You all suck!" Another wrote "Before you throw my package onto my porch do a little happy dance" So yes, occasionally the customers' instructions should be ignored. But they should always be read and whenever possible followed.

I like the customer who put please and thank you into their instructions. I follow them happily. Others I follow out of due diligence, when possible.
 
More on Amazon's customers' instructions.

I had one tell me "Please don't deliver the purple dinosaur" As if I know what is in your package. Amazon will love me for opening the box and taking out the purple dinosaur. Now what do I do with it?

Another told me to deliver to the back of their rowhouse "It's the one with the purple Subaru" That should be easy... not! There were two purple Subarus in different yards! How about your house number in the back if you want a rear delivery to a row home? Oh, sure I have plenty of time to waste counting houses to find yours.

I can only imagine what the van drivers think with as many as 1000 packages or more to deliver.
 
Forgive me, sometimes I have no idea what you mean. 🤪


Many if not most drivers don't bother with the customers' instructions. I do, but sometimes when I read them, I think WTF.

One driver told me "When I see all caps I ignore the instructions" another told me "I disregard all customers' instructions"

I try my best because I keep in mind, without the customers Amazon doesn't need me.

One customer wrote in her instructions "You all suck!" Another wrote "Before you throw my package onto my porch do a little happy dance" So yes, occasionally the customers' instructions should be ignored. But they should always be read and whenever possible followed.

I like the customer who put please and thank you into their instructions. I follow them happily. Others I follow out of due diligence, when possible.
If a person gets a job as a delivery driver and refuses to follow basic, legitimate instructions such as “5th house on the left, grey Toyota in driveway”, they need to be fired.
 
It's a lot easier if you buy the solid 1-2-3 blocks. They also have solid 2-4-6 blocks.

I really need to get a couple sets of these. This is one tool I have never bought.

While I love my 2 Micro-Mark magnetic building jigs, there are some kits too big to use it effectively.
 
More on Amazon's customers' instructions.

I had one tell me "Please don't deliver the purple dinosaur" As if I know what is in your package. Amazon will love me for opening the box and taking out the purple dinosaur. Now what do I do with it?

Another told me to deliver to the back of their rowhouse "It's the one with the purple Subaru" That should be easy... not! There were two purple Subarus in different yards! How about your house number in the back if you want a rear delivery to a row home? Oh, sure I have plenty of time to waste counting houses to find yours.

I can only imagine what the van drivers think with as many as 1000 packages or more to deliver.
We get our next door neighbors packages all the time. If I see the driver on camera I will ask them to look at the address. Their response was "the system said to deliver here".

My neighbor put a big number sign right by the sidewalk to try and encourage proper delivery.
 
If a person gets a job as a delivery driver and refuses to follow basic, legitimate instructions such as “5th house on the left, grey Toyota in driveway”, they need to be fired.
I wish Amazon thought like you! It is discouraging for me to hear awful stories about other drivers from customers.

But these dumb asses work for as little as $18/hour. Amazon puts up with a lot of crap to have as much as 800lbs of packages delivered for as little as $54.

Still these fools get themselves "deactivated" (fired) as Amazon calls it for independent contractors. I know of only one other driver who has been doing it almost as long, 8years as I have, 9years. The rest come and go. I've seen drivers return an entire load without leaving the station.
 
We get our next door neighbors packages all the time. If I see the driver on camera I will ask them to look at the address. Their response was "the system said to deliver here".
Part of the problem is Amazon combines deliveries if the mailboxes are within 50' of each other. That can create confusion when scanning multiple packages to different addresses for the same stop. Again, a little due diligence on the part of the driver goes a long way.

Why Amazon uses mailboxes is beyond me. We are forbidden by federal law to put anything into a mailbox. But still customers request "Put it in my mailbox" Amazon's standard delivery instruction is the front door unless the customer requests otherwise. But we can never put anything in the mailbox, even if the customer asks us to.
 


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