Running Bear’s June 2025 Coffee Shop

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What is up with centipedes? We see them occasionally in the utility room sink. They give my wife the creeps!

Thank you for sharing all the information. We seldom see any insects in the house, but I find it all to be interesting.
House centipedes eat spiders also.

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So its kind of like a semi owner operator, you look at a board to find a route you want?

Can you call and negotiate a better rate with them, or is it firm?
It's all done through the Amazon App. There is no longer any negotiation. You wait for rates to go up and they always do. My wife is the master of the Amazon App. I just wait for her to tell me where we are going. Amazon has over a dozen different stations including groceries.

We only work out of the stations delivering packages. I refuse to deliver groceries; I'm not being at the mercy of people giving tips.

There are five different Amazon stations for packages in the Baltimore Metro area. My wife will take routes/blocks from any of the five if the money is right.

I do know many Walmart deliveries come directly from their stores.
 
Good morning, busy on the forum!

I got my part of the lawn mowed, I use a John Deere 304x. Purchased new by Dad in 2007. Numerous new belts later, runs like a top. New filters, oil, and sometimes plugs every spring is all it needs. Kawasaki motor.

Wife uses the Briggs and Stratton 6.75 22in push. Just as old. Plugs, oil, air filter, blades.

Light rain and 60f.

Train shed followed by Dombey and Son by Dickens.

Fascinating novel, majors on pride and human behavior. The book has been on a slow steady build, will finish it this week.

Ordering pickup shoes to improve tender electrical on my 4-6-0. The weak link. Anyone use them,?

Later, Dave LASM
 
Good Morning All. Clear and a tad bit cooler this morning at 72°, high today much cooler at 89°. Why??? Well, overnight the NWS added afternoon thundershowers to our forecast, although at just 40% chance. Of course it will happen for sure, as yesterday I both topped up the pool and irrigated the garden!
Busy day again yesterday, starting with picking more Green Beans and Tomatoes. Hand-pollinated a few Yellow Squash also. When I take a break from bending over the Green Bean row, I sit under a shade tree and trim the tops and roots off some of the Onions that I picked last month. Postponed the pressure canning of the Green Beans until today, as it took longer to pick them yesterday than planned. Add to that, my wife went shopping at Walmart (and other places) and wasn't going to be available to help snap them all. But she did find some wide-mouth Mason jars that are better to use for the beans than the narrow-mouth ones that I had ready. Even though they are brand new, I still ran them through the sanitize cycle of the dishwasher to get them ready for today. Still not quite enough Tomatoes ready for the spaghetti sauce that we're planning to can, but they will keep for a few more days. I've run out of room to store them! I have approximately 80# in various containers. Spaghetti sauce goes into 24 oz jars and I will use the narrow-mouth pint jars that are already sanitized for plain Tomato sauce.
Not sure what today's activities will be after the canning. There's parts of the yard that are due for mowing again, but a lot has to do with whether it will rain or not. No gardening is planned for today since I watered it yesterday.

Out in the train shed yesterday, I mostly ran trains. Nothing special, I did not do any local switching. I did switch out 16 full Ethanol tankers for 16 empty ones at the Ethanol plant. The crew set 4 up on each side of the 4 loading racks, and on the next run, will move them down the track and position the remaining 8. In my world, the initial positioning and eventual pick up is done by a dedicated crew doing nothing else. The re-positioning is usually done by a passing local when available. If not, I will dead head a crew out to do it. I also started sorting through some more re-discovered bags of detail parts to see what I can use immediately. First up were some trash and recycle containers that I assembled and painted earlier this year. About half were duly positioned on the layout. Most of the rest today, but I am saving a couple for the unscenicked part of the layout. I also gave 4 recently built freight cars a quick spray of dull coat to take the shine off. I'm not planning on putting any graffiti on these, but I may weather a couple before I take their pictures to add to my database.

Terry - Sketchy ads? Maybe some folks want to see them! I used to except this site from AdBlock and occasionally click on ads just to generate revenue for Bob. But after an update a year ago, it went back to blocking them and I just haven't changed it.
Dave - As I just posted, I use AdBlock. It's free and works over 95% of the time. They do ask for donations if you want, but it isn't required.
Insomniville - A device for keeping the chlorine floater out of the skimmer mouth would be a great idea. I've had issues with that over the years and Mike mentioned that earlier this summer.
Chad - Protected or not, if someone kills a protected rattler, shame on them for telling anyone. As Deacon posted, my family is a protected species.

Everyone have a wonderful Wednesday.
 
@migalyto Did you see last night's Cubs-Cardinals game? The was a back-and-forth affair. I can't remember ever seeing a runner score from second on a sacrifice fly in a MLB game. I turned out to be the winning run.
I did not watch it. I will check out the condensed game later though.

I always love the Cubs Cards rivalry. The Cubs Brewers are a good one too.

We call Busch stadium Wrigley South and Miller Park Wrigley North. Both are an easy drive and when the two play its about half and half with the fans attending.
 


I always love the Cubs Cards rivalry.
It's over 140 years old! It can be traced to the 1885 World Series (World Championship) an end-of-the-year playoff series between the National League champion Chicago White Stockings, who later became the Cubs and American Association champion St. Louis Browns who later became the Cardinals.

The Cardinals have won 19 NL pennants, while the Cubs have won 17.

I'm familiar with the Cubs-Cardinals rivalry going back to 1969. I watched many "Game of the Week" between the two. In the days of guys like Ron Santo, Billy Williams, Bob Gibson, and Joe Torre.
 
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Good Morning All. Clear and a tad bit cooler this morning at 72°, high today much cooler at 89°. Why??? Well, overnight the NWS added afternoon thundershowers to our forecast, although at just 40% chance. Of course it will happen for sure, as yesterday I both topped up the pool and irrigated the garden!
Busy day again yesterday, starting with picking more Green Beans and Tomatoes. Hand-pollinated a few Yellow Squash also. When I take a break from bending over the Green Bean row, I sit under a shade tree and trim the tops and roots off some of the Onions that I picked last month. Postponed the pressure canning of the Green Beans until today, as it took longer to pick them yesterday than planned. Add to that, my wife went shopping at Walmart (and other places) and wasn't going to be available to help snap them all. But she did find some wide-mouth Mason jars that are better to use for the beans than the narrow-mouth ones that I had ready. Even though they are brand new, I still ran them through the sanitize cycle of the dishwasher to get them ready for today. Still not quite enough Tomatoes ready for the spaghetti sauce that we're planning to can, but they will keep for a few more days. I've run out of room to store them! I have approximately 80# in various containers. Spaghetti sauce goes into 24 oz jars and I will use the narrow-mouth pint jars that are already sanitized for plain Tomato sauce.
Not sure what today's activities will be after the canning. There's parts of the yard that are due for mowing again, but a lot has to do with whether it will rain or not. No gardening is planned for today since I watered it yesterday.

Out in the train shed yesterday, I mostly ran trains. Nothing special, I did not do any local switching. I did switch out 16 full Ethanol tankers for 16 empty ones at the Ethanol plant. The crew set 4 up on each side of the 4 loading racks, and on the next run, will move them down the track and position the remaining 8. In my world, the initial positioning and eventual pick up is done by a dedicated crew doing nothing else. The re-positioning is usually done by a passing local when available. If not, I will dead head a crew out to do it. I also started sorting through some more re-discovered bags of detail parts to see what I can use immediately. First up were some trash and recycle containers that I assembled and painted earlier this year. About half were duly positioned on the layout. Most of the rest today, but I am saving a couple for the unscenicked part of the layout. I also gave 4 recently built freight cars a quick spray of dull coat to take the shine off. I'm not planning on putting any graffiti on these, but I may weather a couple before I take their pictures to add to my database.

Terry - Sketchy ads? Maybe some folks want to see them! I used to except this site from AdBlock and occasionally click on ads just to generate revenue for Bob. But after an update a year ago, it went back to blocking them and I just haven't changed it.
Dave - As I just posted, I use AdBlock. It's free and works over 95% of the time. They do ask for donations if you want, but it isn't required.
Insomniville - A device for keeping the chlorine floater out of the skimmer mouth would be a great idea. I've had issues with that over the years and Mike mentioned that earlier this summer.
Chad - Protected or not, if someone kills a protected rattler, shame on them for telling anyone. As Deacon posted, my family is a protected species.

Everyone have a wonderful Wednesday.
What? No mention of Bobby Sherman passing yesterday? Not that I was a fan, but the wife was.
 
Good Morning All!
56F @ 71% overcast. Been cooler for the last few days, more to come for the next few days.

What a mission - 37 hours round trip and nobody knew what had hit them!

Besides the cot behind the ejector seats, there is also a chemical toilet, refer and microwave. Talked with a couple of F117 pilots when were were at the Ellesworth AFB museum who happened to be site-seeing with family like we were. One stated that the B2 cockpit/sleeper is smaller than your normal Freightliner/KW/Pete sleeper cab. Also said that the go-to drink found in the refer was Mt Dew. Both of the crew need to be in the front seats for landing/take off, refueling and of course over the target. Food is pilot choice but usually junk food; easy to heat and eat. Bags of other junk food candy/snacks abound. Wonder what the dash looks like mid-flight and if they have a good stereo for jamming? The B2 is not supersonic as that would create a sonic boom and pretty much void the stealth part. As to the refueling - they are still stealth, all radar would see is the tanker.

Love our military! Great job!

L8r
 
Another repeat of the last few days. Not going to get any better here until Friday at the earliest.

Hiding inside from the heat for the fourth day now. I did open my front door last evening about 2000 to grab the mail. The moisture in the air was thick as thieves. Before opening the door I thought it might be nice to have a Bitburger and sit on the front porch after the sun set. Not. The beer would be hot before I even sat down.
 
Good morning from a weird looking sky in So. Central Wisconsin. The sky has that ugly yellow hue to it that always indicated to me that nasty weather is on the way. The WeatherChannel radar shows a storm coming but it doesn’t look too bad as it doesn’t have all the yellow and red colored severe weather spots. My area is on the bottom edge of the storm system as it moves through going northeast.

It’s 71f degrees now heading to the mid 80’s. Looks like the rain will start in the next hour. It should continue for most of the day.

Terry has a doctor appointment at 2:20 that I will tag along ( chauffeur) for and then we will stop for a late lunch or very early dinner after. The grandson has a hockey game at 5:30 which makes the early dinner appealing. I will stop at the nearby Michael’s and return the Calligraphy pen tips I picked up curbside the other day. They are the wrong brand but worst they are not the fine tips I ordered.

I am looking again into my stock market portfolio. Maybe because I’m bored or frustrated with current world events but I’m thinking it’s time to reduce my exposure. I finished a thorough review on each of my stocks last week. Most are dividend producers and should be held but I’m now thinking why?
 
Good day folks, already 88 here, sunny with the forecast of 96 and possible rain. LadyC went to get a pedicure and then we will get lunch. Possibly make it an early dinner then snacks later? Heading home tomorrow, then family back in Friday or Saturday for the vote at Church whether my Nephew will be our next Pastor Sunday.
 


Mornin' all. It's ~85F and 73% humidity. Kicking around outside yet again. The temp is fine, the humidity is meh.

Got a couple of cloudbursts yesterday out of the blue. Maybe a tenth of an inch, if that, but more than predicted. Sometimes I wonder if the weather app just uses random numbers to guess the weather. It would certainly explain why the predictions change so often.

Got up early this morning (ugh!) and dropped the cat off at the vet, and remembered why I truly hate doing that. I always feel horrible "abandoning" them, even though I'm going to pick them up later. Urgh, am not a happy camper today. At least my littler cat is here to keep me company.

She's not happy about her absent brother either, though...

On a different note, I waited half a day yesterday for my toys to arrive from Amazon, only to go check the tracking -- whereupon I discovered that they were still in my cart and I never actually ordered them. So now I'm waiting for them again today. At least I got some work done on track planning; I think I have a winning concept, now I just need to add the details and see if it all fits together, unlike the previous five attempts.

And that is all I plan for today, other than picking the cat up later. I'll just eat out; I'm not feeling like cooking. And pick up a new prescription since the doc thinks I'm vitamin deficient. At least there's no sign of diabetes or worse things! I love it when my labs come back better than expected.

westtexjohn: The Austin show has been on my calendar since I discovered it a couple of weeks ago. I'm hoping it's a good one! I might even take the train down there since there seems to be a station right next door, and it seems rather appropriate... Then again, I might need the car to haul whatever I end up buying back home. Choices, choices...

santafewillie: The floatie-stopper-thingy has been on my TODO list for... three, maybe four years? I could just be unlazy and put a string on the thing, but... nope. Not clever enough! If I ever actually get around to my clever enough solution, I'll be sure to share. =)

And now I can't get rid of the images dancing through my head of ants using the insides of old Lionel formed rails (whatever you call that stuff) as their own little subway when you're not looking. Thanks for that, bnsf971! :)

I feel like I have a bunch of other stuff I wanted to respond to, but I can't seem to find it, so... oh well. It's been rather busy around here lately, so I'm sure there will be opportunities to say more later.

Have a great day everyone!
 
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