Running Bear’s May 2021 Coffee Shop

[Sirfoldalot]

Morning Gang! Supposed to reach a high of 69 today with partly sunny. It was downright chilly yesterday as I tried to do some yard chores - and still fussing with the RV that is parked in front of the house. Guess I will get a letter from the HOA - but wait - I'm on the board - wonder how that may be handled?

The Spousal Unit has MIL duty from yesterday noon until Monday noon, so I will actually be able to fix a few things here without hearing - "You're not going to leave that out here, are you?"

Also need to hit the Wallyworld for some supplies and another higher class grocery for a few things too!

Just a quick coffee, FLO. I'm going to try and beat the crowd at WW!
BBL

 

[McLeod]

Goood Morning!

There was frost again this morning; 35°F right now. It's a good thing I covered the wife's flowers last night.
The sun is shining, and it's supposed to warm right up. I think I'll cover things up one more time tonight, just to be safe, and it's supposed to be clear sailing from now on.

Just going to have a quick coffee and read a-bit; then I'm out. There's lots to do this weekend.

I'll just leave a couple of photos on the table. - The reason I took these two photos is because the box cars are older, and I'm trying to record history.
I sure don't like the after-market artwork, but, it's there. It's very nearly impossible these days to find any boxcar that hasn't been assaulted by criminals.
BCOL was built in 1992 and the CN was built in 1994. They both have a different kind of door, I think:

Thanks for the likes on my posts. It is greatly appreciated, and if it wasn't for people noticing; then I wouldn't bother.

Have a good one!

 

[TLOC]

Good morning global modelers. A nice day in Wisconsin till this evening. Even the weather guessers admit they don’t know the track of the possible storms. They say we will get heavy weather if the sun come outs. It’s out now so...

The plumbers are here adding a reverse osmosis system under the kitchen sink. Terry was complaining about the crud on her coffee machine that she has always cleaned the last couple days of the month for years. When the plumbers were here a few weeks ago they mentioned the RO and the son in Texas has a system so we were familiar. We have a water softener so we will have better water for cooking and of course for her needed coffee.

Taxes, they are not political! The reason, the politicians don’t listen to us anyway and do what they want. Interesting discussion though, well written and no nastiness. It is amazing how things are so different in the same country.

Sound decoders? What are you using if you do sound? I just received 8 ESU loksound decoders v5’s and will deliver them and the locomotives to a buddy who has the ESU programmer. I thought seriously about the Soundtraxx but kept to the ESU.

We are getting organized to head to Austin on Tuesday. We will be gone around 3 weeks depending on how long we take to get there and the same for the return trip. We will definitely stay in Austin 10-14 days. Day trips and maybe a overnight as we continue to explore Texas. Funny thing, Willie, mentioned Marble Falls, that and Llano are on the first possible day trips. The son heads to work and we head out searching.

Brian our son forwarded me a picture of him and his crew on a water tower in Llano. They have buzzards sitting on the tower and when they open the inspection hatches a few times per month the buzzards crap all over. They were installing some items to hoping keep those things off the tower.

enjoy your day
tom

 

[santafewillie]

Good Morning Everyone. Cloudy and 69° with all of the rain chances removed from today's forecast. Yard needs mowing again even though I mowed it last Saturday. Nothing new on the grocery trek except that Kroger has not removed the "mask required" sign from their door, despite the national announcement. Compliance was still over 95%.

How about a whole pile of sausage and gravy with buttermilk biscuits this morning Flo. I'll take pineapple juice this morning instead of OJ.

Thanks for the likes and comments yesterday regarding my projects; Karl, Guy, Sherrel, Rick, Tom O, Steve, Garry, Patrick, Hughie, Ken, Gary, Tom.

Yesterday in the train shed, I worked on that Accurail kit and did some more custodial work while the glue set up. I did finish the car including re-numbering it and applying dull coat.

For those who might be unfamiliar with Accurail kits, this is no "shake the box" kit. Not counting trucks, wheels (which I replaced with metal KD's) and couplers; this kit has 34 individually applied parts. They also sold it with four road numbers. For $4, they would send the modeler a decal sheet with twelve sets of additional side and end numbers, allowing 16 different cars to be added to a fleet. If you were willing to cut and paste those numbers up further, the combinations were far greater. I stuck with the 16, all of which I bought in 2014. They were the last freight cars that I purchased because I decided that I was out of room on the layout.
It will go on the layout without weathering for now.

James - Thanks for the BL2 link. Another place to visit on the bucket list.
Guy - Looks like a nice place to walk alongside the tracks. Partial shade and trains as well.
OK Jaz - This one's for you. Wife painted a picture of one of our Rhode Island Red roosters a few years ago.

Sherrel - You're correct that Texas has higher property taxes since we have no state income tax. And it does vary widely depending on which county you might live in. Properties a mile away from me across the county line are on average, double what I pay. What also helps me is the freeze on taxes for seniors. They raised the valuation on my overall properties in 2020 by over 22%, first change in valuation since 2014. New guy hired for that position decided to make up for the previous lady who was always a little lax. She also spaced out her appraisal increases so she showed a small increase every year in her district; instead of the big one that his guy got which will be followed by many fallow years. Since I was already covered by the freeze, ag exemption, and homestead exemption, my total taxes only actually went up 3%, the first rise in 6 years. Note too that in the list that I posted, there are no municipal taxes, no tax for garbage/sewer, library, or any other associated city taxes.

I pulled over at the turnoff for the ranch - and took a leak on the side of the road.
That's my contribution to him!

Probably no where that he didn't already go!
Tom O - Thanks for mentioning the Museum of the Pacific in Fredericksburg, I had forgotten that it was there.
LBJ!!! Most Texans turned on him after Medicaid funded millions of taxpayer dollars to the 4 million people who had never paid into the system. It's a bigger nightmare today.

AWOL Coffee Shop visitors - In my observation, Bob (Burlington Bob), Dave (LASM) and David (Trussrod), have all taken time away from the shop and then returned, repeatedly.

LATE ADDENDUM
Guy - Those doors are known as combo doors, a regular sliding door and a plug door. the idea was to allow both doors to be opened for forklifts carrying wider loads like lumber, but also allowing a smooth inside wall for normal loads with the plug door in the closed position. Center beam flatcars took over for lumber, and the cars themselves fell out of favor because of the additional maintenance costs associated with the extra door. I'm not sure whether or not they are still made, or when the last ones were made if they are not.

Today is NASCAR DAY, the third Friday of May every year. It's a relatively new observation beginning around 2003 or 2004 if I recall correctly. IIRC for those under 50 years old!
Everybody have a great day and an awesome weekend. Enjoy your day and stay safe.

 

[kbkchooch]

Sound decoders? What are you using if you do sound? I just received 8 ESU loksound decoders v5’s and will deliver them and the locomotives to a buddy who has the ESU programmer. I thought seriously about the Soundtraxx but kept to the ESU.

Tom For sound mostly I have Soundtraxx, but ESU/Loksound is running a close second. With having a programmer now the V5s are becoming my decoder of choice. That being said I do have 1 loco with a WOWSOUND decoder and it sounds great.
I have trashed a few decoders in locos that came with factory MRC sound and refitted them with Soundtraxx, as well as 1 loco that I bought secondhand with a Digitrax sound bug.....both sounded like

 

[TLOC]

Hi

A few weeks ago JazA complimented one of my pictures. Thank you again. She did mention I should throw some bushes or trees in front of the crack on the wall. That crack actually is concrete seeping from when the forms for the foundation were removed. When I built the layout on the 2 concrete walls I had thought of drywalling them. I didn’t think too many would notice and in person you really have to be looking but when operating watch the track not the wall. So I didn’t. I did grind one down but it wasn’t worth it. But in pictures they do stand out. So I added some trees. It’s an improvement IMO at 40’. I am thinking of re-doing the trees around this one with more leaf structure and adding a 60’70’ tree/s. Better modeling via peer review. Thank you for looking and please comment. It feels good to be doing something positive in the train room.

TomO

picture taking view

helicopter and throttle view

the tree on the left is a 40’ tree, should I go higher, needs trimming. The right one needs more leaf structure.

better—the fix maybe

the original picture

 

[GeeTee]

gas is holding at $2.69 this week , Tropical storm trying to for in the Gulf https://cdn.star.nesdis.noaa.gov/GOES16/ABI/SECTOR/gm/GEOCOLOR/1000x1000.jpg 40% chance ,looks like its goin to get here just in time for the weekend.

 

[Mountain Man]

Cloudy and mild here after two days of rain. Fuel costs continue to climb as always as the tourist season approaches, running from $3.39 to $3.59 and higher depending on location. Governor just announced $93 million in tax hikes in direct violation of our Taxpayer Bill of Rights law, which prohibits it unless state-wide voter approved. Kind of hard to concentrate on modeling in the face of the need to survive since retied pay does not increase, nor is interest on savings worth more than a pittance. Also, no one can afford lumber or other construction supplies anymore, and apparently no one wants to work either. We were at the local supermarket yesterday and the bakery and deli have been closed: the staff quit and no replacements are available. Makes me wonder how they plan on paying their bills if they aren't working.

Houses that were being built in our area are now sitting idly, waiting for crews and money to complete them, and the handful that have been completed are priced out of this world for this region by hundreds of thousands of dollars. Ironically, our property tax assessment this year went down. There is some advantage to being old after all!

All over, businesses are trying to hire but people are not responding. Guess some of my summer projects are going to be on hold for awhile.

As the Chinese so famously said: "May you live in interesting times". Looks like we are doing just that.

Still, it costs nothing to dream and plan, and it gives me a great excuse to shelve some of the heftier honey-do projects!

 

[IronBeltKen]

We don't call this state Absurdistan for nothing!

The Lottery was supposed to help fund schools, then the Casinos were, but the tax payers have not seen a break. So where is all the $$$$ going?
. . .

Karl, I believe a large part of the answer can be found right HERE!

 

[GeeTee]

The architectural term for them is a Folly .. a costly ornamental building with no practical purpose. You spend millions of education dollars
on them , and the only thing you get in return is higher tax rate .

 

[GeeTee]

FYI Fox business is reporting that KCS will likely ditch the CP merger in favor of a CN merger.

 

[TLOC]

FYI Fox business is reporting that KCS will likely ditch the CP merger in favor of a CN merger.

yep and they have to pay CP $700,000,000. USD for legal feesfor cancelling their agreement. If the CN deal falls through CN will pay KCS $2 billion for legal fees which also cover the 700m to CP. My prediction is in 2023 this merger gets denied.

What a joke, I have stocks in all 3 and the smart deal was with CP. legal cancellation fees mean nothing to these big boys. Doesn’t bother the lawyers who drew up these contracts if any party loses, the Attorneys still win.

Tom

 

[Texas Hobo]

Good Afternoon all! An on and off rain here today. At least the ground has time to absorb the water, unlike those folks over in Lake Charles area.
Can I get a sarsaparilla?
I started putting some Woodland Scenics Plug and Play lights in a couple of buildings.

The main building lights aren't to bad to work with, but the gooseneck lights are murder. The wires are like working with a single strand of hair.

STAY SAFE

LATER

 

[GeeTee]

yep and they have to pay CP $700,000,000. USD for legal feesfor cancelling their agreement. If the CN deal falls through CN will pay KCS $2 billion for legal fees which also cover the 700m to CP. My prediction is in 2023 this merger gets denied.

What a joke, I have stocks in all 3 and the smart deal was with CP. legal cancellation fees mean nothing to these big boys. Doesn’t bother the lawyers who drew up these contracts if any party loses, the Attorneys still win.

Tom

Agree 100% , It will get denied most likely, if KCS was in finacial difficultly it might be a different story ,but their not. I suspect that KCS may be counting on it getting denied as they would receive a reverse cancel fee from CP . That's the only reason I can see for KCS even considering it is they see it as free money.

 

[Mountain Man]

Don't know much about the CN/KCS business. This area is D&RG/Sante Fe/UP/BNSF courtesy of Buffet buying it all out. So the depots are from one era, the tracks from another, and the trains from the current one...oh,yeah, the Rocky Road locos that service the Portland cement plant near Florence.

Both Canon City and Florence, however, both have the old D&RG and Sante Fe stations preserved and in use, and Pueblo maintains the old UP station in near mint condition.

Sad thing, so many miles of track left that are disused or abandoned (the entire Royal Gorge route up the Arkansas Valley towards Tennessee Pass from Canon City westward, for example) while the Washington nitwits keep trying to fund multi-billion dollar public transportation schemes that go nowhere.

I need to charge up the DeLorean go back.

 

[montanan]

Good evening, Going to make it quick today. Woke up to a couple of inches of snow this morning and it did snow on and off all day, melting as fast as it come down Can't complain about the moisture.

I may have located another dachshund, a little one year old girl. If it goes through, it will be road trip time down to Texas.

Gotta run and get dinner in the ove3n.

Later

 

[GarryCBQ]

Good evening .....

Regarding the possible acquisition of KCS by CP or CN. As has been reported, CN now has the better offer. We will wait and see what is decided by Surface Transportation Board. ... I own stock in KCS, CO, CN, and other railroads. They do well with the buy and hold strategy.

This possible acquisition reminds me of when I worked for CN's GTW. I wrote parts of GTW's applications to the ICC for approval of acquiring DT&I and DT&SL. Both acquisitions were completed. I also worked on a proposed GTW acquisition of part of the Milwaukee Road. It fell through. Soo Line acquired it, and now that is CP.

WIllie .... The Santa Fe hopper looks great.

Tom O ...... Nice job hiding the concrete wall for the "picture taking view". My train room has drywall covering the concrete foundation walls.

Ken ..... Ghost students? What next?

Hughie .... Your lighted buildings look nice.

Chet ..... I hope things work out with the dachshund.

Everybody ...... Have a nice day.

 

[IronBeltKen]

Hello Shop Dwellers, we've got 69*F and calm under partly cloudy skies here in central MD.

And a hearty THANKS to all the like'rs and commentors - Hughie, GT, Willie, Tom-O, Rick, Patrick, Gary, Guy, Sherrell, Karl

I see there hasn't been much activity in here over the past 8 hours, other than a few posts about the CP & KCS CN & KCS planned merger, which the conventional wisdom seems to be that the application will be denied...and I hope that it is! IMHO we've had way too many mergers over the past few decades, I like to think that there is still some variety - even though I don't live anywhere close to KCS territory. I still have a bitter taste in my mouth from the absorption of Western Maryland into the Cheesie System, who promptly liquidated it.

Chet - that's great news about finding that young dachshund, hope it all works out!

* * *
In trainroom news, I finished [?] putting in all the cloth clamps around the perimeter of the layout. This last 10ft section had mostly wide open space on the back of the fascia, so I was able to just stand in front of it, apply hot glue to the clothespins, and stick 'em on!

...so tomorrow marks the start of the second phase of this project: Cutting the landscape cloth sections into the correct dimensions for whatever locations they are supposed to go in. I might need to go out and buy a set of heavy-duty fabric shears, because this one experimental piece of landscape cloth I cut off was a bit of a pain using plain scissors. The reason I put a question mark by the word "finished" [above], is because I might discover that need the cloth clips spaced a bit closer to each other, I find out once I start hanging the first few cloth pieces. At least if more clips are needed, I still have way more clothespins than I would need.

Good night - and have a pleasant tomorrow!

 

[Boris]

Taxes, they are not political! The reason, the politicians don’t listen to us anyway and do what they want. Interesting discussion though, well written and no nastiness. It is amazing how things are so different in the same country.

All politicians, regardless of label, embrace them...

With having a programmer now the V5s are becoming my decoder of choice.

Me too! Never thought about it, BTW, love working with the Lok programmer.

All over, businesses are trying to hire but people are not responding. Guess some of my summer projects are going to be on hold for awhile.

That's because those businesses don't want to pay people a decent wage, or provide them with regular hours. Around here (NJ), they are advertising signing bonuses from $400 to $1000, plus starting salary around $18.50 to $20/HR plus guaranteed hours. That's where people are going. Free market Capitalism at work.

I don't think CN + KCS will fly before the STB, without CN making a lot of concessions, (Like selling their North South line to CP). CN _ KCS is anti-competitive as constituted.

PC #4902 with an Eastbound at North Philly on 5/17/1969. Painted in the American Railroads Scheme for the Golden Spike Centenial. Hal Smith Photo

PRR MU #263 at Queen Lane on the PC Chestnut Hill Branch 5/18/1968. Hal Smith Photo

 

[Jaz avalley]

Good Morning All. Partly cloudy and 67°. Right now the light rain is mainly east and southeast of me. I'm not sure we'll get any today, although it is sprinkling at the Weather Underground station 1.1 miles southeast of me. If it's Friday for Tom, it's Thursday for me and the weekly grocery/beer trek to Denton is on tap. It won't be a big one since we're taking a short three day trip to the Hill Country in Central Texas starting Sunday. We plan to stop in Hillsboro to visit the Roadside America Museum, which is a privately owned collection of 40s and 50s advertising memorabilia, classic cars, and nostalgic Americana. Then it's on to Marble Falls for lunch and a tour of one of the local wineries or breweries. Sunday evening we will meet an old work buddy in Fredericksburg, which is re-known in Texas as a German Heritage town, for dinner. Then a day and a half touring that area, more breweries and wineries and a wildflower seed farm, before departing Tuesday afternoon for dinner with our son and his wife in San Antonio. Depending on when we get to San Antonio, we may go to the model railroad museum there first.
Yesterday was a somewhat productive day, I got four new tires for the RDX in advance of the trip and cleaned up some of the garden afterward. Then we went to eat at Outback Steakhouse with a negative experience that turned positive later. They brought the entree out before the salads, and the server brought cold bread! He sent the manager over who knows us from many previous visits, and she apologized. What I didn't realize until the server brought the check, was that the manager comp'd everything but the drinks, thus saving us around $45!

Easy this morning Flo. Just a bowl of raisin Bran with milk this morning.

Thanks for the many likes (and loves) yesterday regarding he progress on the Savings & Loan; Sherrel, Karl, Steve, Guy, Garry, Patrick, Tom O, Hughie, Joe, Chet, Gary, Tom, Ken.

Mostly yesterday I painted stuff out in the train shed. All of the mailboxes, roof vents and fire hydrants that came with the Bachmann kits. A couple have already been added to the Savings & Loan.
View attachment 128311
I'm switching directions for a couple of days, and I decided that I wanted to build an Accurail freight car.
View attachment 128312
View attachment 128313
I started with the underbody, but I guess that I forgot to take any progress photos!

Sherrel -

Good question! Maybe Elon Musk is going to bore a tunnel to the left coast!
Steve - Interesting side hobby. That's a nice looking bracelet.
Guy - That bank isn't the tallest structure on my layout, but I can relate to it's size. They recently completed a skyscraper in a town twelve miles away, all of four floors of a Holiday Inn. In this part of the world, grain elevators are considered "prairie skyscrapers".
Garry - I can see how those Bachmann kits could supply a person with loads of detail parts. I now have all of the mailboxes, fire hydrants and roof vents assembled and painted; and I will be dropping them into scenes all over.
Tom O - I do sometimes get into a rut or get bored, but not for long. I usually just run trains for a couple of hours and that always perks me up.
Terry - I don't have an issue with paperless billing because I never gave my E-Mail address out to any utility, credit card co., or bank. Whenever they ask for updated info, I still refuse. But if you ever drop your guard and accidently give it away, then beware. I know folks who innocently gave it to utilities years ago before all of this paperless BS hit, and they now have the same issues as you have. I also pay most bills with an envelope, check and stamp.
Tom - I thought that I spotted a vineyard on the left.

Property taxes - Gee Tee brought up the outrageous taxes in his area, $8K a year is outrageous! I pay about $900/yr for a four bedroom 1500 sq ft home, 15 acres and a train shed, plus a barn.

Everybody have a great day. Kroger supposedly dropped the mask mandate yesterday, we'll see how that works out in a few hours.I'll most likely still wear mine this week.

Blimey 8k versus 900dollars is madness,plus you have 3x more land, is this a tax for paying for the police the roads the street lights etc, we pay 1800pounds the figure was set on purchase for 14 acres and a 3 bed,we bought another 6 so 20 acres now and we built a large extension almost doubling the groundfloor but they thankfully do not reevaluate,unless the rules change...faints.