Running Bear's August 2025 Coffee Shop

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Good evening from Seattle. Not a good day walking as even with a 4 hour train ride I only got 11,000+ steps in. Ah, too bad. Damn though I’m sore. I can’t tell if the diabetic neuralgia in my feet is acting up or if it’s from too much walking. Seattle though is much more hilly then Vancouver which I thought was pretty hilly in the downtown area. Everything slopes to the harbor there ! The last 4 days averaged 16,842 steps and the weather was great. Seattle today had lots of sun with only a touch of a breeze

We did the Pike Public Market this afternoon. Saw the fish throw at the Pike Pace Fish Market
IMG_7217.jpeg


1 bad throw (fish fumbled) and a good one that I videoed and CANNOT attached here

Today’s lunch at 1:30 was a superb fried shrimp and truffled fries with a diet pop. Terry had a red clam chowder where normally it’s a white, she loved it. She stole 1/2 my fries

Dinner was at 7 back down near the Public Market, roughly a mile from the hotel. So 2 walking trips to that area and back today.

I had a shrimp po’boy sandwich on a buttered bun. I was concerned but it actually was great! I love shrimp basically cooked any way.
Terry had a lobster roll with extra lobster and loved it.

Tomorrow we are taking a 3 hour city tour ride with guide. After that we will meet some long time friends at a watering hole by the Space Needle who live in the area. Then out to dinner at their place. They are 4 friends who left Wisconsin together in 1990 and built a home on the water in Medina.

More fun tomorrow
 
Good evening from Seattle. Not a good day walking as even with a 4 hour train ride I only got 11,000+ steps in. Ah, too bad. Damn though I’m sore. I can’t tell if the diabetic neuralgia in my feet is acting up or if it’s from too much walking. Seattle though is much more hilly then Vancouver which I thought was pretty hilly in the downtown area. Everything slopes to the harbor there ! The last 4 days averaged 16,842 steps and the weather was great. Seattle today had lots of sun with only a touch of a breeze

We did the Pike Public Market this afternoon. Saw the fish throw at the Pike Pace Fish Market
View attachment 235820

1 bad throw (fish fumbled) and a good one that I videoed and CANNOT attached here

Today’s lunch at 1:30 was a superb fried shrimp and truffled fries with a diet pop. Terry had a red clam chowder where normally it’s a white, she loved it. She stole 1/2 my fries

Dinner was at 7 back down near the Public Market, roughly a mile from the hotel. So 2 walking trips to that area and back today.

I had a shrimp po’boy sandwich on a buttered bun. I was concerned but it actually was great! I love shrimp basically cooked any way.
Terry had a lobster roll with extra lobster and loved it.

Tomorrow we are taking a 3 hour city tour ride with guide. After that we will meet some long time friends at a watering hole by the Space Needle who live in the area. Then out to dinner at their place. They are 4 friends who left Wisconsin together in 1990 and built a home on the water in Medina.

More fun tomorrow
Sounds awesome. My girlfriend and I were up in the Puget Sound area last month visiting some of her relatives. One of the places that was pretty good was the Bayview Thriftway store in Olympia. In the deli they'll make some food for you to take to this one dining room. I got a burrito while my girlfriend and her cousin both got some kind of pasta. After lunch My girlfriend and I went for a walk around the docks for a little bit while her cousin did some grocery shopping. We also stopped in Everett while we were up there and visited another one of her cousins and got tacos from a food truck near the hotel we were staying in that night. We then drove back down to Seattle the next day. I wish we could have stopped at the Space Needle and my girlfriend wanted to stop at the first Starbucks location, but it was the middle of rush hour. We were running kind of late and needed to get to our next hotel near the airport so we could catch our flight back in the morning. We'll have to do both of those another time.
 


Good morning, Everybody!

My Birds (Baltimore Orioles) had the day off yesterday. Therefore, there is no game to watch this morning. As I often do on days like this, I'm watching the Washington Nationals. Yesterday the Nationals hosted the Mets in DC, and the Nationals came away with the win! Money can buy big names, but it doesn't guarantee wins.

I enjoy watching this young Nationals team. I really enjoyed watching the Nationals' rookie pitcher, Brad Lord. This young man is putting his name into the conversation for NL Rookie of the Year! For unknown (to me) reasons the Nationals bounced him back and forth between the rotation and the bullpen. WTF! It's not like they have "deep depth" in starting pitchers.

Deep depth is a term I picked up from Earl Weaver. I was blessed to be born during the 35-year period when the Orioles won more games than any team in MLB. I will always remind people of that every chance I get!

Finally, the Nationals have kept Brad Lord in the rotation. In his six starts since returning to the rotation he has a more than respectable ERA of just over 3.00. Better yet, the Nationals have only lost one of those six games. With the lone loss coming at the hands of the team with the best record in all of MLB, the Brewers. A close loss at that.

Brad Lord reminds me of former Orioles' starting pitcher Dylan Bundy, in stature and style. I like the way he pitches; he pounds the black and the bottom of the zone. All the while mixing it up. Like Dylan Bundy he only has slightly above average stuff. Also, like Bundy, this young man knows how to keep the ball off the barrel of the bat! He gives the Nationals a chance to win every game he starts. You can't ask for any more than that.

Another thing I find curious about the Nationals is the sponsor on their jersey, AARP! o_O It is ironic to me as the Nationals are one of the youngest teams in MLB. What can I say? I'm a member of AARP. (target audience?) It is cheap enough. I like cool gifts, and my wife reads the AARP magazine. I got a great discount on life insurance too. I'm still wondering why anybody would be dumb enough to sell me life insurance and at a discounted rate! "Quick honey, give me a pen, before they change their mind"

I'll spare you the rest of the details of the game and any more of my ramblings.

All is well here in Southeast Baltimore.

Enjoy your day Everybody!
 
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Found that thread. Man, that was a lot of work! I cannot believe the cost of printing(?) the board was only $.65 (back then). I've made a few of the piecemeal ones with the light strip that you had in your later photos and would continue with those except that I cannot find a lower kelvin light strip for sale. I think about 2800K is my range now but it is not a favorite for the masses, I guess. I could just layer kapton until the right color is achieved...
The cost of printing was for double layer boards only (not more layers like a lot of things today) and a minimum quantity. I think it was 100. You could do fewer but the cost was a lot higher.

The best board (I didn’t design) and it’s the EM13 board that takes D&H decoders (though I’ve used other micro ones as well with a little work). It’s on the forum too.
 
The cost of printing was for double layer boards only (not more layers like a lot of things today) and a minimum quantity. I think it was 100. You could do fewer but the cost was a lot higher.

The best board (I didn’t design) and it’s the EM13 board that takes D&H decoders (though I’ve used other micro ones as well with a little work). It’s on the forum too.
Oh and btw. There are two light boards I did. The V2 is a better design that makes use of the capacitors in a better way for a short anti-flicker circuit. However. I am not a hardware engineer and I’m sure that the circuit is far from optimized. I designed like a software guy would approach it with basic electronics understanding. That said it works, supports a few different voltage regulators and supports direct current hookup or a decoder.

I want to make a version with the decoder built in. I have one or two home brew decoder curcuit projects and firmware that I want to integrate into a light board.

Also the V2 one up on the site supports the complete board with you adding LED, but there is also a version that support the light strip tape you can buy that you can cut in segments. And then there is one more format I forget what it’s for. I think it’s for using with factory light boats so you can add in a few capacitors and a decoder. But it’s been a few years since I last looked at the project.
 
Oh and btw. There are two light boards I did. The V2 is a better design that makes use of the capacitors in a better way for a short anti-flicker circuit. However. I am not a hardware engineer and I’m sure that the circuit is far from optimized. I designed like a software guy would approach it with basic electronics understanding. That said it works, supports a few different voltage regulators and supports direct current hookup or a decoder.

I want to make a version with the decoder built in. I have one or two home brew decoder curcuit projects and firmware that I want to integrate into a light board.

Also the V2 one up on the site supports the complete board with you adding LED, but there is also a version that support the light strip tape you can buy that you can cut in segments. And then there is one more format I forget what it’s for. I think it’s for using with factory light boats so you can add in a few capacitors and a decoder. But it’s been a few years since I last looked at the project.
Here's a site I found a little while ago for DIY DCC decoder. He includes the circuit diagram for reference. Motor and function decoders.


I had to go find it again as I had deleted it from my bookmarks once I realized that there ain't no freaking way! haha
 
Here's a site I found a little while ago for DIY DCC decoder. He includes the circuit diagram for reference. Motor and function decoders.


I had to go find it again as I had deleted it from my bookmarks once I realized that there ain't no freaking way! haha
I’ll Check it out

Here is one I got off the other site. I actually bought some of the “commercial” ones from them. but have not used them yet. But they’re all open source.


There is another one I got off the other site several years ago and actually bought parts for but never did anything with. I need to find the links to it.
 


@Kusojiji I also wanted to say about a post someone made earlier. You don’t need to consist your motor decider and all your car function decoders. Merely having them all on the same address will do in most cases.
If I'm understanding this, if I have a loco with address 3985, make the passenger cars 3985 as well and tie the cabin lights to a function that 3985 isn't using and tie the tail lamp to F0 to come on with the loco's lights.

Since I made all my passenger cars the same address, can I just leave them all on the track and program them all at the same time?
 
Well, howdy there internet peeps and those with illumination one way or the other...

It's Troy again!

Been up an hour, but because I'm geographically ahead of Willie, thought I'd wait until he was up before posting. 😜

It cooled down enough (mid 60s in F-degrees) to sleep with the windows open. A bit muggy, but we did it.

Weather guessers say it'll be a real nice week or so.

Screenshot 2025-08-21 at 5.34.46 AM.png


For those of you who only use C degrees, nothing over 28° in the forecast.

Other than a grocery run to get steaks for the grill tonight, not much else going on. Wife gets her haircut today.

I still have game figures to paint. So I'll probably do that today. As for writing, the words don't want to be worded. Not sure what this scene is bringing on, so the characters aren't talking to me yet.
 


Morning all,

65° and clear, going for a high later of 92°. Can't wait for that cold front dropping the temps to the low 80's for the weekend.

Got to leave here in an hour and a half to go to get my 5 week post surgery appointment. Just glad it's in the morning instead of this afternoon.

Willie: I did understand the dialog between the dialog between the 2 this morning. After Air Force electronics training and a Vo-Tech school certification in electronics, I used to do component level repairs on circuit boards. Then I fell into computers and then went to college, getting a BS in Computer Science. My Electrical Engineer daughter doesn't understand why I know enough electronics to be dangerous...

And here I thought it was to pass gas. You know, a silent but deadly!

So no one really knows where it came from!

Just remember farts smell so deaf people can laugh at the joke!


BBL
 
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