Running Bear's January 2026 Coffee Shop

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Good Morning All. Clear and 23°, supposed to hit 55° later on. The wintry forecast will finally hit us, later this week it is supposed to get nasty.
1768914140002.png


Those 7° nights are scary since homes around this part of the country aren't built for that kind of weather. Exposed plumbing under pier & beam houses. That 7" of snow on Saturday won't be fun either, since snow plows are non-existent around here. But it isn't as bad as some years that we have had in the past but still survived. No rolling blackouts are being discussed this year like they were in Feb. 2021.

Running a little late this morning because I went back to get a few more minutes of sleep after loading the heater and starting this post. A few minutes turned into more than an hour!
As I posted yesterday, we made a wasted trip to town and I'll be going back today. Although today I will only be going local about 12.5 miles away to the PO and pharmacy. Wife's eye doctor appointment which was re-scheduled for this Friday has since been moved back to February rather than us traveling during the predicted 2.2" of rain proceeding the snow! I've become more discretionary as I have aged.
Over the next couple of days, I will be moving a supply of firewood to the sheltered front porch to avoid trudging through the possible snow coming up.

Had an issue out in the train shed yesterday while running a few trains. I had a Kato SD40-2 that just wouldn't run. There's a well known issue with this particular model regarding a design flaw with the electrical pick-up. I've known about this flaw for over 20 years, but it never had affected me yet; until yesterday. I decided to attack it yesterday instead of setting the engine aside. Took over an hour dissembling it and working on it. But I was successful. A long term fix is to remove the contact strips and solder wires from the truck to the light board, but soldering is not my strong suit. This is the one and only engine model that Kato used this design on, and it has been known as a problem since the beginning of production in 1999.
As I posted yesterday, on Sunday I added drivers to two convertibles so I could put them on the road instead of a parking lot. Surgery was needed on both, even though I started with "seated" figures. Here's one.
1768922687117.jpeg

The results of both including passengers.
1768922797913.jpeg

1768922734413.jpeg

1768922747584.jpeg

The Mustang is a recent Oxford model and the Karmen Ghia Porsche is a 20 year old Malibu International model, which I believe are actually counterfeit Model Power models from the 90's. I don't remember all of the details, but they were super cheap at Walmart at the time. I have many that I had bought, and I also bought a bunch from a fellow forum member who was getting out of the model railroad hobby at the time.

Tom O - Cold weather is always on my mind here. I just really don't like it. Anything below 35° bothers me. I have no issues with our 100°+ days here in the summer.
Good luck to Terry in getting the family situation under control. I remember some of your posts from a few years ago regarding the sister. I always feel fortunate that those situations don't exist in either of our families.
John - I'm not really looking to make any money on the pennies that I still have. I'm just hoping to have enough to last the rest of my modeling days. I have containers and boxcars full, as I have been using them as weight for 35+ years.
Convenience for us is having anything within 15 miles! In the last year, there has been a Dollar General and a liquor store opening just 6 miles away. While I have no need for the liquor store, the Dollar General is good for odds & ends that we might run out of.
Lonnie - I had seen that older video of the UP engine catching fire before. Interesting that it happened again in the same area.

Everybody have a great Tuesday.
 
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Willie - hang in there and stay warm. I'm keeping my fingers crossed concerning your pipes. Keep the bath tub trickling over night. It's the ice in the morning that will make things rough on the roads. Be safe.

We've had an inversion layer for the last week. Air quality is bad...Silicon Valley bad. Timberline lodge and Mt Hood Meadows ski resort are both at about 6,000 ft and it's supposed to be 50f today. That's how bad the inversion layer is. We went below freezing for about 2 hours today and we should be just under 50f this afternoon.
 
Even getting older now, I still deal with cold better than summer heat. I hate it when I start sweating buckets with no way to stop it except to come inside. I love to be outdoors, but not when it's 95°F and the HI is 110°F.

Eyes are responding to the drops very well according to the doctor. Pressure tests were 16 mm/Hg left eye and 12mm/Hg in the right eye. After dilating, she also told me the drains around both iris's looked good too and are now functioning the way they are supposed to. I wish I had argued with the front desk back in Oktober; my left eye would not be as bad as it is now.

Using the drops, and all of this pressure testing is being used as a baseline for further exams. Once the pressure is under control at a steady pressure, she will be able to see if anything else is wrong if things change on future exams. Pressures now are well below upper levels for normal.

February 12th I get fitted for glasses using my Air Force HGU-4/P Randolph Engineering frames as a donor pair, and then back on the 19th for follow-up pressure testing.
 


Marlin39 said:
Willie - hang in there and stay warm. I'm keeping my fingers crossed concerning your pipes. Keep the bath tub trickling over night. It's the ice in the morning that will make things rough on the roads. Be safe.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the thoughts. I normally do not have an issue with keeping warm, even during blackouts because I heat mainly with wood. My pipes normally are not an issue either, except in 2021. Sometime years ago, our water coop failed to file what they thought was unnecessary paperwork with the state utility commission, so they were hit with the rolling blackouts during the "deep freeze" of 2021. As a result, every one of their water pumps froze and we and 1000's of others were left with no water. So, no more water drip and the water remaining in everyone's pipes froze.
I replaced all of my split copper pipes with Plex pipe which is more forgiving to expansion, but I still drip water. The water coop has since filed the paperwork which means that they are not subject to the power blackouts any more. Note that one of my daughters lives 4 doors down from a fire station in Dallas that did file the proper paperwork, so she was never without power since she was on their part of the grid. As far as the roads, I am fortunately at a point in life where I don't have to deal with them. We have enough food and beer to last a few weeks, and if there is a medical emergency, then it's EMS's issue to take care of us. They are pretty diligent even where we live.
 
santafewillie said:
Those 7° nights are scary since homes around this part of the country aren't built for that kind of weather. Exposed plumbing under pier & beam houses. That 7" of snow on Saturday won't be fun either, since snow plows are non-existent around here. But it isn't as bad as some years that we have had in the past but still survived. No rolling blackouts are being discussed this year like they were in Feb. 2021.
Click to expand...
We can handle it here but I don’t think we’ve had any nights yet get that cold this winter. At least not yet. Good luck.

I don’t think we’ve had that much snow at once yet either (in the valley).
 
I'm looking forward to seeing this low track to the north so we finally get a measurable snow this season. It might keep Willie from being buried in snow too. But the downside of that is Willie will be getting freezing rain.

They still haven't read the instruction for their Magic 8-Ball yet, so everything is still up in the air over this approaching storm.
 
rgeiter said:
When your co-worker buys a new tip for his
3-D printer that can print small stuff. Pretty nice surprise this morning. He’s always feeding my layout with stuff. View attachment 254956View attachment 254957
Click to expand...
I want a friend like that 😊
To the average Joe, that looks like dumpster trash, but to hard-core MRRers like us, that's pure gold.
A pile like that would definitely look good on my layout 👍
 
Willie- A few days ago you posted pictures of your people painting process and how you organized the painted people.
I liked your ideas and decided to do something about this :
3 people.jpg

I found a fishing organizer and just finished two and a half days of sorting to get this:
HO people.jpg

This box is replacing the 10 small containers that kept getting knocked over or moved around as I searched for different things.
Thanks for the inspiration!
 


santafewillie said:
Good Morning All. Clear and 23°, supposed to hit 55° later on. The wintry forecast will finally hit us, later this week it is supposed to get nasty.
View attachment 254960

Those 7° nights are scary since homes around this part of the country aren't built for that kind of weather. Exposed plumbing under pier & beam houses. That 7" of snow on Saturday won't be fun either, since snow plows are non-existent around here. But it isn't as bad as some years that we have had in the past but still survived. No rolling blackouts are being discussed this year like they were in Feb. 2021.

Running a little late this morning because I went back to get a few more minutes of sleep after loading the heater and starting this post. A few minutes turned into more than an hour!
As I posted yesterday, we made a wasted trip to town and I'll be going back today. Although today I will only be going local about 12.5 miles away to the PO and pharmacy. Wife's eye doctor appointment which was re-scheduled for this Friday has since been moved back to February rather than us traveling during the predicted 2.2" of rain proceeding the snow! I've become more discretionary as I have aged.
Over the next couple of days, I will be moving a supply of firewood to the sheltered front porch to avoid trudging through the possible snow coming up.

Had an issue out in the train shed yesterday while running a few trains. I had a Kato SD40-2 that just wouldn't run. There's a well known issue with this particular model regarding a design flaw with the electrical pick-up. I've known about this flaw for over 20 years, but it never had affected me yet; until yesterday. I decided to attack it yesterday instead of setting the engine aside. Took over an hour dissembling it and working on it. But I was successful. A long term fix is to remove the contact strips and solder wires from the truck to the light board, but soldering is not my strong suit. This is the one and only engine model that Kato used this design on, and it has been known as a problem since the beginning of production in 1999.
As I posted yesterday, on Sunday I added drivers to two convertibles so I could put them on the road instead of a parking lot. Surgery was needed on both, even though I started with "seated" figures. Here's one.View attachment 254963
The results of both including passengers.
View attachment 254966
View attachment 254964
View attachment 254965
The Mustang is a recent Oxford model and the Karmen Ghia is a 20 year old Malibu International model, which I believe are actually counterfeit Model Power models from the 90's. I don't remember all of the details, but they were super cheap at Walmart at the time. I have many that I had bought, and I also bought a bunch from a fellow forum member who was getting out of the model railroad hobby at the time.

Tom O - Cold weather is always on my mind here. I just really don't like it. Anything below 35° bothers me. I have no issues with our 100°+ days here in the summer.
Good luck to Terry in getting the family situation under control. I remember some of your posts from a few years ago regarding the sister. I always feel fortunate that those situations don't exist in either of our families.
John - I'm not really looking to make any money on the pennies that I still have. I'm just hoping to have enough to last the rest of my modeling days. I have containers and boxcars full, as I have been using them as weight for 35+ years.
Convenience for us is having anything within 15 miles! In the last year, there has been a Dollar General and a liquor store opening just 6 miles away. While I have no need for the liquor store, the Dollar General is good for odds & ends that we might run out of.
Lonnie - I had seen that older video of the UP engine catching fire before. Interesting that it happened again in the same area.

Everybody have a great Tuesday.
Click to expand...
We believe the sister will now to Terry’s demands. The 2 nieces who live closer to us than their mom came over last evening. When it’s comes to giving help to family we have no issues in helping pay a portion or in this case past and future medical bills. We just won’t hand them the money. Everything Terry said had to be done was agreed upon last night and both nieces were thrilled they didn’t have to help their parents financially as neither are well off enough right now to help. All medical bills, the mortgage and utilities will come to Terry’s set up. It’s up to the girls to get the direct changes handled and their mom to sign off.

They were shocked to find out how badly their mom has screwed up the finances, especially the medical but were devastated when they were told how in arrears the mortgage is. That’s when they asked if Terry would meet them last night. They both were helping to pay the mortgage.

It took our lawyer he said maybe 90 minutes doing a check on the sister’s finances to discover how bad it is.

Terry’s youngest brother said yesterday to Terry he will contribute 20% but didn’t want the others in the family to know

I hope it works out but Terry was able to sleep last night

TomO
 
@RhB Michael great news on your eyes.
Cold here today and just gonna get worse this week. LadyC took off early today, heading for Illinois to pick up her Aunt to celebrate her 80th birthday. She is planning on staying til Saturday, but that depends on what snow may hit here and there. Heading to Conway, to hit a bookstore, gamestore and Golden Corral, as LadyC hates buffets. So this is my opportunity! You all play nice!
 
Good afternoon everyone.
Took the dog out at first light and it was zero. He didn't waste any time taking a whiz and we both made a beeline back to the door. He went straight to the bed and crawled under the blankets. I didn't see him for a couple hours 😊

It made it up to 10° and now I have to go down to the mail box. The Athearn GP35 I ordered on fleabay
came, so I have to go out as the postal lady didn't think ;) to bring it up to the deck.
I just asked the dog if he wants to go get the mail and he gave me the "are you crazy" look 😆

Have a nice rest of the day ☺️
 
DeaconKC said:
@RhB Michael great news on your eyes.
Cold here today and just gonna get worse this week. LadyC took off early today, heading for Illinois to pick up her Aunt to celebrate her 80th birthday. She is planning on staying til Saturday, but that depends on what snow may hit here and there. Heading to Conway, to hit a bookstore, gamestore and Golden Corral, as LadyC hates buffets. So this is my opportunity! You all play nice!
Click to expand...

Yes, I'm glad it so far has been halted from getting any worse, and I'm very thankful for that. The only challenge I really face is shooting, since I am right handed, but left-eye dominant. I can still see the sights without any interference from the glaucoma, but the clear circle of vision around the sights and target is not really big.

I'll have to see how it goes this spring on the range.
 
santafewillie said:
Good Morning All. Clear and 23°, supposed to hit 55° later on. The wintry forecast will finally hit us, later this week it is supposed to get nasty.
View attachment 254960

Those 7° nights are scary since homes around this part of the country aren't built for that kind of weather. Exposed plumbing under pier & beam houses. That 7" of snow on Saturday won't be fun either, since snow plows are non-existent around here. But it isn't as bad as some years that we have had in the past but still survived. No rolling blackouts are being discussed this year like they were in Feb. 2021.

Running a little late this morning because I went back to get a few more minutes of sleep after loading the heater and starting this post. A few minutes turned into more than an hour!
As I posted yesterday, we made a wasted trip to town and I'll be going back today. Although today I will only be going local about 12.5 miles away to the PO and pharmacy. Wife's eye doctor appointment which was re-scheduled for this Friday has since been moved back to February rather than us traveling during the predicted 2.2" of rain proceeding the snow! I've become more discretionary as I have aged.
Over the next couple of days, I will be moving a supply of firewood to the sheltered front porch to avoid trudging through the possible snow coming up.

Had an issue out in the train shed yesterday while running a few trains. I had a Kato SD40-2 that just wouldn't run. There's a well known issue with this particular model regarding a design flaw with the electrical pick-up. I've known about this flaw for over 20 years, but it never had affected me yet; until yesterday. I decided to attack it yesterday instead of setting the engine aside. Took over an hour dissembling it and working on it. But I was successful. A long term fix is to remove the contact strips and solder wires from the truck to the light board, but soldering is not my strong suit. This is the one and only engine model that Kato used this design on, and it has been known as a problem since the beginning of production in 1999.
As I posted yesterday, on Sunday I added drivers to two convertibles so I could put them on the road instead of a parking lot. Surgery was needed on both, even though I started with "seated" figures. Here's one.View attachment 254963
The results of both including passengers.
View attachment 254966
View attachment 254964
View attachment 254965
The Mustang is a recent Oxford model and the Karmen Ghia is a 20 year old Malibu International model, which I believe are actually counterfeit Model Power models from the 90's. I don't remember all of the details, but they were super cheap at Walmart at the time. I have many that I had bought, and I also bought a bunch from a fellow forum member who was getting out of the model railroad hobby at the time.

Tom O - Cold weather is always on my mind here. I just really don't like it. Anything below 35° bothers me. I have no issues with our 100°+ days here in the summer.
Good luck to Terry in getting the family situation under control. I remember some of your posts from a few years ago regarding the sister. I always feel fortunate that those situations don't exist in either of our families.
John - I'm not really looking to make any money on the pennies that I still have. I'm just hoping to have enough to last the rest of my modeling days. I have containers and boxcars full, as I have been using them as weight for 35+ years.
Convenience for us is having anything within 15 miles! In the last year, there has been a Dollar General and a liquor store opening just 6 miles away. While I have no need for the liquor store, the Dollar General is good for odds & ends that we might run out of.
Lonnie - I had seen that older video of the UP engine catching fire before. Interesting that it happened again in the same area.

Everybody have a great Tuesday.
Click to expand...
I may be wrong but the green vehicle looks more like a Porsche than a Karmen Ghia. The driver may appreciate the added handling and horsepower of the Porsche. :D
Nice job on adding drivers.
 
RhB Michael said:
Yes, I'm glad it so far has been halted from getting any worse, and I'm very thankful for that. The only challenge I really face is shooting, since I am right handed, but left-eye dominant. I can still see the sights without any interference from the glaucoma, but the clear circle of vision around the sights and target is not really big.

I'll have to see how it goes this spring on the range.
Click to expand...
My prescription shooting glasses help me see the target better, but the handgun sights are still not clear anymore.

I had to quit competing back in 2016. I had won the state smallbore silhouette title 2010 & 2011, but like you my eye sight was being an issue. It was floaters that moved into my vision looking through the scope. I'll be honest, I also was beginning to have issues holding steady offhand. Hitting the rams at 100m requires some real "zen" when they're smaller than a 3x5 card. I had attained a Master class rating, in 3 silhouette disciplines, which made it all the more frustrating.
 
RhB Michael said:
Even getting older now, I still deal with cold better than summer heat. I hate it when I start sweating buckets with no way to stop it except to come inside. I love to be outdoors, but not when it's 95°F and the HI is 110°F.

Eyes are responding to the drops very well according to the doctor. Pressure tests were 16 mm/Hg left eye and 12mm/Hg in the right eye. After dilating, she also told me the drains around both iris's looked good too and are now functioning the way they are supposed to. I wish I had argued with the front desk back in Oktober; my left eye would not be as bad as it is now.

Using the drops, and all of this pressure testing is being used as a baseline for further exams. Once the pressure is under control at a steady pressure, she will be able to see if anything else is wrong if things change on future exams. Pressures now are well below upper levels for normal.

February 12th I get fitted for glasses using my Air Force HGU-4/P Randolph Engineering frames as a donor pair, and then back on the 19th for follow-up pressure testing.
Click to expand...
I am just the opposite. I grew up in "Snow and Cold and Yuck" and never wanted to see it again. Headed west after I got my degree, and never looked back. I only go back east for weddings, funerals, and public executions. It is 75 today, but we are heading to a cold snap Friday with possible rain and 66 for temperature, You learn that AC is your friend.
 


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