Running Bear's June 2024 Coffee Shop

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We used to be able to make a dump run coming back with more than we took
Todd that's not good. I have to laugh at that one. I 'm bringing a lot of good stuff to the Stormville Airport yard sale coming up in a few weeks. It's all good stuff I just don't no longer need it. A lot of house items, clocks, tools and HO train cars etc. because I'm downsizing my layout. I just want to get rid of the stuff in case I need to sell the house.
Swal
 
Terry is a great financial person. I’m terrible which is why I don’t carry cash. Cash is meant to be spent and I’m good at spending…

The same with me.

Can you imagine if you've had a typical woman for a wife?🤣

My wife is much like Tom's. She's not stopping me from getting new hearing aids, but she's not happy that I'm spending that amount.

She's a penny pincher even when there is no need to be.
 


I played golf yesterday and shot 47 and still won all the money. I play with a lot of rich friends and as bad I as I played, they played worst. Four of them are going to Saratoga for the big race this Saturday. There not renting out their place but instead going to the track. I'm playing with them again today after I visit my wife. I hope to have another good day.
Swal
 
correct, the russians have destroyed the one and only the BIG one from the Antonovs, it got destroyed last year when the war started..
But they have some more Antonovs so this is another one. I think (not shure) there are 3-4 left. But the biggest got destroyed, but i think i heard they are rebuilding it!

The big one that was destroyed was the AN-225 with three engines per wing


This is an AN-124.

 
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This is obviously not your fault. But i was reffering to general masses (my ex falls into that category). I keep finding out most men can live on very little. Most women are absolutely horrible with money, they just can never be satisfied. Most advertising is directed to women, because the banksters know how to get money from them.
Men are pretty good at spending money too. But usually its on toys -- ATV, guns, golf, motor cycles, RV, model trains etc. Only a minority spend a lot on shoes and clothes. My impression is that women are the other way around.
 
The same with me.



My wife is much like Tom's. She's not stopping me from getting new hearing aids, but she's not happy that I'm spending that amount.

She's a penny pincher even when there is no need to be.



Proper Hearing Aids are essential! I have been wearing them since 1972. I have seen the advancement in technology. Lately they have gone leaps and bounds. I get new ones every 3 years at the end of the warranty. I do not bother going past the warranty. In 3 years time new advancements happen all the time. I budget for them during the 3 years because I spend 15k on them for a pair/set for top of the line for my hearing impairment. I am legally deaf. I only have 17% hearing capabilities in each ear.
 
Good Morning All. Cloudy and 67°. The seemingly never ending thunderstorms made another appearance overnight, after a brief visit around dawn yesterday. Rain gauge now holds 1.25" in it and the yard looks like a rice paddy. I have now had thunderstorms 8 of the last 10 days with a tornado thrown in! May's rainfall total of ~17.5" is not actually the wettest May I have recorded in my gardening records; that would be May 1982 when I received 20.9" here. That would be the year that the lake across the road actually came up to the road when it overfilled. For a perspective, here's a picture of the normal size of that lake, taken last week after the tornado by my grandson's drone.
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That year, the normally sized 26 acre lake grew to over 600 acres! However the Corps of Engineers assured us that the dam itself (seen in the distance) is 1' lower than the actual road and water would flow over it along with the spillway before breaching the road in front of us. Not so a quarter mile north where the road dips down a valley to a creek; there almost 750' of road was underwater.

This constant rain is holding up the carpenters from finishing the trim on the train shed, as their ladders would be unstable and unsafe in the soft mud. Same thing with the tree trimming crew that I need to safely remove the many splintered tree branches, and indeed, some trees as well. It is also affecting my ability to clear much debris and trim branches already on the ground, since I also sink or slip in the mud.
However I always try to look at the positive. The pool water is almost cleared up, although it's still too cold to get in; the result of no sunlight to heat it up. I found my battery powered Ryobai lawn mower in the field yesterday and it still runs. Grass catcher is nowhere to be found yet. I expect Joel to find it in his pasture across the road some day.

New phones arrived yesterday, so my wife will be taking them in to be set up. I'm still thinking that she sabotaged mine last week in order to speed up her getting a new one! Once we decided to go for it, it started working perfectly again!
Other than that, I don't know today's plans until I go out and see just how wet it is. Can't tell much from standing on the porch.

Out in the train shed yesterday, I ran a few more trains. All seem to be working fine right now. I am moving very slowly on my structure rehab right now. The walls that are under weights are taking up most of the workbench space, but I am trying to get as many flattened out while they are still damp as I possibly can. I am primarily working on the rooming house (aka Wicked Wanda's from Bar Mills).
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I did get the base off intact and got it under weights.
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However I am not completely satisfied so I am going to laminate it to a piece of .040" styrene sheet.
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I'll see the results later today when I head back out there once again.
There is one wall that is an issue as well.
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I did some preliminary work on it yesterday. It involves adding interior corner braces and a lot of Gorilla Super Glue.
The shingles are an easy fix.
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I did them while waiting on the lamination to occur.

Swal - That STYX/Foreigner concert still sounds like a great stand-alone concert. If it wasn't for my already shot hearing, I might consider going. They will be playing in Dallas later this year.
My dumpster is emptied on a regular scheduled route every Friday, that's why they don't call me. It's just a 3 yard one for household use, not a big roll-off one. Where I live, there are no city services like garbage trucks etc. I rent usage rights to two neighbors to help defray the $120 monthly cost.
Hughie - Great looking remodel. Stepping over the side of the tub was beginning to be too much for my wife before she had her knees replaced. Now I have gotten used to it as well and find bathtubs inconvenient when we stay at hotels.
Mike - How did the sleepover go?
Todd - On the subject of self restraint, I have seen it take over many couples' lives. My wife is as frugal as me. She takes care of most accounts and we pay off the only credit card (AMEX) every month. Our plan was simple and it worked. First few years together, we spent on ourselves. Then we switched to buying a house and property; house on a 15 year note, property on a 10 year note. Once paid off, the money went to put three kids through college. Once that was done, everything went into retirement accounts which were started 20 years prior but only got minimal automatic 401k deposits. Ever since 2005, it all went to us. I have a couple of friends who are our age with over $30K in credit card debt, and another couple who decided to upsize their home in 2012 and are having trouble making payments on their social security. Both couples have always driven the latest cars, never over 3 or 4 years old.
Tom O - Yes, too much is made of the stock market and how well it's doing. The former President touted that a lot. That's not the everyday economy though. It did mirror the everyday economy for a while during his term. It's been good to me in most years, but barely broke even in 2018 and 2022 though.
I refer to the cash in my pocket as my "motel money". Problem is that I never have a chance or desire to use it as such!

I've rambled on long enough this morning, I need to see what last nights rainfall set me back. Everybody have a great day.
 


Good morning all!

A huge cup of coffee needed this morning!

The sleepover is now in the books, and the house is once again silent! The girls ended up staying in the pool till almost 11pm last night. The only causality was a popped floatie, I'm sure my retired neighbor's to the left and right that go to bed at 8:30 loved that.

Did get out and run a few of the locomotives that haven't been used since I switched scales. You can always tell the ones that never have run. All the addresses were 003 and need to be programmed yet to their RD#s.

A nap will be a must today!

Have a great day all!
 
My short appearance this day! Summer is finally here and looking for 88 later today and 95 for tomorrow!

I have not felt good at all during the last 3 days - I seem to have the feeling that my end time is slowly approaching - sorry to be down, but can't help the tiredness and fatigue that I am experiencing.

JAY - I would have sworn that the picture you posted had a second deck - NO!

My daughter is driving out here with her two sons age 16 and 14 from near Mobile - That will add to the already wife's daughter and son's age 10 and 9 ... a total of 9 in the house. Seriously, I am not thrilled because of my inability to do anything with them?
 
The same with me.



My wife is much like Tom's. She's not stopping me from getting new hearing aids, but she's not happy that I'm spending that amount.

She's a penny pincher even when there is no need to be.
Terry’s not a penny pincher but she watches our spending. She’s a budgeter and the budget allows for the eating out and gifting to the kids. We are fortunate to do be able to do that

My trains are another matter. My budget for the month is the balance of my SS after she takes out for the supplemental health insurances. If either of us need something additionally medical (like glasses or hearing aides) we use our SS balances. 50% of my PayPal from weathering commissions is for me and the balance gets fed into a money market, or I’d spend it. When I built the last layout, I hit up my allowance, PayPal and money from the MM. I was totally floored by how much track and lumber had gone up. On this layout I using the old modules and previous purchased extra materials
 
Good morning all!

A huge cup of coffee needed this morning!

The sleepover is now in the books, and the house is once again silent! The girls ended up staying in the pool till almost 11pm last night. The only causality was a popped floatie, I'm sure my retired neighbor's to the left and right that go to bed at 8:30 loved that.

Did get out and run a few of the locomotives that haven't been used since I switched scales. You can always tell the ones that never have run. All the addresses were 003 and need to be programmed yet to their RD#s.

A nap will be a must today!

Have a great day all!
I tried for an hour yesterday while cussing out a ESU equipped diesel because it wouldn’t start up. Finally walked away and when I came back I tried address 3, geez it works!

I know we are all different but 8:30 seems early unless they have a morning job. I’m now a midnight to hopefully 6am guy. It’s took me about 8 of the 10 retirement years to sleep consistently past 4:45am.
 
Well, howdy there internet peeps and those with a few bucks

It's Troy again.

Just took the wife out to get her hairs trimmed, and then to 5 guys for burgers.

Right in front of 5 guys, the stoplight at the intersection in front of the strip mall was sporting two large lawn ornaments. One a white SUV and the other a grey pickup truck...

My guess from years of covering accidents is one of them wasn't going to waste the orange light and blew through the intersection as the other was making a left on yellow.

This ain't California. You have to watch the oncoming left turn lane and let them have the yellow.

On mom news, the doc at the nursing home altered her water pills, trying to see if that would help with her fluid levels. Evidently she's running low on blinker fluid. ;)

Meeting with the therapists etc today at 4 pm... Here's what I get to drive through about an hour from now:
Screenshot 2024-06-05 at 12.58.56 PM.png


Going from Ft Wayne, through Churubusco, Ligonier, to Goshen. And that storm is moving the direction you'd think it is, to the NE.

Think I'm going to get the laundry out of the dry, then scoot and see if I can dodge the yellow and orange blobs.
 
I tried for an hour yesterday while cussing out a ESU equipped diesel because it wouldn’t start up. Finally walked away and when I came back I tried address 3, geez it works!
Almost all of my locomotives are still address 3. I need to build a small program track yet. With this layout, I have switched to an NCE wireless system that i believe doesn't support programming. I could be wrong about, but I thought I had read something along those lines. Maybe someone here knows?

I still have my 2A powercab that does support basic programming, so I can use that to adjust some CVs and program to RD#. Other than that, I haven't dived any deeper with DCC.
 


Almost all of my locomotives are still address 3. I need to build a small program track yet. With this layout, I have switched to an NCE wireless system that i believe doesn't support programming. I could be wrong about, but I thought I had read something along those lines. Maybe someone here knows?

I still have my 2A powercab that does support basic programming, so I can use that to adjust some CVs and program to RD#. Other than that, I haven't dived any deeper with DCC.
Mike: I have a bunch of them set to 03. I bought a Lokprogam for the ESU decoders I just have to clear off enough workbench space to accoodate a couple section of Ready Track and my Laptop. ALL of my other stuff is at least minimally programmed.. I's quite awkward when you set the controller to o3, and five engines start moving. I also have JMRI downloaded, but haven't gone any farther.
 
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