Running Bear's March 2023 Coffee Shop

[troyphoto]

Good Morning All!
34F @ 75% and so far partly.

Missoula trip went has expected. 36F when we left Libby, 5F at Trout Creek ( about 60 miles out ), then went up the further East we got. Hit 40F in Missoula. I completely spaced hitting the cash machine before I got to where the plotter was. Geesh, said I. Smiled and winked at the wife. She just happened to have the cash. Boy, ima gonna pay for this! She wanted to stop at Lowes and check out paint for the mud room. Told her I would pay for it to get us even. Big mistake - $396 for 5 gallons + a quart, tape and roller rubbers. Well, I did get some caulking and a couple circuit breakers for the train cave. Was not a fair exchange. Flip flop was pretty much 40F until Trout Creek, and 36F from there to home.

Picked up a HP DesignJet 750C Plus plotter for $100. This is an 'E' size plotter. Had been sitting in garage for about 10 years so I expect stuff will need fix'n. Powered her up this am; no smoke! Anyway I didn't think to take a pix before I started taking it apart. You probably know what a plotter looks like anyway. You can see from the 2nd pix the carriage belt is toast so ima looking for that. Paper roller gears look to be nice with good edges. 3 of the 4 ink cartridges still 'shake', black is solid or empty. Getting new ones anywho. Waste ink reservoir is probably full so need to deal with that. Guy I got it from said he bought it brand new, used it for awhile then quit his Architect business and stored it.

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Y'all have a great day!

Later

I had the bigger cousin of one of those: a photo printer. Head got out of alignment and sold it off to someone else in the industry for $300. With extra inks and paper. He didn't hear the part about "needs some recalibration, cleaning" etc... grumped that it didn't work. Wanted me to take it back. I told him I was moving to California in a week, and had no use for it. His check cleared, so he must have figured out a $2500 printer for $300 and a service call fee was still a good deal.

PS: Looks like you need a new drive belt. And the print head probably needs flushed. I'd start with new inks on any where the heads are clogged.

 

[PRR Modeler]

Afternoon All,

Started out with a walk at 62F and currently it's 84F. Earlier I drove up to Jon's house and I dropped off the kit and we discussed what needed done. After getting home I discovered MOH had made homemade pepperoni rolls. Tomorrow is chores and a haircut. Not sure what else is on the schedule. Saturday I'm driving down to see my buddy Tom and the rest of the group.

Troy- Thanks for the explanation. I guess there's always people trying to scam the system.

Karl- Nothing wrong with a quiet night at home.

Willie- Nice looking structures and little people. Good luck to your grandson. Way, way back in the day I played the Cello but gave it up after 3-4 years.

I hope everyone has a good night.

 

[Bruette]

Willie, that's great to hear about your grandson!

Can you believe I played the Cello for one semester in junior high school? I had hands like catchers' mitts, better suited to sports. Now my hands are all but useless.

 

[santafewillie]

A rare Good Afternoon All. We just had about 15 minutes of hail, but it's over 75° and it mostly melted before I picked up the camera. The ground was completely white with just below dime-size hail. Here's some that was still on the back porch mat after it mostly melted elsewhere.

The predicted high winds haven't materialized yet and the temperature dropped by 15° since I took the picture. It does appear that more rain is forthcoming. I should get out to the train shed while I still can!

 

[TLOC]

Good afternoon. Brunch out was super great. Cash only small business owned and run by Sisters. Ate 1/2, 1/2 came home. Coach was able to relax as we had no interruptions and the waitress just said hi Mark. Stopped after at a great bakery and even though Terry is an excellent baker she doesn’t do chocolates or I don’t artisan breads. Dropped the girls at our place then headed to get ANOTHER new stick for the grandson but thankfully a 30 day breakage warranty. Instead of $110 plus tax it was $21. The next stick up for height and weight will be $199.99. Hopefully a couple years down the road. One of the Verona dad’s was in buying 2 sticks for his kid on the high school team. They are in the High School division 1 Final 4 tomorrow and even with his 10% off discount he was paying $560. Nothing is cheap out there, hobbies or sports.

Stopped on the way home at a place Troyphoto might recognize from his gaming. Corporate HQ, distribution center and retail store of Noble Knights Games located about 5 miles from home. I needed some clear Matt varnish and went in to pickup the Vallejo but they have stopped carrying Vallejo in the storefront. I am going to try the Army Painter Matt varnish Air brand.

A roommate of the son in law from college along with a his brother started this place. 81 cars in the employee parking lot and 15 in the customer lot. There were quite a few gaming tables going. Great service but retail only pricing.

My sister talked to Terry she is now flying in Friday. Our son is going to fly tonight to Phoenix as is the sister. Instead of hopping on her flight this afternoon she will stay at our brothers and fly here tomorrow with the nephew.

I will head down to the paint bench and get something done.

 

[PNKFLOYD]

Guys name is Brendan Kavanagh AKA Dr K.

Smudge-This was well worth the time to enjoy the music and watching the musicians having a great time.
Thanks for sharing!

 

[Jaz avalley]

Been March here for 3 1/2 hours already! Where are the laggards from across the pond?

Ok I’m late

 

[Jaz avalley]

I want to thank Jaz avalley. Truckdad, Christan, Chadbag, TLOC, Pink Floyd, Sifoldalot, Big G Racing, Troyphoto, Smudge17, Kbkehooch, Bruette, Texas Hobo, CambriaArea51, Boris SantaFe Willie Roofintrash and Curt for their comments on my new bathroom project.

I wanted to buy a bathroom cabinet for my project and found almost all were made of particle board. I wanted one made of real wood, so I had to build one myself. Kind of hard to do without a table saw but I got it done. It was my first time using concealed hinges.
Swal
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Real wood is well worth the effort nicely done

 

[Jaz avalley]

Jaz, those pastries you posted look fantastic!

My wife makes a pastry coated in chocolate and covered in coconut, It is my favorite!
Were those nuts on the one with chocolate and coconut? I want that!

You would never need to worry about me. No man should ever strike a lady. Even in my worst days I would not think of striking a lady.

I'll tell you a secret. In high school I feared no one. Except for the girls. I always tread lightly around the girls. It's a fight no man can ever win. Fortunately, I had two older sisters. I knew how to behave around the girls. My plan if all else fails, run!

I have my last cup of coffee before bed, and I sleep like a baby.

I like chopped hazel nuts as with the sugar it reminds me of a Ferraro rocher
i swop out the nuts for the coconut,at present getting cocoa butter for white chocolate is not easy over here but I can press an almond or other nut in the centre before cooking then adding the chocolate and coconut,
if the mixture comes up a tad dry coconut milk\cream can help, but to date I have managed, I’ll try to remember a half bit one….normal I pop them in whole and suck lol.

you can also go melted chocolate and a nut butter almond being the easiest to get, sort of a Nutella avoiding all the sugar.

i have a new bread recipe with psyllium bread,and I p,an to try it as a pizza, I’ll try to remember to photograph it.usually by the time it is ready to eat I am very eager to scoff it,

 

[ctclibby]

I had the bigger cousin of one of those: a photo printer. Head got out of alignment and sold it off to someone else in the industry for $300. With extra inks and paper. He didn't hear the part about "needs some recalibration, cleaning" etc... grumped that it didn't work. Wanted me to take it back. I told him I was moving to California in a week, and had no use for it. His check cleared, so he must have figured out a $2500 printer for $300 and a service call fee was still a good deal.

PS: Looks like you need a new drive belt. And the print head probably needs flushed. I'd start with new inks on any where the heads are clogged.

Ya, Spittoon is probably close to full as there is ( was ) some ink leaking out or dripping down to the bottom of it. Cartridges are new and still green dotted so I suspect the seller decided to see if he could get $$$ out of it. Tried to plot something although as seen in the pix and my text the carriage belt had deteriorated big time when the thing was being stored and it would error out.

Found out the Clorox Household Cleaner pretty much dissolves the ink and makes it easy to remove. Wife said: "Here, watch this" and sprayed some on one of the case parts. Ink almost immediately started running. Yay said I. Belt ( 47.5" ) is on it's way as is new CYM and Black cartridges. Have to take the cartridge holder apart to get the belt installed, so will clean that up when doing that. Other than the ink, this thing is pretty clean with no broken parts/pieces. Good vacuum job and a 're-plug' all of the cables, it should be good to go. I even have a Jet Direct card for it gleaned from another HP printer; 10Meg card, but do I care? Nope.

I have been looking for one of these for probably more than a year. Wanted a pen plotter as those pens are much cheaper than ink, but when something falls in your lap, ya go with it. I suspect that this plotter will see moderate use, but not a production environment where it never stops.

Later

 

[NYC_George]

Can you believe I played the Cello for one semester in junior high school? I had hands like catchers' mitts, better suited to sports. Now my hands are all but useless.

When we had our band back in 68 / 69 one of my close friends played the synthesizer and thought the band was taking up to much of his time and quit. I had to learn how to play it fast. I remember almost none of it now, 56 years later. Watching these piano videos makes me want to try it one more time.
Swal

 

[Bruette]

Jaz,

My wife loves these things too!

This is my favorite

I seldom eat one anymore.

 

[Patrick]

Evening all,

Rare late day as I left early to get the granddaughter from school. Still watching stuff from home. Weather supposed to get near freezing overnight with a possibility of the white stuff during the pre-dawn hours. No real accumulation expected. 1 more project completed at the office, so tomorrow should be quiet.

ctclibby: 10Mb in a home network is decent, especially when the equipment is really cheap and dependable. I actually killed our last one last year when we upgraded to 1Gb switches at the office. Printers handle the 1Gb stuff so it was no longer needed, and I don't usually drag that stuff home anymore unless I can use it now. My dual monitors at home are cast offs from work.

 

[TLOC]

Ok I’m late

How does your hubby feel about that? Congrats!

 

[santafewillie]

I should get out to the train shed while I still can!

Good thing that I went when I did! between 2:45 CST and 3:20 CST, it rained hard, just at 1.75". Then the sun came out. My whole corner was under about 2" of runoff water, and my pond filled up and overflowed.
Front yard as taken from the train shed steps.

This is why it doesn't drain any faster, the roadside ditch out front is already running across the road since the culvert pipe under our easement road isn't big enough for this volume.

Shot of my pond overflowing since the spillway is being overwhelmed.

However the garden just 45' away is high and unflooded.

So far it hasn't come above the diversion levee alongside my hay field which diverts the main runoff over to the pond and eventually the spillway out to the roadside ditch.

One of the neighbors almost had a really stuck vehicle when passing through the water in picture #2.

Down the road a usually dry creek was rushing from the earlier rain.

I had told my city slicker neighbor down there a few years ago, not to clear the brush away from that creek bank, but he was insistent that he knew better than me and wanted a "country estate" look to the pastureland that his wife inherited. Several of these trees will be uprooted by morning. He told me that the lake that he paid over $100K to build would control runoff, and I told him that he hadn't seen one of those every 7-8 year storms yet. He's seeing it today! You can see the dam for the lake in the center left of the picture. By the way, this lake has a lighted fountain in it, part of the reason that he lost his agricultural property tax exemption.
At around 5:30 CST, it started raining again with the same vengeance as before, and this wave will last longer. The wind is now around 30 mph.

 

[migalyto]

Willie-How much more rain are you supposed to get?

 

[santafewillie]

Willie-How much more rain are you supposed to get?

Original forecast was for 1.25" to 1.4". Presently I have 2.1" and it's raining lightly. Looking at the radar, I only expect at most another quarter inch if that much. 2" is not at all unusual here, the yard floods during heavy downpours but only briefly until the roadside ditch takes it all away. All of my 15 acres are gradually sloping, but the lowest point is my front yard. It's about 3/4 acre and the house is purposely higher. I had the diversion levee and catchment pond/spillway built within 8 months of moving here in 1981 after I first observed the drainage pattern. There's now just a total of 3 acres that actually drains through my front yard to that point in the picture of the water running over the road. It's just one of the hazards of country life that I wouldn't give up for the confines of a city. As I posted, most of the remaining water will be gone about six hours after the rain stops. If that 2"+ fell over six hours, there would be no flooding.

 

[kbkchooch]

It's just one of the hazards of country life that I wouldn't give up for the confines of a city.

I'm right there with ya Willie!

 

[CambriaArea51]

It's just one of the hazards of country life that I wouldn't give up for the confines of a city

Same here. The nice thing is I'm 20 minutes away in 3 directions that will get me whatever I need.

 

[Boris]

Good evening from the damp Jersey Shore. 46° and partly cloudy. No rainfall today.

Got a clean bill of health from the Cardiologist today...at least six months worth. However, all restrictions are lifted. To stem my continued loss of weight, I have to increase protein, and I'm going to give cardiac rehab a try. Next week I go to the TAVR clinic at the hospital for my 1 month echo, ekg and blood work. After next Thursday, I don't see them for another year.

This being Thursday, it's time for the Adventures of America's Train, SA-31, and it's bi-weekly trip down the Coast Line to Red Bank, NJ. Marc Pitanza caught the train crossing over the Navesink Rver this afternoon with four loaded center beams.