Running Bear's March 2025 Coffee Shop

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I was finally able to file my taxes. I had to wait until now because I had a 1099-R, and the IRS couldn't accept it until yesterday.
The process was relatively straightforward, until I got to the part where I submitted the return electronically. I spent more time and effort verifying my identity than I did filing the return. Though it's great to know that yet another series of organizations now has every possible piece of data needed to confirm my identity--or steal it.
 
OK, I guess we do weather reports here now.

1741265148940.png
 
Good Morning All!
27F @74% and partly.

Maria misread the directions for the washout stuff for her Colonoscopy - needed to be finished 2 hours before the cutting; so she was push to the end of the line to make sure her tummy was empty. Finally got to the table about noon. Says she slept from 0900 until then, so I guess not a big deal for her. Me on the other hand was just given a few hours to go train chasing. Drat the luck. Starving, so got a couple of corn dogs from Town Pump and headed West. Pretty slow day for BNSF but I had nothing to do but sit in the sun ( for the most part ) and wait.

Posted some pix in 'Prototype Railroads - CtcLibby pix. Here is a teaser.
IMGP1121.JPG


Also, thought that you may be interested in one of the views around here. Downtown proper, looking pretty much South.
IMGP1113.JPG

This is from the Kootenai River Bridge apron across the tracks from Amtrak ( to your left ).

Oh, and Maria came out from under the knife just fine. Had a couple of Polyps - waiting for Oncology

L8r
 


Good Morning All!
27F @74% and partly.

Maria misread the directions for the washout stuff for her Colonoscopy - needed to be finished 2 hours before the cutting; so she was push to the end of the line to make sure her tummy was empty. Finally got to the table about noon. Says she slept from 0900 until then, so I guess not a big deal for her. Me on the other hand was just given a few hours to go train chasing. Drat the luck. Starving, so got a couple of corn dogs from Town Pump and headed West. Pretty slow day for BNSF but I had nothing to do but sit in the sun ( for the most part ) and wait.

Posted some pix in 'Prototype Railroads - CtcLibby pix. Here is a teaser.
View attachment 213476

Also, thought that you may be interested in one of the views around here. Downtown proper, looking pretty much South.
View attachment 213477
This is from the Kootenai River Bridge apron across the tracks from Amtrak ( to your left ).

Oh, and Maria came out from under the knife just fine. Had a couple of Polyps - waiting for Oncology

L8r
Polyps! Hope the reports are fine. So did they put her down on the 3,5 or 10 plan for the next test?

Love the rust on that bridge behind BNSF 8136. Is that within yard limits since the ditch lights are not activated?
 
Morning all,

I've been reporting weather stuff for years as well.

Currently mostly cloudy and 29°. High later of 58°.

On top of losing part of the fence, I found shingles that appear to match my roof in the yard when I got home yesterday. Fence stuff I can sort of deal with, but re-roofing the house is not something I can do myself anymore. I've put 3 roofs on 2 different houses over the years myself and with family help. I can't physically do that anymore...going to be an expensive year.

BBL
 
Polyps! Hope the reports are fine. So did they put her down on the 3,5 or 10 plan for the next test?

Love the rust on that bridge behind BNSF 8136. Is that within yard limits since the ditch lights are not activated?
Tom: My bad, the pix of 8136 was on the rear and I forgot to mention it. I have been trying to get better shots of that bridge for *years*. Other than having a boat it is next to impossible to get close to the thing. The foreground bridge that goes over the tracks is an old haul road that they turned into a walking trail - no motorized vehicles and it is about 1/2 mile walk to the tracks from 5th Street. Other side is on high fenced private property and I have not found out who owns it ... yet. I guess that I could take a picnic basket and walk the walk but there is not any place to sit and enjoy the scenery while waiting. I will try and get a distance pix from 5th Street and post it; although you can't see the ends. If nice sunny day, a pix of a partial engine might be ok, as they are going by there at 50+ unless going/coming from the siding at Libby. DuH - how about an overhead from the haul road? Hmmm...

Polyps are pretty much normal for most people ( 2 of 3 will develop ) and they get checked out. Since Maria is almost 70, I suspect she will have to do another Colo in 3 years, then after that they don't worry about it. Doc says that there is a 15 year sliding window to where they need to check if they are cancerous. So in other words, if not cancerous on the next test, no need to do it again. If cancerous, various stuff gets thrown at them.

L8r
 
Good Morning All. Mostly clear and 39°. The wind will reverse and come from the south today and we'll be in the 80's tomorrow. Another minor cold front with rain Saturday before settling down and returning to the 70's next week. Glad to see that the vicious north winds have moved east, sorry that you folks have to get them now.

Spent the morning yesterday ensuring that all of our required tax information was together. Had to sort through a lot of eventually useless brokerage statements and the like to get what was really required. It boils down to SS income, interest income, a very small pension statement and a sizable RMD from one of the retirement accounts. We'll probably owe a little due to the RMD which I do not have taxes withheld. Actually I don't have taxes withheld from anything, but not enough is taxable enough to incur a penalty.
After lunch, I hoed the onion rows in the garden. So far I have not lost any of the plants that I have planted. Spinach and other greens have not broken through yet, I expect to see that kind of stuff within the next few days.

Fridge is nearly empty so it must be the weekly grocery trek day today. I know that the Vitamin Shop is on the list along with a stop for gas. It won't be long before I will have to fight road construction to get to Denton. they are going to widen IH35 from 2 lanes in each direction to 4 lanes, with "flyover" service roads. About a 50 mile stretch from Denton to the casino north of the OK border, They are already doing the bridges and overpasses north from where I get on, and the utility relocation seems to be progressing well south to Denton. Of course to get to the Interstate, there's still the 5 miles of construction on the county road that I described last week.

I continued with my model home rehab out in the train shed yesterday. First steps were clean-up. I've posted before about the tiny spiders that plague the train shed, here's an example. This is inside. The only way in or out is through the small chimney opening seen here with the cobwebs.
IMG_0465.JPG

A quick cleanup with my cleaning paintbrush.
IMG_0467.JPG

I'll seal that hole later in the process.
Making progress.
IMG_0463.JPG

I've made more progress but didn't take any updated pics. Another improvement I am making is to remove the way overscaled and grossly out of position porch light that came with the kit.
IMG_0457.JPG

This was also taken care of yesterday and the area under it was shaved and filed to resemble the clapboard siding. The original clear styrene for the windows has deteriorated a bit and I will replace all of that. There's enough room inside the model to manipulate the new thicker styrene.

Todd - We finally got a motel nearby us about two years ago. It's a 4 story Holiday Inn Express. Seems out of place though as it's the tallest structure in town.
Good luck to Maria on her polyps. Mine have always been benign.
Mike - I have had good luck with LG appliances over the years, until recently. They've let QA slip out of their hands. The older ones still work fine but not the newer ones.
Mac -
scary to drive a curtain side trailer over some bridges on Jersey coastline
I bet that it is! Be safe out there.
Troy - Sure seems like the makings of an indoor pot farm to me!;)

Everyone have a great Thursday, and thanks for taking the wind away from us.
 
Good morning from the south central part of the cheese state! 2-4” of the While Gifts from Above were received yesterday with my yard on the lower end of the 2”. Based on the current 10 day forecast it should be gone by the time the 60f degrees appear Monday. Right now it’s 20f degrees feels like 10 and heading into the low 40’s.

Terry has been on her computer all week playing out guess the stock market. She guessed correctly on defense industry stocks and auto stocks. But even with those good guesses she’s only up 10% this week. She is doing this separately from our regular investments which she greatly reduced around Christmas and is going to ride out through the end of the month. Then review and retrench if necessary. She still is avoiding the crypto market. I still feel it’s a scam, she wants to play it but is semi agreeing with me

I have a physical this afternoon. I am worried that the EKG is going to send me to the hospital. Hopefully I’m wrong but the breathlessness after climbing the stairs from the lower level is definitely elevated and I mentioned it in the paperwork last week for the pre-registration. That got me a phone call from the Doctor’s nurse asking if I was ok. Just in case I checked the organization of my commission work making sure everything was tagged with the owner’s name and my schedule chart has the correct return addresses. My 2 friends, Terry and the kids know what to do

Enjoy your day
 


Tom: My bad, the pix of 8136 was on the rear and I forgot to mention it. I have been trying to get better shots of that bridge for *years*. Other than having a boat it is next to impossible to get close to the thing. The foreground bridge that goes over the tracks is an old haul road that they turned into a walking trail - no motorized vehicles and it is about 1/2 mile walk to the tracks from 5th Street. Other side is on high fenced private property and I have not found out who owns it ... yet. I guess that I could take a picnic basket and walk the walk but there is not any place to sit and enjoy the scenery while waiting. I will try and get a distance pix from 5th Street and post it; although you can't see the ends. If nice sunny day, a pix of a partial engine might be ok, as they are going by there at 50+ unless going/coming from the siding at Libby. DuH - how about an overhead from the haul road? Hmmm...

Polyps are pretty much normal for most people ( 2 of 3 will develop ) and they get checked out. Since Maria is almost 70, I suspect she will have to do another Colo in 3 years, then after that they don't worry about it. Doc says that there is a 15 year sliding window to where they need to check if they are cancerous. So in other words, if not cancerous on the next test, no need to do it again. If cancerous, various stuff gets thrown at them.

L8r
I’m on the 3 year plan and my next and supposedly last will be in 2026. I’ll be 75 and the doc said pretty much what you wrote.

8136 on the rear explains why the ditch lights were not on. Thank you
 
Good morning from the south central part of the cheese state! 2-4” of the While Gifts from Above were received yesterday with my yard on the lower end of the 2”. Based on the current 10 day forecast it should be gone by the time the 60f degrees appear Monday. Right now it’s 20f degrees feels like 10 and heading into the low 40’s.

Terry has been on her computer all week playing out guess the stock market. She guessed correctly on defense industry stocks and auto stocks. But even with those good guesses she’s only up 10% this week. She is doing this separately from our regular investments which she greatly reduced around Christmas and is going to ride out through the end of the month. Then review and retrench if necessary. She still is avoiding the crypto market. I still feel it’s a scam, she wants to play it but is semi agreeing with me

I have a physical this afternoon. I am worried that the EKG is going to send me to the hospital. Hopefully I’m wrong but the breathlessness after climbing the stairs from the lower level is definitely elevated and I mentioned it in the paperwork last week for the pre-registration. That got me a phone call from the Doctor’s nurse asking if I was ok. Just in case I checked the organization of my commission work making sure everything was tagged with the owner’s name and my schedule chart has the correct return addresses. My 2 friends, Terry and the kids know what to do

Enjoy your day
Geesh Tom. I suspect that it might not get you to a hospital just because of that - but you probably will get to do a 'stress test' followed by a Cat Scan and/or MRI. If your legs are also tight/sore when climbing more for the case of a stress test. Although it is scary, these days fixing the heart is not a big deal in the grand scheme of things. Stints are usually outpatient, bypass is another issue and more invasive. Either one will require almost 6 months of recoup. My 3pass recoup was near 6 months to the day before things came back together. The soreness went away after a couple of days except for where they put tubes in for draining the chest cavity and my leg where the new/used blood vessel was taken. ADD was the worst part for me. We went home from Ohio 6 days after the 3pass. Maria used a debit card to buy an '08 Edge, packed all the stuff from the truck in it and off we went. We realized that there was not enough money for both of us to be home. I could not drive commercially for that 6 months, so after a few weeks of making sure I was going to be ok ..sorta, Maria went back on the road and I bounded around dealing with home stuff. You will be ok.

L8r
 
I found shingles that appear to match my roof in the yard when I got home yesterday. Fence stuff I can sort of deal with, but re-roofing the house is not something I can do myself anymore. I've put 3 roofs on 2 different houses over the years myself and with family help. I can't physically do that anymore...going to be an expensive year.
Turn it into your homeowners insurance. Do it sooner than later. Everyone with roof damage is going to be trying to file a claim.
 
ISPs are Internet Service Providers. To my knowledge neither Firefox nor Yahoo provide internet service, only browsers and / or email service.
Sorry for wrong terminology. My ISP is through the "tin can and string" phone company here in west Texas. Other than a satellite internet provider, I have no other choice. It is not the fastest but it runs my internet and my Roku.

I logged into my e-mails today with no problem using Chrome. Life is a surprise everyday.

Take care....John
 
Well, howdy there internet peeps and those with shingles.

It's Troy again.

Hopefully, if you have shingles,, even loose ones, they're the roof kind.

Spent today signing books, writing postcards, and printing off mailing labels. I spent about $185 sending out 25 books. The hardcovers seemed to like going in the big brown trucks. The paperbacks, 5 oz lighter, and half-an-inch less thick likes US Post.

That was actually more intense mental work than writing. Making sure I spelled names correctly, double checking addresses before hitting the "buy label" button, etc.

then I had to run to two different drop off points... Hopefully i got all the books out. I'll double check shipping receipts vs names tomorrow. Even though I was checking them off the list as I printed the mailing labels. You never know with me.

We're going to the tex-mex place tonight. Wife wants me to build her shelves tonight for the 4:20 growing facility. Told her I needed queso dip and chips to be that energetic.
 
Can't they all go book rate USPS? (inside the US ones at least)
They can if I want them to wait three weeks (or more). Media Mail rate shipping is sloooooooooow. And I'm not sure I can track it. So the scammers would be on that. Yes, there are book scammers. They're not making much money, but just enjoy the rip off.

I priced shipping in the holiday season and misjudged the weight of the eventual hardcover, so it was running about $2 more on average than I priced it at.

Since I charged them for shipping, I want to give them a timely arrival and not drop to media mail
 


They can if I want them to wait three weeks (or more). Media Mail rate shipping is sloooooooooow. And I'm not sure I can track it. So the scammers would be on that. Yes, there are book scammers. They're not making much money, but just enjoy the rip off.

I priced shipping in the holiday season and misjudged the weight of the eventual hardcover, so it was running about $2 more on average than I priced it at.

Since I charged them for shipping, I want to give them a timely arrival and not drop to media mail
Yeah I don’t know if you can track books and media. I think the last one I got had a tracking number. Technically media mail and book rate mail are two separate tariffs. At least they used to be. I’ve bought a few books that have come that way in the last few years. Wasn’t as fast as first class mail but wasn’t bad.
 
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