Good Morning All. Cloudy and 66° out on my back porch. Windy weather predicted for today, with very strong thunderstorms predicted for tomorrow. That's a bit of a drag as I have to drive my wife to Dallas tomorrow for a flight with our granddaughter to Florida. The flight won't be affected as it's on Saturday after the storms move on.
Today is the usual weekly grocery trek. Should be a quick one since we ran some errands Tuesday when visiting the cardiologist.
Lawn tractor crapped out on me yesterday, just stopped running. No sputtering, no banging, just stopped. Smoke coming out of the area where the cooling vanes are. I have a call in to my neighbor who repairs small engines. Though I have many talents, gasoline engine diagnosis and repair is not one of them. I fear the worst.
Thanks for the reactions to yesterday's update. Not much more to complete.
Made very little progress yesterday out in the train shed. I made two signs.
The vertical sign I made Tuesday.
Patrick - Ponds. I have posted before about our newest neighbor, a city slicker who moved onto the 100 acre property down the road, and his refusal to listen to those of us who have lived here for 40+ years. He had this dream of a country estate. He had a large pond built, with a lighted fountain no less, only 18 months ago. The pond itself was originally about 25' deep and covers 2.25 acres. Against my advice (and at least one other neighbor), he cleared brush and undergrowth out of some woods uphill, installed a $50K road, and a culvert to direct runoff water into the pond. Last month, he had to drain the pond and had to hire a bulldozer operator to come out and scoop out a couple hundred yards of soil that washed off the cleared forest floor and now runs into the pond every time it rains. Besides silting up the pond, it is eroding and exposing the roots of the lowest trees in his woods! He also had to refill the pond with water that he pumped out of the ground. I don't know what the bulldozer cost him, but he ran the pump 24 hours a day for 11 days. His wife didn't want to wait for enough rain to fill it up. It will happen again. He has not yet seen a "real" rain on their property like I have seen a few times before. The flow of water down that incline from his property and a few thousand next to it on the south is a real sight to behold. Now his four longhorns have water again.
Smudge - Don't fear painting figures. They're relatively easy but you need good lighting, magnification, a relatively steady hand, a fine pointed brush, water-based paints and most importantly, patience.
Chet -
Willie - I really liked the Walthers diner kit. I put interior lighting in mine and a bunch of 1/87 hungry people.
This is actually a City Classics kit that is very similar to the Walther's kit, which I also have pictured below.
Joe - I was a member of Jefferey's forum, "Rails of the World".
Everybody have a great day.