Running Bear's November 2025 Coffee Shop

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Good evening. It's mostly clear and 57.
Of of my senior coworkers fell down the steps of an RV yesterday, and suffered a broken hip. Supposedly it isn't broken badly enough to require surgery, but they can't seem to tell him what the plan is going forward.
 
I am at 33° 44" so we are further south than you. It's really quite south of where the Northern Lights can usually be seen. Supposed to be a better chance tonight, it's just timing. By the time that I knew last night, the show was over.
The folks that are seeing this are very fortunate. Even if we could see them from here, the storm brewing down south is creating too much cloud cover.

Anyway, hope you folks don't experience any outages. If my loco stops running, I'll blame the solar activity! :P
 


The folks that are seeing this are very fortunate. Even if we could see them from here, the storm brewing down south is creating too much cloud cover.

Anyway, hope you folks don't experience any outages. If my loco stops running, I'll blame the solar activity! :P

Supposedly it's supposed to be tonight again, but around here the clouds rolled in today. I did see more pics from my area that were posted on FB by a step-cousin and some others from last night and I guess it was pretty spectacular. Unfortunately I didn't see it when I looked.
 
@Texas Hobo take care of yourself!
It's been a nice last couple days here. Monday was cold but sunny as we headed to Branson MO for a few days. My Nephew and his Wife also took a couple days to come up for a break too [with four kids, they can use it]. Anyway the condo is really nice, the weather has improved the last two days to just gorgeous. They had to leave this morning after we had a late breakfast at Cracker Barrel.Last night we were even able to see the Northern Lights here. We are here til Friday, went to see The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe in a live play yesterday and it was great. Tomorrow is just gonna be a quiet day and I plan on spoiling my Missus.
 
Amazon I will have one (ignitor) here on Monday.
Correction: I said Amazon will have the ignitor here Monday. I said Monday because I kept thinking it was Saturday. (Problems always occur on weekends and Holidays.) Updated tracking shows it will be here today. The package left an Amazon facility in Swedesboro, NJ at 8:53pm Wednesday. If all goes well it should be here today. Most likely after I am in bed.
 
Here is an updated map for those wanting to try and see this.

View attachment 247773
Thank you Mike, now I know what my wife and I have been seeing on the horizon in rural areas before the break of dawn.

I was thinking like Uncle Louis when he said "That's not the friggin' Christmas Star, Gris... Its the light at the sewerage treatment plant."
1763015719474.png
 


Good morning gang!

39° under clear skies heading for a high of 59°. Wind should start kicking up around lunchtime so hopefully it will take some of the leaves out of my yard and put them somewhere else.

Today’s my biannual visit with the endocrinologist. Should be short and sweet and hopefully I’ll be home by four.

BBL
 
Morning all,

Tire pressure monitors...both my vehicles have dead monitors. I check the tire pressures weekly with a good tire gauge. The Equinox would tell me which tire and give me air pressure in each tire. The Colorado just showed that I had a low tire (not really helpful). In either case, I just turn off the Serv TPM message in the vehicles. An air gauge is a lot cheaper than the sensors. Neither vehicle has a monitor in the spare, but I check those about bi-monthly, with the truck being a bit more difficult.

We clouded up last night, so couldn't see the aurora. Currently clear but getting cloudy later. Expect the temps to hit around 70ish. Currently 48°.

Wasn't ignoring the questions on why we don't insulate the house. At this point, the siding and roof are costing him nearly the value of the house. Insurance isn't fully covering the expenses as his policy doesn't cover the code upgrades that have to happen. Still have the old windows to deal with as well.

BBL
 
Good Morning All. Clear and 51°, headed in to the 80's today. It's too bad about the freeze Sunday night which took out all of my remaining Tomato and Pepper plants; because the next 10 days are going to be perfect weather. Well, maybe rain on Wednesday.

Last day of PT yesterday, nothing special. I can do all of the routines at home except one which requires a piece of equipment. I honestly can't say that it helped, I still experience shortness of breath when exerting too much. I'll keep doing many of the routines though.
Wife got her stitches removed yesterday; that only partially relieves her self-consciousness though.

It's the weekly grocery trek again today. The store is having their Grand Opening this week after 5 months of remodeling. Supposedly hidden savings everywhere! I'll see, but I normally just shop by my list and don't do any other looking. I already have mixed feelings about the new interior arrangement. By the time I get used to it, there will be a new Tom Thumb grocery store opening 12 miles closer to me. My wife really hates traveling to the Kroger store for some reason.

Out in the train shed yesterday, I mostly ran trains. I am pleased with my recent purchases from ScaleTrains of the GP30's and the SD40-2's that I received about 6 weeks ago. I have removed what I think is the last Athearn Blue Box loco from the active roster. They have served me well over the years.
I also painted the sign on the side of the Downtown Deco Hydrocal structure. This picture is before I touched up those stray white spots. I just forgot to take an after shot. I'm not even sure how they got there to begin with unless the stencil removal took off the black and the brick color underneath that.
1763040460249.jpeg

I am also going to try my hand at lightly sanding it so some of the underlying bricks show through before giving it a wash of India Ink/alcohol. Hopefully it works as planned, because I destroyed the stencil when I removed it. These kinds of signs were still common although aged, during the early-70's around here. Most were painted over with murals later in the decade and no longer exist. Lots of art majors at UNT in Denton.

Hughie -
Willie, they were seen as far south as Grimes and Montgomery Counties.
That's pretty close to the coast, I wasn't aware that they could be seen that far south. We developed a fog last night so I didn't even bother to go out and search.
Good luck with your recovery and thank God it wasn't worse.
Kevin - Have a safe trip home.
Karl - You should know that the same wind that takes your leaves away will bring your neighbor's leaves to you!

Everyone have a wonderful and safe Thursday.
 


Our TV media Northern lights expert, the weather guy said our best viewing would be at 4am.so I set thevalarm, which I didn’t need as the internal clock said get up at 3:55. Out front faces due north but the light pollution from Madison overwhelms the sky. Terry also up said if we go west maybe 5 miles we might see it. Not at 4am, I’ll try another time

Good morning to all 31f degrees heading to 56. The trip to the east coast of Wisconsin yesterday went well. Even though we could see it the last 6 months Terry never directly asked what health issues her friend is having. It’s two fold but the shock was her financial condition. Now we know why her beloved boat and house really were sold. She’s not there yet but that is causing her stress. The stress her doctor said aggravated some stomach issues.

We hit up a great Italian food store yesterday in Kenosha and headed across the street where I had their way too big signature burger. The drive home was quiet until Terry started brainstorming ideas to help her friend. All of them decent ideas but I’ve known this woman for almost 53 years actually about 3 days after Terry and I had our first date, I met her. She won’t accept Terry’s help. Word of advice. If a nephew or niece have financial suggestions where to invest, run, run, run. She didn’t run

It’s a day to finish up the eastern approach bridge to the Swing bridge. The piers will be filled ins but I’ll hit the 2 bridges with another shot of the base green/gray base coat. Then this evening drop it over at the friend’s layout along with the styrene silhouette of 71” of paper mill facade fronts. A 10” deep x 31” long separate warehouse/shipping section minus roof is ready. I have the Digester/recovery building complex footprint cut out. It’s 19” long x 8” deep and raises to 100’ HO scale feet. It keeps changing so I have not cut any styrene except for the footprint. It’s 10’ of buildings in a 32’ long space x 2’ wide. The other 22’ of the complex is going to be split as you look at it with an additional 8’ to the left of the digester/recovery complex and 12’ to the right of the shipping department. We have some agreement on track but really if he wants to load it up that’s his choice. I gave him what he wanted, I designed him a papermill. I will start after Thanksgiving to laminate the CMU (concrete block) to the facade. Then the siding, windows, doors and vents. The complex for me is in 3 zones:

19” of Digester/recovery complex
71” of buildings (consists of 4 buildings with different depth)
30” of warehouse/shipping

The engine shed is done except for paint and weathering.

The Wood handling building is a facade but now off to the right of shipping. The footprint of the pulp log storage yard has been painter taped off. We will come back to this in December. The pulp logs will be a separate project that his wife said she’ll happily work on. She also wants to tackle building and detailing the Wood handling building. I had the final dimensions for the wood handling building but if she is going to do it and with the big space available We may change it.

The toughest part of this project now that we’ve locked in the building dimensions minus the WH building will be the details specifically the conveyors. Just from the chip pile to the digester is a 12’ run. I have some ideas but they can wait.

I have spent more time researching and mocking up structures for this project than on any other paper mill I have designed for myself or others. It’s been fun, aggravating, frustrating and this week very much fun again. He promised to have the 2 mainline tracks and the paper mill interchange tracks laid down today in front of the mill up to the eastern approach of the river. That finalizes the paper mill footprint.

Have a great day
 
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