Sappy

I know you've hardly been able to sleep without any layout updates, so here you are. Rainy days are usually my most productive.
OSHA has been sending letters regarding the high number of people who wandered around the station and fell onto the tracks behind it, because of no safety barriers. A railing has now been added to address that minor issue, along with sidewalks so Faceless Freddie can now enjoy the view in safety.


Here's the sappy bit...I've been keeping an eye out for a dark blue Karmann Ghia for the layout. Mom and dad had one identical to this when they got married, and I found one yesterday at a train show here in town. Ta-daa!
I'm also repainting one of my VW buses (not the one above) to match the one we had back from 1978-84...it's not quite ready for prime time - I'll probably finish that later this week.

In related news, the layout now has more Volkswagens per capita than Wolfsburg, Germany.

Side Benefits

Living on a side street off of a not too important primary street means we have never seen a snow plow within a half mile of our house. However, that changed today.
Shaunn has a home nurse, and she shared with him that if a street has a disabled person living on it, with certain other qualifying criteria(housebound, home care), the city has 48 hours to plow that road after a major snowfall, so that the docs and emergency services can get there in an emergency.
So, armed with this knowledge, he called the mayor's action line. And within 2 hours, our street had been plowed and salted. So long, sheets of ice!

Early Christmas

I forgot to mention in the last post...when I shut off the outside spigot last night, I had to move several storage totes that we placed in that room over the summer. As I moved the totes, I opened them to see what was inside. One of them contained - woo hoo- the eyepieces to my telescope, which I've been looking for since moving here in mid 2005. Just in time for those still winter nights which are perfect for stargazing.

Oops

Well, the weather reports were...conservative. We had about 5.5 inches here. So they were closer to correct than me. So I'll stop with the fraud lawsuits.
It did give me an excuse to winterize. so when I got home tonight, I put the storm windows in the screen doors, and shut off the water to the outside spigots. This is to avoid a repeat of our first winter here, when the pipe for the rear spigot burst, turning half our patio into a skating rink.
The snow let me again appreciate how effing great our Accord is in the stuff. Shaunn's nurse came by today, but had to park in the street when her Explorer couldn't make it up our driveway. When I got home, I just drove right up, the wheels slipping for just an instant in the snow ruts she created. Why do they sell suvs again?

Layout trivia

When I designed the layout, I used a design program to rough out ideas until I came up with something I liked and would fit in my available space. When I built it, the track was laid out using the eyeball process. I always wondered how much track was on the layout. I had a rough idea, but I never had added it all up. So, I measured out the track...
The mainline run, not including dead-end sidings, consists of 1177 inches of track, or a hair over 98 feet. In HO scale (1:87), this is a track distance of 8533 feet, a little over 1.6 scale miles. No wonder it took me so long to get it all down.

First snow

We got the wood last night. It was an exciting time. Wood. Giga and I went to the place, loaded it, drove home, and had it unloaded all in the space of about 30 minutes. Simple. Unfortunately, the wood had apparently sat in the rain we had over the weekend, so lighting it last night was kind of a non-event.
Tonight and tomorrow, we're supposed to see about 4 inches of snow. But I'll never understand how the local weather can accurately tell you what they'll get in New England or Nebraska, but always be completely off for the local snow forecast.
So, they're stating 4 inches here...this means we'll see some flakes in the air, and maybe - maybe - about an inch on the ground. I think we need the weather predictors in Nebraska to tell us how much to expect.

Warm house

We love using our fireplace. Last year, we went thru most of the scrap wood from the train table, and then started buying those compressed-sawdust logs from the store. they burn nicely, but the price works out to about $3 a log, which isn't very cost effective. So today at lunch, I did some checking around for firewood sources, and found a place near the house that sells seasoned firewood pretty cheaply.

I caleld them to inquire, and the salesman cheerfully said that their price is $40 for a 'rack' of logs, which he explained is about 1/4 cord. For those of you not familiar with these terms, a 'Cord' is about 85 Furlongs, or 19.5 metric Cochranes of wood. At any rate, it's enough to see us through most of the winter.
Giga has offered his truck and help in getting it home, we're going after work tonight. One problem, the temperature has been dropping all day, and is going to keep going. So I think we'll just stack the wood in the car shelter for the time being, and I'll move it to its permanent home later this week. That'll also give me time to throw together a rack this week to store it on, so it stays nice and dry for the burnination. This will also give the wood from the tree we had removed a place to dry so it'll be ready for next winter.