Scattered Thoughts . . .

There isn't much which is more amusing than watching a toddler suck on a lemon!  Lukey grabbed ahold of the lemon in Grammy's water while we were in the lounge on Friday night and then couldn't put the slice down until it was a mess of pulp!   It made for a nice series of photos... ...and he just kept eating it...

We seem to have started a tradition when it comes to dinners while out of town for the train show and especially so on the first night of our annual train show weekend. It took a few years to get to this point however.  Truth be told, we didn't really know what to expect the first year we attended this particular train show. That first year, Sheila, Adam and I left home at around 6am on Saturday morning... arrived in Springfield when the gates to the show opened... waited in traffic to enter the immense parking lot... waited in more lines to buy tickets and actually enter the first of four buildings housing the show... made our way through the four buildings and walked around the extremely crowded show all day... then drove back home that evening. It was a verryyyy loooonnnnnnggggggg and exhausting day!  Not only was that a long, exhausting day but we knew that just one day at this show was not nearly enough time to see everything. This show is big... I mean BIG. I've

View from our room upon arrival... This year was the first year that we were able to leave home for the train show by lunchtime, or even whenever we wanted, so we could arrive by check-in time. In the past, we always had to wait for Adam to get out of school before heading out of town.  We are now empty-nesters so we have the freedom to leave home whenever we desire!  Liza, however, had to wait until she was finished with her teaching school day which meant that Liza and the grandchildren would not arrive at the hotel until later in the evening. When the kids arrived at the hotel for their first train show, we were all in the lobby lounge area enjoying a few beverages and waiting for them to arrive so we could order some pizza. The hotel lobby with some of our party at the front desk... Liza tells us that the kids were a bit confused when they left home... and understandably so. All of us had been reminding them all week long that we will be going to a train show for the we

Here is a short video of this new Hudson locomotive I picked up at the train show. I don't have any control over the sound with my current transformers so the sound isn't working as it should but you can hear some of the sounds playing randomly. Plus, I have no battery in the locomotive allowing the sound the continue through direction changes. The sounds do play, but not in any particular order nor do I have control over them with my old Lionel transformer. That being said, the locomotive does run with this old transformer so I can run the train while I am waiting for my new MTH transformer! I'm looking forward to installing a battery into the sound system and using the new transformer with this locomotive!

This past weekend we met up with a group of friends and family for one of the largest annual train shows in the country. The grandchildren accompanied us this year as well. This was their first visit to any train show and I suspect it was probably the first of many train shows for them. I shot quite a few photos as well as some video... a bit of each will be shared here in the coming days depending upon how my health is holding up through the rest of this week. Right now I could use about a month of sleep! Before I get into any specifics about our trip, I thought I would start with something simple and show some photos of a train I bought while at the show. I always begin the show with a long list of items that I want to purchase and/or research while we are at the show but, by the end of the day on Saturday, I was a bit disappointed in that I didn't find anything I was hoping to see. Just as I was sharing my disappointment with Sheila, George and Barb, and as the words

A Mastocyctosis Angel, created by a fellow patient and gifted to me... a symbol of compassion and energy. Gift of Extra Spoon Since many of you reading this blog are actually personal friends with me already, you know that I've been extremely busy for the past two months with family events. Whenever I get busy in any aspect of my life, all other areas of my life must be put on hold. I simply do not have the energy nor health to focus on more than one thing at a time. Every now and then, I get newly diagnosed patients asking for my help, advice and guidance. Just this past month, I received a number of requests for such help but I have been silent in my responses and feel I should try to explain my situation.   If I get involved in helping newly diagnosed patients, nothing else in my life gets done. There is no additional energy for anything beyond what I must focus on at any given time. Systemic Mastocytosis literally sucks the life right out of those of us struggling with

This is our first week since Adam has left for basic training so the house has seemed unusually quiet lately. This evening, however, the grandkids visited for dinner which changed things up and into a bit of a hectic pace... which, believe it or not, was a nice change. These kids really are a piece of cake whenever they visit us though. We had a nice dinner, some cake that was leftover from Adam's going-away party, some little snacks and even watched a couple of movies. Of course, the kids also had a chance to play with toys that reside in our home... especially the train table. The train show is quickly approaching and this will be the first show for the kids. I'm not sure they understand where we are going just yet but they seem excited nevertheless! It will be fun watching them at the show... unless stimulation overload takes over, of course. Anyway, here are a few photos from this evening... Kenzi

My new O scale, 2 rail, F-unit diesel locomotive on a short test track...  (that yellow locomotive in the background is a Lionel GP unit on 3 rail track). My health has been quite lousy for the past week so I have not gotten much of anything accomplished in this new year. I don't want to write about my health right now so this blog post is about something less painful to read. The first good thing that happened this morning is that my health was in the "fair" range.  The next good thing that happened this morning is my car started! It is frigid here... well below zero with wind chills approaching -50 degrees. I know I need a new battery so it was a small miracle that my car actually started this morning.  I ran some errands and arrived home to find our postal carrier leaving a package at my door. Just yesterday, I had found a few trains online in eBay at great prices. These are all O scale, 2 rail (same size as the 3 rail Lionel trains everyone knows except using

One of the many exceptional models at the show... Christmas is now behind us... tomorrow is New Year's Eve when we say goodbye to 2014 (or good riddance, whichever the case may be) and welcome in a bright new year. In the first month of the new year each year is the biggest and best train show in the United States.  This enormous train show is something we look forward to every year. Actually, we look forward to the following year's show the moment we leave the show the previous year! We now have only another few weeks to wait before we find ourselves in Springfield, MA again with tens of thousands of other model railroading fanatics. This year Adam will not be attending the show with us since he will be beginning his new career in the Air Force. The weekend of the show will be his first weekend at basic training. We will, however, be accompanied by some new train fanatics to take Adam's place... the grandchildren and they will be bringing along their mom. It is g

Church Street in Burlington, Vermont Back in early December, our good friend, Frank, asked us if we were available on the Sunday before Christmas to visit Burlington. Fortunately, this day was still open for us and we jumped at the chance for another Christmas in Burlington so we put the day on our calendar. We missed an opportunity to get up to Burlington during Christmas last year so we were pretty excited at the thought of getting back up to Burlington during Christmas this year. Our plan was to do a little barhopping and to get some photos on Church Street while it was decorated for Christmas. We set out at lunchtime for our short trip north to Lake Champlain and Burlington. There were plenty of shoppers which made for a lot of traffic and parking scarce. Fortunately for us, all these people were actually shopping and not venturing into the restaurants and pubs that line Church Street. It was nice to be able to choose a place to go and then find available space at the b