Scattered Thoughts . . .

Sheila did too much lifting and playing with a toddler on Saturday and has had serious back problems since then.  Actually, her back has gotten worse with each passing day since Saturday.  This morning was the worst it has ever been. I came out of the bedroom at 6:30 this morning to find Sheila lying on the living room floor in the dark.  If she hadn't spoken up in the dark to warn me that she was on the floor, I would have tripped over her, landed on her, and likely made her condition even worse.  That certainly wouldn't have helped either one of us! Apparently, she had previously made it to the bathroom, in pain, but trying to sit on the toilet put her back into an intensely painful spasm.  She managed to slowly, over the course of the next half hour, crawl her way back to the living room where I found her. At this point, Sheila couldn't get to the bathroom nor anywhere else.  When I helped her to carefully and excruciatingly make her way back to the bathroom, just sittin

One of the days while Adam and Joi were visiting us was spent in the backyard just socializing.  Liza, Whitney and the grandkids were also there to spend some time with Adam and Joi.  Even Judy and her son, Jamie, surprised us by visiting after hearing that Adam was in town! We haven't spent any time with Judy since before the pandemic so it was nice to spend some time with her on this day.  She and Jamie stayed for dinner with all of us.  I always make more food than is necessary so last minute extra guests never cause a plating shortage.  We were very happy to have them share this day with us... As the sun set behind the trees and the sailboat, it started getting a little chilly in the autumn evening air so we built a small fire to keep everyone warm and cozy... The kids always gravitate toward the sailboat and the playhouse.  Actually, we now have a putting green that also captures Lukey's attention.  If I remember correctly, Lukey spent some time with Ace on the putting gre

W hile Adam and Joi were visiting us, we did quite a bit of sightseeing and eating out.  That was a really nice change after spending much of three years in the house during the worst periods of the pandemic.  Of course, we're all still vulnerable to the virus and we still develop the virus every now and then but, after being vaccinated and boosted many times, the severity of the virus seems to be far less than before we were vaccinated and boosted.  That has certainly been the case for us.   _________________________________________________________________ Ironically, as I write this blog entry, we have the virus running through the family yet again.  Whitney's household is testing positive which is very bad news since our granddaughter in that household has cystic fibrosis so is considered very high risk.  Today, Lukey (in Liza's household) tested positive and is feeling a bit lousy too.  We're hoping that everyone recovers quickly and unremarkably and, of course, we&

While Adam and Joi were visiting us the week before the holiday weekend, we headed up to Burlington for a very nice cruise on Lake Champlain.   We do one cruise every summer and had already done one cruise back in June with Lukey and Kenzie but this sightseeing cruise is always a nice time so doing a second cruise this summer received no objections from either one of us.   Actually, we jumped at the chance to do a cruise with Adam and Joi.   Adam hasn't been here for a visit in quite a few years and he is now married to Joi so it was nice to see both of them again.  We met Joi during our cross-country trip on Amtrak a few years ago.  That was a great trip and we enjoyed our time with the two of them while getting to know Joi a little better.  Now they were visiting Vermont...  just before a holiday weekend...  at the peak of foliage season...  which made for a very busy tourist season in our neck of the woods.  Every place we visited was very crowded with tourists.   Since it was a

A fter replacing the traction tires on my O scale MTH Hudson steam locomotive the other day, I put my O scale MTH RS-1 diesel locomotive on the test track for a test run too.  I figured it was a good time to maintain and test this diesel locomotive since I was on a roll with all these model railroading maintenance tasks.  Unfortunately, the moment this diesel engine started rolling, the traction tires broke off three of the four wheels with traction tires! I immediately ordered a new set of traction tires that should arrive in the next week.  Installing these four traction tires on this diesel engine should be even easier than replacing the traction tires on my Hudson steam locomotive.  My Hudson steam locomotive ended up being a much easier project that I thought it would be, which was great, but this diesel engine should be even easier.  In the meantime, I removed the RS-1 from the test track and removed the one traction tire that did not break apart.  Even though this lone traction

W hile I'm in the house every day this week while still recovering from a very busy week last week, I've been doing some maintenance on some of my model railroading locomotives in between long naps.  Earlier this week, I cleaned and lubed a big Fn3 scale steam locomotive.  That little project went extremely well so I continued testing various locomotives and provided maintenance on them as needed.   The latest two locomotives I worked on were two MTH O scale locomotives.  One was a steam locomotive and one was a diesel locomotive.  I haven't run either of these locomotives in a number of years so I expected them to need some work.  I already knew that the MTH steam locomotive needed new traction tires so that is where I started.  I had the new traction tires on hand so that seemed like the logical place to start. Since I hadn't used either of these MTH locomotives in a few years, I quickly realized that I have forgotten how to set up the power control for these MTH loco

The nine feet of used track that I had ordered online the other day arrived today so I was finally able to run this large Fn3 scale steam locomotive on some track for the first time.  A couple of days ago, I spent a little time cleaning and lubricating this old steam locomotive.  I had tested it, running, while it was lying on its side but I had yet to run it on any track...  until today.  When the track arrived, it was in need of cleaning.  The rails were a solid dark brown color indicating they would not conduct nearly enough of the low voltage electricity needed to power any locomotive.  The rails appeared to be completely oxidized.  Actually, it appears as though this track was barely used and probably spent most of its life on a display shelf which is likely what its primary use will be at our home too (along with occasional test runs).  After a few minutes of cleaning, the tops of the rails were nice and shiny again. I didn't clean any of the rail joiners nor where the rail j

A bout twice a year, I try to put aside some time to do some maintenance on my model locomotives.  They accumulate dust and grime so that is the first thing to address.  They also could use periodic lubrication.  After some cleaning and lubrication, I look the entire locomotive over to see if it needs any other work.   Yesterday morning, I worked on some of my O scale locomotives as well as a couple of HO scale locomotives.  One of these O scale locomotives could still use some more work so I might try to tackle that tomorrow morning.  It is one of my older locomotives so I'm thinking there is some caked up grease on the gears.  It is not running as smoothly as I would like and the likely problem is some old, hardened grease on the gears.  Hopefully, that will be a fairly simple job.  (See the edit added at the bottom of this blog entry for more information on what I thought would be a quick and easy task.) This morning, I pulled out my largest locomotive.  I had purchased this ver

T wo or three times a year, I put together a small photo book of photos I have shot documenting some of the things we've done so I can send it to my father.  We haven't traveled at all since the beginning of the pandemic and we are still in no hurry for that.  Well...  we would like to travel but the risk is still too great.  I've already had the virus three times and I am still experiencing lingering problems due to the virus so I'm in no hurry to expose myself further.  My health was bad enough before these lingering problems due to the virus.  I don't need to continue to expose myself and my health to more problems. While I was sorting through photos and choosing photos to put in this photo book, I came across some of my solar images from a session in July that were worth writing about here in my blog.   I specifically remember this particular session because I was able to watch a solar flare erupt and recede for about an hour.  It was a pretty amazing and very m

I finally purchased a much needed dedicated solar astronomy camera and it arrived last night!   I've been using a sort of generic beginner astronomy camera (well...  maybe one step above entry level) meant primarily for guide scopes and planetary imaging.  There are far worse cameras than the one I've been using until now but this camera is not really an ideal choice for solar imaging.  It has been slow, difficult to use, noisy, and the image quality has been seriously lacking.  Producing good results out of this old astronomy camera has been difficult, frustrating and requiring a lot of extra post-processing.  I've had to work very hard at finessing fine detail out of the images and I've only managed to succeed at doing that because of my decades of photography experience.  I admit that I've managed to produce some nice imagery with the old camera but it has been difficult to accomplish requiring a lot of extra work and time.  Plus, much of the data from the old c