BarstowRick's H&P Layout Restoration

BarstowRick Sep 15, 2020

  1. BarstowRick

    BarstowRick TrainBoard Supporter

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    No, I can't afford to hire anyone. Let alone feed them, cloth them and raise their kids. Say, what? What did I say?
     
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  2. BigJake

    BigJake TrainBoard Member

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    (emphasis mine)

    Wait, now I'm really confused...
     
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  3. BarstowRick

    BarstowRick TrainBoard Supporter

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    I won't do one of those you said, someone else said then I responded and then you said and I jumped back in and it just got more confusing as it went along. With that said, I'll admit I love stuff like that.

    I'm hoping to get some wires stripped tomorrow. Nothing sexy about that. Maybe I can compete with a jack hammer removing a stoop that blocks the way from the front yard to the back yard. This isn't going to be fun for the guy jack hammering all that old cement. I feel for the guy.

    In the meantime the neighbor moved out from a house across the street and didn't take her cat's. Guess who is hanging out in my back yard? Oh boy!!

    More news later.
     
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  4. badlandnp

    badlandnp TrainBoard Member

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    So now the 'crazy model train guy' will also be the 'crazy cat guy???'

    :LOL::ROFLMAO:

    Hmmm...layout re-wired, trains running, cats chasing li'l electric 'mice.' Can't wait for the video!
     
  5. Massey

    Massey TrainBoard Member

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    I never have understood how someone can adopt a little furry friend and not take them with when they move. My cats (all 6) are part of my family and they go where I go. And I have in the past adopted cats left behind.
     
  6. BarstowRick

    BarstowRick TrainBoard Supporter

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    That's what I like to hear. I had both cats outside on the stoop grabbing a bite to eat. One is very friendly while the other is skittish. We shall see what happens next. These two will have to get along with the others in the colony. So far that isn't working out so well.

    GOT some wire stripping done!! Now that's good news.

    Busy day ahead.

    Feed the colony of cats.
    Breakfast for me.
    Take morning pills.
    Clean out litter boxes.
    Pick up pee pads.
    Take trash to dumpster in the alley.
    Get a nap.
    Lunch
    Get another nap
    While eating supper try to keep up with the local news and national news.
    Mostly Covid
    Feed the cat's one more time.
    Watch some TV, with very little of interest on the boob tube. I've seen every segment on LAFF. Not laughing.
    Can't get much else.
    WIFI is shut down. Neighbor left with his half of the commitment to finance it.
    So Hot Spot which is all but useless in this neighborhood operating at minimal whatever it is they operate at. Slow, slower and then nothing. If you knows what I mean.
    Then sometime before midnight. Between 10:00 p.m. and 11:00 p.m. :p
    Another nap. I need the energy to go to bed.
    While watching or rather sleeping through TV shows.
    At this point the cat's show-up to claim a sleeping spot only to waken to some sort of info commercial. Aiiyiiyii!
    Take night pills.
    Off to bed where again certain cat's have staked out their claim to a sleeping spot.
    Snoozz With interruptions to any rest I get with a visit to the porcelain throne. Every two hours or more often, as needed. Where's the rest in that?
    Then morning arrives and it starts, all over again.
    Sigh!

    :sick::confused::cool:
    Later!
     
    Last edited: Jul 24, 2021
  7. BigJake

    BigJake TrainBoard Member

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    Yeah, lots of folks working from home during the depth of the Covid crisis adopted dogs and/or cats. And now that the economy is opening up and they have to go back to work (or worse, move to take a new job), their adopted pets are left behind. Shelters are having to euthanize again...

    I'm not a particular fan of cats, and my wife is allergic to them. But we do love our dog, all 8 pounds of faux-fearless, Chihuahua-mix! Oh, he's ferocious, from his own side of a window. He's a great road trip companion, but he also loves his friends at the 'resort' where we board him if we can't bring him along.

    My kids rescued him off the street at a busy intersection, while driving home from high school one fine spring afternoon on my son's birthday (they've both finished college, on their own now, but we've still got him). No collar, no chip... Vet said he'd be adopted quickly if we put him in the pound, but we wouldn't hear of that...

    We named him Lucky. My wife gave him his first name: Damn. Sometimes lengthened to Dammit, especially when calling him by his full name.
     
  8. BarstowRick

    BarstowRick TrainBoard Supporter

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    Your doing your part to house and care for a pet. What more can anyone ask. Well done!
     
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  9. Shortround

    Shortround TrainBoard Member

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    I can't have any pets. While so many in the neighborhood have gotten BIG snarling dogs. Even some little snarlers. I don't want to hear it but at least they will attack the 'owners'.
     
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  10. badlandnp

    badlandnp TrainBoard Member

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    Have two cats now. Rescued the one from a friends front door step on a -15F night. Her cats were beating it up, so he ended up with me. White long haired guy that purrs instantly and was so scruffy looking upon moving in. Hence his name 'Scruffles.'. The neighbors cat chose to move in shortly after I did also. Kept trying to keep him out, but he would dive in just as soon as I opened the door! So I finally gave up trying and accepted the inevitable. Then I asked neighbors, and the one claimed him. She told me to just keep kicking him out as he had become an outside cat along with her other two. (I think the fella of the house made that choice when he moved in.) But, lately she has acknowledged that 'Gunner" is really my cat now, sort of...

    However, neither cat is allowed in the Trainshed. They do tend to shed, and their hair gets on my clothing which gets into the layout. Other than that, they are fairly spoilt, according to my kids!
     
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  11. Shortround

    Shortround TrainBoard Member

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    I can't have pets here. But, the lady downstairs had two little cats and they destroyed the plastic venetian blinds and haven't seen either since the end of spring. The air conditioners went in. :unsure:
     
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  12. DCESharkman

    DCESharkman TrainBoard Member

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    I am allergic to cats and nothing against them, but I love dogs! I wish I still had my Siberian Huskies, but like me they got old and are pulling the great dogsled in the sky now!
     
  13. BoxcabE50

    BoxcabE50 HOn30 & N Scales Staff Member TrainBoard Supporter

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    No pets in my building. But not a problem anyhow. Had plenty of years and have plenty of memories.
     
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  14. Inkaneer

    Inkaneer TrainBoard Member

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    Got a solution to your problem. Get rid of the cats!
     
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  15. BarstowRick

    BarstowRick TrainBoard Supporter

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    Getting rid of them isn't likely to happen. It's a long story. So here's the short version.
    '
    These cats in the colony have been spade or neutered by a sponsor who vested dearly in them. Looking for permanent homes for them. However, not knowing anybody up here in Idaho Country, makes that difficult.

    Time will tell..
     
  16. Massey

    Massey TrainBoard Member

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    Hey Rick, you OK? I hope your cats have not figured out a way to inherit your trains… I swear when mine look at me they are trying to figure out how to either eat me, or if it would be the right time to off me.
     
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  17. BarstowRick

    BarstowRick TrainBoard Supporter

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    I worry about the same thing with my feline colony. If I don't get up when they think I should. Obviously hungry I get the feeling I may be the next meat they eat.

    Speaking of which cat food just recently went up in price. Better then 50 cents a can of 5.5 0z. food. That's getting better then expensive. I did find on line a 60 can case for 43 cents a can. That will help the budget for now. Just hope no one reads this and changes that offering.

    The layout, the layout??? What to do?? What can I say? I got discouraged with it and went into a harrumph funk Not happy with all the work it's going to take to rebuild it. Lately, I'm finally getting back to it.

    Another aspect of all of this. Also, a daily growing dilemma. It took me a long time to pack everything up and it will most likely take me even longer to get it all unpacked. I decided to leave things in a ready to move mode just in case I get thrown out of here. I can't call this home quite yet.

    Folks from California aren't exactly welcomed here. Once they find out where you hail from they kind of shun you. I got told just recently they wish all the Ca's would go back home. Sigh!!

    Anyway, I have good neighbors. We like to barbecue. So, some things are working out.
     
  18. badlandnp

    badlandnp TrainBoard Member

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    Rick, Am truly hoping you don't have to relocate again. It's a lot of work! We here would rather see you expend that energy on the layout, self servingly! :rolleyes:

    On another note, and hopefully this isn't a bad note, I left Boise in '90, and the next year Ada county had a huge influx from CA. Real estate went thru the roof, which helped me sell my house, but made it more difficult for the average Idahoan to afford one. CA's would pay anything for a house due to the perceived cheapness of it compared to what they left behind. However, what mostly people see actually happen is there community gets "Californicated." for lack of a better term. Newbies from CA want all the CA luxuries they left behind, then start driving the tax base up to pay for stuff, their kids turn the schools into jungles, etc, etc. When I left Livingston, MT in 96, the CA effect was hitting the town and it has become a town full of CA's.

    There are good ones in the bunch coming up and escaping the CA, always have been and always will be. It's the majority of a#*$%es that show up that give the rest of CA a bad name. I have had several good friends from there, but they keep it quite about the CA thing...

    You probably know all of this already.

    Enough of that. Now get back to that purring furball on your lap, and then to the layout!;)
     
  19. BarstowRick

    BarstowRick TrainBoard Supporter

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    Spoken like a true Idahoan. In response. All you've said is true. The lack of family discipline is the biggest problem with Californian's. One of the reasons the states school systems is suffering. Let the kids run wild.

    It would be nice to have the medical luxuries I had in California here in Idaho. You are right that would drive the taxes up to the same intolerable levels we paid in CA.

    Dogging California, for a paragraph or two. The green minded ones have moved in and taken control of everything. They are doing the same in Washington and Oregon, never mind here in Idaho.

    The forest suffers because of the lack of proper care from Foresters. They need to remove the fuel for these fires. It used to be about fire prevention. The thinking and attitude today is let it burn. Problem solved. Thus the fires and we are back to bad air quality.

    The freeways are falling apart and they claim they don't have money to repair them.
    One after the other large corporation have left or are leaving California.
    Taxes and manufacturing requirements are more then most want to deal with.
    The recycling centers and other projects tax payers paid for, are slowly being shut down.

    They want a high speed train and as it appears #@%^&$ to "No Where". I'm all for trains but it needs to serve the major populaces. However...Fresno and Bakersfield? Really? I can see Sacramento over to the Bay Area and on down to Los Angeles. Then from Los Angeles and out to Las Vegas. But down the middle of San Joaquin Valley? They already have the San Joaquin Valley Flyers. If the high speed trains stops at every station the Flyers do, it won't be high speed rail service. Check out the ridership and that might enlighten you as to how much the trains are being used and a indicator on how needed or not they are.

    It's not a smart or happy time we live in.

    Just my thoughts on the subject.

    Anyway I digress.

    Yes, the smoke here has been extra bad this summer. Touching off my allergies and asthma. Not fun!! According to some Californian's I stay in touch with. Many of the fires are burning where fires burned before. You just have to wonder.

    My cat's woke me up in a most interesting way this morning. One of Debbie's cat's was sitting on the windowsill outside yowling. i think he was saying feed me in Catalonia language. So, everyone is fed as of this morning and now it's nap time.

    Here at home the jack hammer that's been banging away on the steps. The ones that blocked being able to get from the front of the house to the back, has stopped and the steps are gone. That will make things easier. Now my neighbors can get the their trash out to the dumpsters in back. We can rake the leaf's up in the front yard and dispose of them. Finally!!!

    The layout, the layout. I'm determined to get it running but I will have to pace myself.

    Thanks to everyone for your comments and interest in my train layout. I'll get it back up and running in time. Reports may be slow coming.

    Later.
     
    Last edited: Aug 15, 2021
  20. badlandnp

    badlandnp TrainBoard Member

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    Looking forward to it! As you know, life gets in the way of our hobby too often. Even though I have my layout moved to my new location, it languishes unchanged. . . . life invading the time allotted! And cats, and . . .

    :LOL:
     
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