On the 16th I go in again to get a shot in my right retina. I've been doing this every 13 weeks for over two years. On the 28th I go to the VA Clinic for another eye exam for new glasses, I hope.
Same, am 47 and these are my first. I started getting a little fuzzy up close a couple a years ago and use readers, is to the point now where I can barely read at all within about 3ft - readers are great if both your eyes are degrading at equal pace, mine are not. They said it'd be about 10 days to get, but my eyes were the last thing left... starting losing my hair in my mid-30s, I was the same size as I was in HS until my early-40s when long-term prescription GI meds gifted me 40lbs I can't get rid of... I mean daaaaaaaaa**n, Gina - my eyes were all I had left all joking aside, am really hoping they help. It's been getting frustrating.
The train and toy show was amazing. If you are into Lionel trains and about post-90s overproduced Hot Wheels, that is. There were maybe 3 tables of anything N scale. I did buy this guy, just because the guy was really cool and did actually have a full E6 Shinkansen set which shocked the daylights out me even though I don't want one. I figure if am using a 4-8-4 Bachmann US train and tender for a railway museum, it's not like there isn't a US Navy base right there in Tokyo and being that I was stationed there for s short stint I thought putting this with it would be fun. What I *really* wanted was N scale autos, I need a ton of them. The only table that had decent ones had prices higher than online and almost seemed offended when I asked if they would deal if I was to buy several things. None were anything I had to have so I just left. I also meant to go back and talk to our local club (Kokosing Valley) here in Mt Vernon, they had a small layout in the back and I meant to chat with them a bit but was down the road a ways before I remembered. I also really wanted to take a picture of the guy who had the HO-scale Tyco GP20 (Chattanooga livery scheme) marked at $235 just so we could all mock him but I didn't think of that until I was gone, either If I was into Lionel Trains, though, that was the Mecca, no joke. So many, so so many. Some really great old toys, too, just none I liked enough to buy.
I wish kato would put out more autos. I bought a 6 car set back in the 90s which I still have placed on my coffee table layout although 1 of them met an early demise after a move. That set if you can find it brings a hefty premium on ebay. I recently did find a bunch of their 8 car nissan sets which are 90's era cars and picked up a couple of them. I still have to paint the wheels and headlights which is a drawback I guess if the lack of those details bother you. https://www.ebay.com/itm/195271622487?epid=12039260609
Tomytec is my goto, but for some reason now every Car Collection they release is like $80-100. Both Kato and Tomytec had packs of taxis in the mid 00s - early 2010's that I would beat an old lady with a stick to put hands on. You never even see them on Ebay.
Tomytec is nice for sure. I have a few of their more recent sets as well but... their n scale is not 1:160 n scale so the mini vans almost appear to be full size lol. That fine though, most will never know.
when you've finally found that rara avis Kato Denny's NIB you've been looking for after most of a year and forget about the auction end time only to see it sold for $34 an hour ago.
I'm being tested, and I'm pretty sure am going to fail it... as a lot of you know, I scour the interwebs on a regular basis for the ever-elusive N scale Japanese taxis. It's something I never imagined would be this hard to track down. Well, today at work, I found one. NIB. The website is in Italian and I had to email it to myself to use translate on it, and when I finally got home, I was 100% ready to buy it. This little beauty was about to be MINE! ...and then I got to the shipping screen. The pair of autos is 8.50 euros so just under $9 USD which is a no brainer, but the shipping would be 44.50 euros, which would bring the total to $55.41, and I just don't know if I can pay $50+ for -one- N scale car (yes, there's two, but who cares about a solid blue Comfort lol) Gonna have to think about this one, because I would love to have it on my layout, but $55 for one tiny little car might be more than I'm ok with.
you guys are funny. No FJ here, am not going to pay $46 to have a $9 car shipped. I'll be the first to admit I do some really dumb stuff in the name of "yeah, but when it's done", but my hypocrisy only goes so far lol
I'm not saying anything. I have looked at guns before and thought "Maybe I should buy this, I have a holster that will fit it"...
this made me chuckle - the last gun I bought was in Oct of 2021 and I have yet to put a single round through it. But I do look at holsters for it
It's been a while since I've sat down and actually worked on anything more than window shopping for my layout. Had the rug pulled out from under me financially a few times in a row, some work stuff happened, then the holidays rolled in... all of it has taken me out of layout mode entirely for the last few months. I have been getting little things every payday still - a roll of pinstripe mask here, $9 for tiny bicycles there, etc, the stockpiles have been getting bigger even if I'm not talking about it. I still have all the kits and raw mats to work on my city. I still have a console dresser in the study with drawers full of wood scraps and little cars and scenery items to paint and such. I finally have Christmas taken care of for my friends and family, and I have quite a bit of personal time I need to burn before our fiscal year ends 1/27 which means I have a lot of time off next month and not a lot of money to do much with it. It's been a long time away from this - of me poking my head in here at work to drop a smart-aleck comment on something or like a photo for someone but not really adding much of anything to this community. I just haven't been 'in it' lately. But I'm ramping back up this morning. Have been organizing all of this into 'project boxes' and thinking about the build process of each. It's not really a resolution, I don't much believe in them, but once the new year starts I think I'll finally be able to dive butt first back into things again, and today is the first time in a long time I feel excited about the idea of it all. It almost feels like my reward for everything since like October. Actually, what it sounds like is a bunch of fun
As much as we'd like otherwise, hobbies will always yield to life's higher priorities, whether it be work, finances, family, or other constraints. Some of us are retired, and still don't get much done besides spittin' on our hands! "Getting ready to" seems to be the opening line to my retirement song. I enjoy reading your posts, seeing what you're doin' or thinkin', even if it doesn't quite meet your vision of acceptable progress. Hobbies are for enjoyment, not for fretting over. It'll come, and you'll get there. Enjoy the journey, even/especially the side-trips and detours.
