Notes to self

1. Lift foot 1 inch higher than next step. Particularly when barefoot.
2. When donating blood, and the blood sucker can't find your pulse because he's "had too much caffeine" and you got similar results the last TWO times he's drawn blood from you. ASK FOR SOMEONE ELSE!
3. When using a small screwdriver on a smaller stuck screwhead, put it on something solid! (And I don't even remember what happened with the fingernail)

"New" baggage car in new home

A nice article in the local paper meant a fair number of observers and visitors when 605 reached her new home.

Here, she's leavin' town, heading for the freeway and probably the fastest she's ever traveled. (55mph)

Not sure what was the scariest

1) The threat of hypothermia, (we never saw the sun, and it was drizzling a lot, then the wind came up.)
2) Being left alone to video everything for the last 4 (of 6) hours with someone else's equipment. (and still have to take still pics)
3) Watching the car lurch up down sideways and the boss's wife commenting "At least adrenaline keeps you warm"
4) Getting a phone call in the middle of all this mayhem "Honey, the computer's acting up" which turned out to be a dying (now dead) keyboard. It's good to have friends who have extra Mac keyboards to loan!

A railcar turned, another dumpster filled

And yet there is more "stuff". So that means another dumpster to be filled. We have tried to recycle/reuse as much as possible. It's turned 90 degrees from it's previous placement and is now headed downhill.

The plan is to load it onto a truck this next week and transport it to it's new home next Saturday.

righteous indignation/crisis addiction recovery

Today I overheard a conversation where one person was telling another that they were very tired and that everyone she knew was tired.

I got to thinking about why this might be. I have no reason to believe that the following applies to these people.

I think many people are addicted to righteous indignation and reaction to whatever crisis' are in the news at the moment, real or fomented by groups that might benefit in the short term. I'm guessing it's what some need when their tolerance for caffeine has risen so that they no longer get the buzz they crave.

For some, like Andy Kaufmann, they'd rather believe that man never went to the moon, Obama's not a real citizen, he's a Muslim etc because it's more exciting than the boring truth.

The same government that is incapable of doing anything, IS capable of elaborate conspiracies.

Have you ever wondered what a stampeding animal is thinking, or IF they're thinking? I wonder about the people who are so enraged about immigration. I think they're being stampeded. Yes, there is illegal immigration. There always has been. Is it worse now? Really?What is the evidence besides short video clips that make it seem that human waste and body parts now mark the border with Mexico. Yes, there are some very bad people. Are we all so threatened that we have to give up constitutional rights?

I haven't seen a video of people lining up for the jobs that are being taken by illegal immigrants.

Health care, remember death panels? What about all the lies we have been told, why do we still believe them? Why do we pass on the emails that promote them?

Anyway, it seems like we're in a (no doubt temporary) lull in things to get excited about. The oil leak is not so spectacular, looks like we're getting out of Iraq soon. I think the crazies have run out of imagination for new unbelievable outrages.

Hate takes a lot of energy. So does righteous indignation.

Give it a rest.

Let's all just take a deep breath, and then another.

Don't believe everything you think.

Meditate.

(Now I'm tired)

A picture of NWP 605 in better times

This appears to be taken in the town where it was likely built, Tiburon, Calif.

Double click for zoom in.

(Tiburon, for you trivia fans, is spanish for "shark")

NWP 605-the video

Baggage Car Update-Leave early, miss the fun

So I left early, figuring how much more could they get done. Quite a bit it turns out. In addition to removing the last of the attached pieces, they got an ID on the car!

Welcome NWP baggage car 605, formerly SF & NP baggage car #5, built in 1892, "retired" in 1939, back to the world! (NWP records say "condemned" as it is apparently also painted on the side. So disrespectful!

Uncovering a baggage car

One side and the two ends cleared, one side to go.

Next project!

Another 30 seconds of my 15 minutes used up...

It's even harder to see this "car" from the outside. There is quite a bit more to be stripped off, although the mover may be doing more of the stripping this time. Lots of mysteries to be solved, questions to be answered.


Find more videos like this on Northwestern Pacific Railroad Network

I'm on YouTube! (am I famous now?)

This is an early version. The birth year of the car has been changed and is more likely 1869.



This is moved without disturbing the tree right in front of it.

Allergic to "fencing"?

So the theme of this week seems to be fencing.
Replacing a rotted, and slotted post, I was NOT besotted with the prospect.



And painting. I built this fence with removable sections so that I can pull them out and power wash then paint them on saw horses, rather than bending over, getting stuck with rose thorns etc
But I still don't enjoy doing it. So in the midst of my mental grumbling the question occured to me, "If one were allergic to 'fencing', would you treat it with an epee pen?"

Open Caboose!

Next week is the annual dinner, so this week was spent tidying up and putting back the ladders and adding steps to one end to make it all pretty.

Now if the cupola would just make an appearance..

The general opinion is that it is starting to look like a caboose.

Another stroll on the beach, another prize!

I should have put a coin next to this for perspective, but it's slightly smaller than a quarter.

Romance and citations on the beach

On my walk this morning, I found two interesting things by the beach. One was this marriage proposal, "Will You Marry Me Smoopy?" and to my right was a group of about 18 people being cited for illegally harvesting mussels from the rocks. It's a full moon/low tide/3day weekend and all. I didn't think it would be polite to photograph them, so I took pictures of the low tide.


Other people are simply above it all.

Our new ( hopefully it will keep out the deer) gate

And this is just a shot I took a while ago


UPDATE!

Later, Moonrabbit and I went for a stroll and garbage pickup along the beach. We scored a decent towel (to be a nice rag for the garage) a nice suede billed baseball cap, and an unopened pint of Bacardi rum!

How cool is this?

Busy day on the railcar restoration front. Became something of an expert on the installation and removal of brake beams (Don't ask) Pulled lots of nail and staples. But the COOL thing I did was use some paint stripper to uncover two of the clerestory windows to discover....

911? There's an alligator attacking my house!

For what it's worth, this is about 300 yards from the rocks rubbed smooth by Woolly mammoths that I blogged about awhile back.

Elderly Couple meet

They awoke to their first dawn together on Mother's day. Sure, there's a 30 year age difference, but at 111 vs 140ish, whose to say it's wrong?

What I've been doing in my SPARE time

I didn't paint ALL this. But I "painted" a lot of it. (I don't paint so much as slop)

BTW this is the 1898 caboose

No moss on my...stones

This is not something that has actually taken any time. It's just a blatant appeal for sympathy. I picked this up about two weeks ago at the hardware store parking lot. Don't you just love people that can't drive well enough to back out of a parking space without hitting something? And then not leave a note.
3 out of the last 4 Saturdays have been spent uncovering this 1860's passenger car. It is close to being ready to be moved, probably early May.



The remodel is done except for the shower curtain rod and attaching the handheld shower.