Day 135

We made it to Louisiana. The trip was pretty long, 8 1/2 hours. It would have been shorter, but we made a couple of fuel stops that we didn't really need to make. Also, we went through beautiful downtown Conroe rather than driving around it on the loop road.

On the way over we drove through Bastrop. On the far side you could see part of the burn area. It burned both sides of the road. There were a lot of brand new building replacing ones that had burnt down.

This part of Texas is wet. It was weird to see water in every river and creek that we passed. Of course things are really green. Not the Texas we are used to.

Louisiana is interesting. It's flat as a table, and ground level is about 6 inches above the water table. Everywhere you walk is squishy. The club is nice, but we didn't get to see much of it because ....

As we were parking Ellen noticed that the tread was peeling off one of the tires. It was one of the ones that we didn't replace when we came down. We were VERY lucky that it did not blow. There was a whole section of tread missing. I took it off and replaced it with the spare. Unfortunately the spare has been damaged while riding under the trailer. I don't want to travel on it. So tomorrow we have to try to get another one in town.

Day 134

We spent part of the day getting ready for the shoot. Mainly moving stuff and buying groceries. I prepped the trailer. I also did a little bit of tree trimming to clear some branches that were sticking out over the driveway.

It rained again last night. It was warm and very muggy for most of the day. The humidity dropped in the afternoon - it was 77 degrees. I was tree trimming when it was muggy.

I spent the rest of the day making yet more changes to the train layout. I've got a very optimized plan - very few left over pieces. It also has some improvements like wider curves and a new viaduct. The pieces cost a little more, but they give me two advantages. First, I can use the bench work they replace elsewhere in the layout. Second, they will allow me to build a water feature and perhaps some more track side buildings.

I emailed a web vendor about prices and availability for some of the stuff I need. I'll probably make an order sometime this week.

Day 133

It rained a little last night, and it raining some tonight. Good timing, because it was just cloudy (but warm) all day.

We started getting ready for the shoot - moving things into the trailer. I did some cleanup and then spent the rest of the day messing with the track plan. I think I've finally got one that will:

1) Fit the existing bench work with minimum modifications.
2) Add a second turn around loop.
3) Minimize the cost.
4) Leave enough room for some interesting structures.
5) Be fun to operate.

I'm still trying to figure out how to get a bridge into the setup.

While I was doing that, Ellen was painting the ceiling. She mixed up a matching color and applied it while I moved the ladder around. I think that officially ends our painting activities. At least I put all the paint cans away.

That was about it for the day.

Day 132

We went to the tournament today. I shot like shit. I was so bad that I decided to shoot the 5-stand, too. I just wanted to get some more targets shot. I did terrible on the easy one and OK on the hard one. I think that I just took too much time off. By the end of the second five stand I was beginning to get back into the swing of it. When it was finished, we ran the dog. She enjoyed it very much.

When we left we went to the hobby store. They didn't have much in the way of train stuff, but I managed to see a couple of Kato things in person that I've wanted to see. They are planning on getting some more stuff in in the next few weeks.

Last night we took our first showers in the new shower. It is great. There isn't enough water pressure to feed both heads at once. Each one works pretty good separately. The rain head is wonderful. One of the nicest things is that you can actually adjust the heat easily. That old adjuster was a pain. It was always too hot or too cold.

Day 131

We didn't have anything planned for today, so we stayed in bed all morning with the pets surfing. A fine time was had by all.

When we did get up, I decided to make up the train display case. It came out looking great. I filled it up with just a fraction of my rolling stock. So I decided to go get another one before Michael's runs out (they are on clearance). While I was doing that, Ellen went next door to Borders to look for books. She didn't find any she wanted.

There was a Petco there, so we took the dog in. We didn't need anything, we just did it to entertain her. She's not spoiled at all. We also stopped at Lowe's to look at counter tops. We found the stuff that we wanted to look at. Unfortunately, the colors weren't exactly right.

On the way home we stopped at Taco Bell, we both like their tacos.

Day 130

The contractor and the plumber came today and finished the shower. The contractor did an incredible job matching paint from two cans to patch the gouge the glass guys put in the ceiling. The fixtures look really nice. We can't try them until tomorrow. It will be interesting to see how they do.

We put the hitch in the truck today. I added the ammo and the cart. The hitch went in smoothly with almost no effort. That's never happened before.

We went out and got a couple of items, some groceries, and ran the dog. She didn't run a lot. That was fine with me, since she did a whole lot yesterday.

When we got home, I opened up the boxes with the train stuff. It was sort of like Christmas. There was all of this stuff that I'd forgotten I had. I separated some stuff out for the display. I also got out some books that much help with the bench work.

I've got a couple of more small changes left to make on the plan. I'm going to mix Kato and flextrak. That's not for cost. It's because that's the way I want it to fit together. The majority will be Kato.

Day 129

We went shooting today. It was somewhat of a disappointment because they had closed the course for a tournament this weekend. We did shoot the beginner's course. We were able to shoot some interesting stuff by shooting doubles and backwards. It really didn't matter that much, since I was shooting like shit.

When we got the mail, my train stuff had arrived. The new coil car is really cool.

On the way home we stopped at a new place, Lady Bird Park. There was a boat ramp there, so Lucy got some swimming in off the ramp. We would have walked around the park, but we didn't want to get very far from the car.

When we got home we had a very tired dog. She really didn't even want to go out for the mail.

I did some cruising on the internet and found a place that sells track really cheap. I'm going to price things out using them and see how much it will really be.

Day 128

I got up at 7:30 this morning. I just had to get working with that track design program some more. It's actually really fun. I spent the day polishing the layout, separating it into layers for readability, and adding the outlines of the bench work. I also did a second version that used flex track for all of the places where switches aren't used.

I was surprised. When I costed it out, the flex version was $600, and the Kato only version was $770. That's because most of the cost is in the switches. I'm not sure what I'm going to do now. $600 is a lot for a toy train setup.

Besides playing, I also painted the trim board that I replaced on the well house. The paint matched pretty well, but I painted all of the door trim anyway. I also sanded the closet door to keep it from sticking. That didn't work, so I'll have to come up w/a plan B.

Day 126

The contractor called this morning. The glass was in so he came out and installed it. It looks very good. Unfortunately the plumber can't be here until Friday.

Wife went out and got her hair cut and colored. She came back looking like she was FOB. Also the color is more red than purple. I like purple better.

I spent the whole day playing with my train program. I also looked up some places to get cheap track. I'm thinking about ordering just enough parts to build out the curves so I can modify the bench work.

We took the dog over to Circle C. There was still a fair amount of water in the creek, and it was crystal clear. So she got to go swimming. We have a tired dog tonight.

Day 125

I spent the whole day on the track planner. It was kind of fun. More like mask design than coding. Change one thing in one place and it affects a bunch of other things somewhere else.

I spent a lot of time out looking at the bench work and matching the plan to the benchwork. I can't do it exactly, there will be some places where I'll have to change the benchwork. Al in all, I think I have a workable solution. List price for the stuff is only $780. The deepest discounts I've seen on the web are 24%. That's still $590.

When I went out to take out the garbage, the UPS guy drove up. He had my knife! I didn't think I'd ever see it again.

The dog got really bored today. We'll have to do something with her tomorrow.

Day 124

I screwed up today. Last night I realized that my track plan (as I had designed it in the late 80's) had a fatal flaw. So I spent about half the day redesigning it. As part of the final polishing, I went out to make sure it matched the benchwork. It didn't. I had thought that I'd used a 4x8 sheet of plywood for the layout. I hadn't. The layout was 78" by 42". That meant that all the track design work I'd done was basically thrown away.

It wasn't all a loss. I had climbed a lot of the learning curve. That made redoing it a lot easier. It still took a lot of time though because I had to work pretty hard to fit all of the functionality I wanted into the reduced space.

One of the bad things with the small layout was that I had to use a lot of the smaller, more expensive switches. That made the total cost come out about the same as the larger set. I've still got some cost optimizing to do.

I'm really enjoying this. It's a lot like writing software, but with no pressures.

We took the dog over to Circle C and ran her. Then we took her for an off-leash walk around the park. She was a pretty good dog all the way. The creek had a lot of water going through it. That's the first time I've ever seen water in it. In fact, I thought it was permanently dried up.

Day 123

We got the bathroom lights today. We probably got them yesterday afternoon, but it was raining so I didn't go get the mail. Therefore I didn't see the box.

It rained hard for periods all night, and through the morning. There's lots of standing water out there. It's also cold and windy. We didn't go anywhere. Instead I decided to install the lights. The first went with no problem. On the second (over the toilet) the dumbshits struck. They hadn't installed a box. Instead they screwed the fixture into the sheet rock. They could have screwed it into a 2x4, but they were too lazy to get a screw that was long enough.

If that wasn't enough, they didn't leave enough wire to connect the light. It's wire nutted in the attic. I couldn't reach the nuts through the small hole in the ceiling. So I cut the wires of the old light and connected the new light to them. As a final piece of half-assedness, the dumbshits only used 12-2, so there was nowhere to connect the ground wire.

I screwed the mounting bar from the new light into the 2x4 and attached the new light to it.

After that I spent the rest of the day with my track layout program. I managed to complete a layout that I think will connect with only a very small amount of finessing. I think it will also fit the existing bench work. Using MSRP, it will only cost $850.

Tomorrow I'll look into some ways to reduce that. I think I'll use flex track on all of the sidings.

Day 122

It rained for most of the day. Sometimes hard, sometimes lightly, but pretty much all day.

I decided not to go to the estate sales because none looked very promising and they were all far away. Also the hobby shop I called didn't have the track I needed. Apparently Austin isn't into N-scale. I spent a lot of time online looking for N-scale stuff. I finally ordered what I needed.

Along the way I found a track planning program. I bought it and now I'm entering the layout that I built using a Kato track library. That will let me know how much rebuilding it will cost. I plan on using e-bay to acquire at least some of the pieces.

I got so tied up using the program last night that I forgot to do an entry.

Day 121

I sealed the grout in the shower today. It took several hours and was a pain in the ass. It would have been easier if I hadn't followed directions. If I do it again, I'll use a sponge rather than spraying it on and wiping up the excess.

We ran out of bread and bananas, so we went to the store. We also stopped at Walgreen's to get some Valentine's candy on sale. It was pretty cheap, so we bought a couple of boxes.

That's about all that happened. We've got a couple of estate sales to go to tomorrow.

Day 120

The weather was changing today. For the morning and the early afternoon it was warm and muggy. Later things dried out and it was pleasant.

I took the display case out to the garage. After putting all of the screws I acquired a few weeks ago away I looked at the box with the trains in it. Unfortunately, I hadn't kept any flex track.

I turns out the there aren't many hobby stores in Austin. We went to the nearest, on Lamar. When we got there, they had moved. They were down 35 by Slaughter. So we drove all the way up there just to drive back. When we got there, they didn't have any track. Some hobby store.

There's one more possibility up by 183. I'll call before I go there, though.

We ran the dog on the way home. She was getting pretty disappointed riding around in the truck with nothing interesting happening.

Day 119

The weather was nice today. Sunny and near 70 degrees. So we took Lucy to Auditorium park. We went early so that we could get a parking space. After running her we walked across the bridge and did a short walking tour of downtown. We were worried because Lucy wasn't drinking anything and she wouldn't run yesterday.

The anti-gun nuts were boycotting Starbucks today. I tried to find one downtown, but struck out.

When we got back to the park, we let the dog go swimming. She had a great time. When she was finished, she was drinking. She also did 20-30 land retrieves to dry off. We also walked over to the auditorium and looked over its park and pond.

When we left we drove by a little hamburger joint that had been there since 1946. They had great burgers and a place outside to eat where Lucy could sit. She got some fries and a piece of hamburger.

Day 118

We got up this morning, and after breakfast we went to get me a much needed haircut. It was a typical Texas haircut - a little short, but I like it.

After that we went to Michael's to get a picture frame and a display case. I'm going to put some of my n-scale trains in the case.

We went to lunch at an Italian place and them stopped at the grocery store. We took the dog to the park even though it rained last night and it was muddy. She did two retrieves and then quit. I was pissed.

When we got home we gave her a bath. We were planning on doing it anyway, and the mud she acquired at the park made it mandatory.

It was cold in the morning, but by the time I went to get the mail at 4:30 it was 72 degrees.

Day 117

It was cold today. It never got above 45 degrees. I decided last night that I didn't want to do anything today, so we just stayed in bed until 11:00. We had the dog come up on the bed, and she dived underneath the covers. That's the first time she's done that. What was neat was that Taiko went under there with her.

Because it was so cold, we didn't even go outside except to get the paper. The whole day was spent surfing, reading, and watching TV.

Day 116

I cleaned up the bathroom today. It took a couple of hours to pick up the paper, clean the counter, clean the mirror, and vacuum. I even got ambitious and vacuumed the rest of the house. Then I moved all of our stuff from the other bathroom. Finally I put the paint and painting stuff away in the garage.

The bathroom looks damn good with the new paint. It matches the tile well. Now the two old lights look like shit. We went to Home Depot and Lowes, but they didn't have anything that we liked. We'll probably have to order something off the web.

That more or less covered the day. It was too cold (less than 60 degrees) to paint.

Day 115

We went to three estate sales today. They were all honest estate sales. We got a few small items, nothing special for the most part. I did get a plane (which I needed yesterday) and one of those mini hammers with the screwdrivers in the handle. I've been wanting one of those for the garage for quite a while.

One the way home we stopped at Zilker park for the dog. There was a whole group of dogs there that she spent a lot of time with. They were brought there by a group of dog sitters. After that we went to a nearby BBQ joint for lunch. I had a pint of IPA that was 9.9% alcohol. I was kind of tipsy by the time I finished it.

It rained pretty hard overnight, so I couldn't paint the board. Maybe tomorrow or Sunday. I do want to get the bathroom cleaned up tomorrow.

Day 114

Ellen finished the painting today. She just has the touch up to go now. She'll probably do that on Saturday, because tomorrow we're going estate saleing.

While she was painting, I went out and smoothed out the rock in the driveway. I also decided that it was time to fix the door on the well house. I ran a couple of screws into places where the nails were coming out. Then I had to us a rasp to take down some interference spots on the door and the frame. I didn't have a plane, which is what I really needed. Finally, I replaced the cracked facing board. I also had to relocate the latch to make it work.

After we were both done, we went over to Walmart to get my drugs. They were having a clearance and we got some toys for the nieces. Then we went to Lowe's and got some paint for the facing board. By the time we got home, it was too late to paint the board.

Day 113

Ellen started to paint the trim today. She spent hours on it. Unfortunately there's a lot to do. Three doors, their frames, and a lot of floor trim. She got two of the doors and frames done, but not the rest.

The dog was going crazy - she didn't get to run yesterday. So I took her to the park while Ellen painted. I brought her back as tired as I could make her. I also stopped at the grocery store and got a pizza for dinner.

I forgot to mention yesterday that I had tried out my helicopter. It flies easily and is a lot of fun. The dog barked at it at first, but later on just wanted to stay out of its way. I need to practice with it a lot more.

Day 112

Ellen took the day off from painting. So I wiped down the shower. It allowed me to take a good look at the thing. It came out pretty good except for one tile that has a defect about an inch long. Unfortunately that tile is in the front just below the faucets. Oh well.

Taiko was smelling pretty bad, so the cats got baths. They were thrilled. They are softer and smell better now.

The weather was better today. Mostly clear skies, but a little cold. Hopefully it will be a little better tomorrow. If so, we'll probably go to the club.

Day 111

We did some errands today. We went to the post office and the credit union. We opened a checking account at the credit union to pay the contractor. We also stopped by the pet food place because we were getting low on dog and cat food.

It rained a little bit while we were out. It stopped while we we eating lunch at a pub like place. After that we ran the dog. She got a little dirty. When we got home I gave her a bath while Ellen started painting. The dog was pretty muddy.

Ellen painted for about 5 hours to put on the second coat. It looks pretty good, but we really won't know until it dries.

I called Brett. I should get the Apex around the end of the month.

Day 110

The great painting operation started today. It was raining, so shooting was out anyway. We went to Home Depot and bought the paint. We also got some sandwiches at the grocery store.

When we got home we had lunch and then Ellen started painting. She worked on it for at least 8 hours. She got the first coat of paint on the walls. There isn't a lot of area, but it takes a long time because she has to paint around the toilet, the mirror, and the light fixtures.

It looks like the bathroom is going to come out looking pretty good. We'll have to wait until tomorrow to really see how it looks.

Day 109

The predicted thunderstorm happened last night. It wasn't as serious as the last one, but it still had some impressive thunder and lightning. We didn't get near as much rain.

That pretty much put an end to going shooting. So we stayed in bed surfing until almost noon. It was sooooo nice.

When we got up I cleared the stuff out of the bathroom and prepped it for painting. I cleaned all of the trim, covered the sinks with plastic, and put paper on the floor. Ellen painted some test spots, but she's still not sure what color she wants to use. I think we'll probably start painting tomorrow.

We went to Lola's (the neighbor's girl) birthday party in the afternoon. We had some good conversations with a couple of the people there. We took Lucy, and she did better than I thought she would.

Day 108

They finished up most of the work today. They did the grouting, cleaned up, and packed up their stuff. There isn't anything left to do except to install the glass and do the finish plumbing. It was nice to put the curtains and furniture back in place. Also the trailers are gone.

They said it would be two weeks until the glass is here. So we went to Home Depot tonight and got some paint for the bathroom. We only got a sample can because Ellen isn't sure about the color. We also stopped at Michaels to get a birthday present for the neighborhood kid. She invited us to her cookout tomorrow.

I expect to get the taping done this weekend. I'd also like to get some shooting in if the weather allows it. It supposed to rain heavily tonight. If it does, it will be too muddy to shoot tomorrow.

Day 107

They finished up the tile today. They've been working very hard. They will do the grout tomorrow. Apparently they will also have the glass guy come by and measure for the door.

We spent another boring day reading and surfing. I'm really getting tired of sitting around all day. It looks like they will have at least a day or two days of work after tomorrow.

Day 106

We sat around again today while they continued to tile the shower. They've been at it for two days and they might get finished tomorrow (if they're lucky). Then they will still have to do the grout. I'm sure glad that I didn't do something stupid like try to do it myself.

I called about the Apex today. Kyle is going to be at Kesselring's the next two days. I'll call them on Friday to see what's up.

We went to the grocery store and ran the dog after the contractors left. I'm getting as bored as the dog.

Day 105

I didn't do an update yesterday because Ellen spent most of the evening (from 8 until 12) on a conference call with the club. I'm glad I don't have to deal with that bullshit. I spent the evening reading a book on Seal Team 6. I'm half way through and most of it has been about the personal life of the author and his training. There were some short descriptions of a couple of very minor ops in Desert Storm.

It was another standard "contractor day". We got up in the morning and hung around all day while they worked on the shower. They got about half of the tile work done. They are having trouble with the fixtures, they can't drill holes in the tile without cracking it. I'm afraid that the end result won't look good around the fixtures.

Ellen went to the neighborhood ladies lunch. She had a real good time and heard a lot of gossip (surprise, surprise). Hopefully they will have more of those.