robert.admin – Robert Raymond’s Blogtorium

November 27, 2025

OpsLog – LM&O – 11/26/2025

ecently we ran out pre-Thanksgiving operation session, a chance to escape the ravages of relatives, and to have fun running trains before having to listen to your drunk uncle explain why the Earth is flat over the ruins of the feast. We had a pretty good crowd for it – not the usual pre-turkey-packer because of last-minute cancellations, but it was still enough to run all that needs-to be-ran and have fun with all that can be fun. But in flying over the confusion in my dispatchocopter, I realized how much I have to be thankful for. To wit- Thankful […]

November 25, 2025

OpsLog – Highland Division – 11/23/2025

o I’m sitting in my office in the back of Bank Tower, writing out train orders. It was just after 7am and the Bristol Local was calling for paper out. I wrote him a simple “Run Extra” order. Then I got the call from the station operator at Waterbury that he’d departed (i.e. I peeked over there). Okay, so sure. Grinchy grin on my face, darkness in my heart, all that. He got about a mile down the tracks and met (cowcatcher to cowcatcher) the first westbound passenger train of the day. So, emergency stopping or smoldering bodies scattered down […]

November 24, 2025

OpsLog – FEC – 11/22/2025

ne must be careful of what one writes… and who one gives it to. –Cardinal Richelieu, The Three Musketeers (1973) So I learned about that on my last OpsLog, where a friend fed my blog through ChatGPT, told it to regurgitate it in its own words and spin it to the negative. Cute. All I can say was that I got an invite to the wonderful Florida East Coast and you, my warmest associate, did not. So consider that and reflect with new-found wisdom. So yes, we did get a nice run over at this fine Palm Bay layout (which, […]

November 19, 2025

OpsLog – WVN – 11/8/2025

n fantasy novels (and some religions), great events are triggered following prophetic signs in the sky. And so there I was, waiting at the clubhouse’s grassy parking lot for Kyle for a ride out to the Komar’s in Tampa for their hosting of the West Virginia Northern, looking up to see a Chinese rocket booster slowly burning up as it crossed the sky, glowing white and emerald, dropping away to the east. So that’s a differing sort of start at least. So we three wise men (myself, Kyle and Bruce) journeyed across the desolation of Interstate 4, making out way […]

November 17, 2025

OpsLog – WAZU – 11/16/2025

ot going to say I was nervous – no, perhaps a little concerned. Doc Andy’s session on the WAZU was coming up and for some reason I asked my wife if she’d like to run with us. So the only way this would work was if she could run one of the remote trains in the other room, sitting at a desk with a forward camera car view and a bank of monitors of the train room up on the wall. This was better than the moshpit layout room, where you feel like you are jammed inside a rush hour […]

November 16, 2025

OpsLog – TBL – 11/15/2025

adn’t run Tuscarora (my microlayout) for some time so I announced I’d be at the clubhouse Saturday and figured I’d run the railroad on my own. That being the case, I got out all the cars I hadn’t fully tested (or struggled with in the past) set up and cleaned it, and got ready for action. Had an extra gondola car (dropped by the midnight eastbound) to spot over at the brewery and two coal hoppers deadheading about, so my session was going to be busy. The first two “scale” hours were pretty slow. Not only was I having to […]

November 16, 2025

Will Eisner: New York City (Review)

ack when I was a pre-teen, I started reading The Spirit by Will Eisner. The Spirit was a superhero whose costume was a mask and a blue suit, and whose only powers were his fists, his stamina, his constitution and his charm. And also he was clever – he could outsmart villains and bring them to justice. But what made The Spirit so very amazing to me as a young kid were the backgrounds. Oh, it might have been “Central City” but everyone knew it was New York City. The streets were filled with litter, the brick buildings were worn and leaning, the […]

November 9, 2025

My Father’s House (Review)

nteresting book and premise – an Irish priest holes up in the Vatican as the Germans invade the city, take over with their usual ruthlessness, and besiege them. Hugh O’Flaherty is our Monsignor-on-the-Ground, running a ring of saboteurs and spies to get as many escaped prisoners out of Rome. And for this, he’ll need money. I would like to know what the true story was here – how close did the actual story follow the book. One thing I know – if you are an American and fine with dictators and secret police, Hugh’s opposite, Gestapo Head Hauptmann might change […]

November 6, 2025

OpsLog – YVRR – 11/4/2025

here were two great things that happened on Tuesday, November 4th. I had a very pleasant drive out the Cocoa Beach, Florida. Plenty of time, Micky-D lunch with a book, even a McFlurry. Got to Jack F’s house a bit early so I walked around the park until the ops session start time and then I showed up. And the second thing was that, when we started the session on the Yosemite Valley RR and John L was bringing the first train from offroad, I realized I was now familiar with the railroad to anticipate how the yard works (yes, […]

November 2, 2025

OpsLog – OSRR – 11/1/2025

can’t explain it. We’d agreed to coming out for another session at ORSS (Orlando Society of Model Railroads). My ONT guys had casually chatted about it a week or so before. But when it came time for trains, everyone forgot. I’d told my wife that I, strangely, had the day off and we could do something maybe. Then I looked at the cullender at 11am and realized, oh shit! Had a session to attend. And of course that really pissed her off. “Be back at 4pm, honey! See ya! Bye!” Got to their clubhouse and realize I was the only […]