robert.admin – Page 153 – Robert Raymond’s Blogtorium

July 14, 2014

Lola! (DOG EAR)

ne my favorite movies is The Great Waldo Pepper. It’s a movie about World War One fliers trying to eke out a living barnstorming and movie flying in the twenties. In one scene near the end, Waldo is talking with Ernst Kessler, a one-time top German ace and now a boozy three-time potbelly loser. But there is still something magical about him. He speaks of flying and the paramount moment of his life, when he fought (and downed) four American fliers. There is a line that sticks with me. “I keep track of talent.” That’s an interesting statement, short and […]

July 13, 2014

The Brick Moon (Review)

o you gotta understand that The Brick Moon is scifi from way, way, waaaaaaaay back. We’re talking initial publication in 1869. Think about that. Telegraphs and steam engines and horses and six-guns. The transcon had just been completed (the Union Pacific crashing in bankruptcy) and the scars were still tender from the Civil War. The Brick Moon starts with a lesson in navigation, how you can tell latitude easily by the elevation of the polar star, but longitude (east-west position) requires clocks and guesswork. But say you could build a tower on the Greenwich Mean Line, one a hundred miles […]

July 13, 2014

ShowLog – Deland – 7/12/2014

f you want to see a BUSY mainline, look no further than the Orlando N-trak sectional layout. We’ve got a train by on our double-track mainline every 30-40 seconds or so. Which is why, when your equipment takes a dump, it’s such a mega-pratfall. Was running north through the bottom of the “U” (what is geographically just north of Jacksonville bay, just beyond I-95). I was pulling 40 mixed freight cars behind two dinky Geeps. Now, these four-axle jobs have a unique deal – if you load them up, they don’t just wheel-spin, they conk out. Reasons abound for why […]

July 10, 2014

Decorum (DOG EAR)

riting about real people (living people (living people who can get pissed at you and give you a sock on the nose)) is always tricky. Unless you are writing a political rag with a fiery agenda, you’ve got to have a care towards those you write about. I reflected on this today while driving home, considering how I’d blog up the TY&E railroad session I’d just run on. You see, besides writing about writing, I write about model train operations. Every session I attend, I blog. Some of the blogs are closely followed by their owners. So, the question is, […]

July 6, 2014

40 Days with Jesus (Review)

ince this blog will probably draw people beyond my normal sphere through search engines, I’d best explain. See, I’m an agnostic (meaning I’m not sure what’s out there, or even if there IS anything out there). But I’m curious, so I’ll read some religious works (I’ve got two books of the Bible queued up and back before I blogged everything I read, I’d read the Hindu Gita cover-to-cover). Anyway, the coworker who gave me this book to accompany my second Lent (I do it for the betterment of myself, and this time I failed – badly) is what I’d call […]

July 3, 2014

Buckets of Irony (DOG EAR)

rony is where you find it when you are a writer. I’m tapping-off (i.e. using my pass card) off the train and it’s coming down in buckets. Someone on the seat next to me had shown me the rain patterns on his phone – no waiting this long line of storms out so it will be a wet bike ride home. And wet it is – the roads are flooding. Around the low grates, it’s about four inches deep, coming over my pedals and churning around the chains. My glasses are soaked, I’m wet to the skin, and the winds […]

June 29, 2014

Genesis (review)

saac spoke up and said to his father Abraham, “Father?” “Yes, my son,” Abraham replied. “The fire and wood are here,” Isaac said, “But where is the lamb for the burnt offering?” Okay, so maybe this is a touch whimsical, but I found this a pretty funny line, something like out of Mel Brooks. Still, in all seriousness, I like Genesis. Outside the beginning, with its people living incredibly long lives, it’s got some good tales twisted through it. Of course, there is the above part, where Abraham doesn’t blink when the Lord tries to poker-face him. And it’s got […]

June 29, 2014

OpsLog – TY&E – 6/29/2014

here comes that moment in a session where things go wrong. Anyone who has been to a session has been there. Every host has too. Usually its at the beginning – when everything turns on and the booster chirps, the clock won’t run, a bank of turnouts won’t throw, everything stops. Something’s gone wrong. And everyone gets really quiet and helpful until it’s fixed. Happened today at the TY&E – engines started shorting a booster for no particular reason. The boys all stopped their jokings and everyone got really helpful. Bill and I watched the trip lights to see if […]

June 26, 2014

Facebook and Writers (DOG EAR)

’m a bit of a political/social hothead. I won’t promote any details here concerning my views any more than I have on the front page of the site. I just feel (like most people) that the world could be improved and that my way makes absolute, perfect sense (and that anyone counter to my opinions is a knucklehead). And that’s fine. Unless you are a writer. Look, it’s okay to have political views (like assholes, everyone has them). But one thing we do need to remember is that we are not only representing ourselves on social media, we’re representing our […]

June 25, 2014

OpsLog – LM&O – 6/25/2014

kay, so everyone knows the feeling of biting off more than you can chew. But I should have known my little GP-9’s wouldn’t get that long heavy string of hoppers over the summit. We were stalling and sanding into Hellertown siding. Picked a set of helpers off 244 as it rolled by and tacked them to the front end. Two Dash-9s (in unlikely LM&O green) really made a difference. Soon we were climbing pretty as a picture through the long curves and spiral tunnel leading to Harris Glen. Down below us in Carbon Hill, little Sean was banging and sorting […]