robert.admin – Page 39 – Robert Raymond’s Blogtorium

April 28, 2022

Alternative Radio (DOG EAR)

used to love listening to Rollins College radio (WPRK) while I doodled back in the train/computer room. It had such good DJs (students and wannabees). When I’d drive in to work (on the day’s I didn’t have the bike) I could listen to Nina’s Sunrise Soul or student interviews or whatever. Then Covid hit and the station went into a broadcasting loop, the same songs over and over. Even with the pandemic winding down (but please, Readers, be careful!) they haven’t brought back the wonderful format I enjoyed, not fully. My radio, 40 years old, finally crapped out and I […]

April 28, 2022

OpsLog – LM&O – 4/27/2022

here are two types of people who want to see a massive head-on between two trains. One is a deranged psychopath. The other is a rival dispatcher. I’ll admit that I take great pleasure in being a good dispatcher. I developed the control systems (the computer to track trains and the warrants to command them). I developed the position, sitting in the middle of the layout with my Atari 520 ST and my crude program thirty years ago, controlling trains on N-Trak modules. I’m a boomer, having walked in and dispatched layouts I’ve never seen before, cold, in cities a […]

April 25, 2022

OpsLog – WAZU – 4/22/2022

t’s always good to see a layout progress from session to session. And today’s running of the WAZU railroad (a reference I’m not sure anyone gets) was no exception. Last session was good; this one was better. We have to applaud the efforts of Doc and Sparky, who personally made operations improvement goal one. In this, they reworked the card system in the yards (including making sure everything was pre-staged and the yards carried reduced car loads (a mistake a lot of modelers make)). Also, the turnout controls were reconfigured with led to a lot less fumbling for switch throws. […]

April 24, 2022

Vanguard (Review)

anguard is the lead-off book for the third cycle in the Ark Royal series. First we had the supper carrier that pulled Space Battleship Yamato stuff with an evil race that boiled out of the black at us. And then we had Warspite, the experimental cruiser with the heavy plasma gun that fought the Indian nation in the colony worlds and blasted and Indian carrier. And now we have Vanguard, the first Earth battleship, built strong and built to last. But will that be enough? Our story opens with yet another alien race discovered. Without knowing anything, Earth sends a […]

April 23, 2022

OpsLog – TBL – 04/23/2022

irst thing: This will be the first of four ops sessions I’ll be attending this week. So get ready for my reports. I’ve not run my little crazy layout since January – three months. Just been busy with scenery on it, other things, life in general, you know. The big thing was my primary switcher, that Broadway Limited SW-7, had taken a dump. To reset it required something akin to a mix of safe-cracking and bomb-disposal: had to get the shell off (a major achievement) and then hold a button down while putting its trucks on a live layout. I […]

April 21, 2022

The Ethics of Media (DOG EAR)

he other night I was enjoying a quiet evening the way I like it – writing game code for my new effort, Pathfinder, the window open, the cool breezes flowing around me, the online radio quietly playing French soft rock. And that’s then the guy, the girl, and the motorcycle entered my world. They came down the street, making more noise than I make in a week. It was one of those suburban Harley’s bought from those urban-dad fake-factory stores, all noise, heavy as a tank. And even though they were rolling slow, the guy was revving his engine (because […]

April 17, 2022

The Butcher of Anderson Station (Review)

nother quick review out of the Memory’s Legion collection of Expanse tales. This one concerns Fred Johnson, Soldier for Earth who ended up as levelheaded spokesman for the Belt, running Tycho Station and repurposing the Mormon’s generation ship out from under them (and, good for that since it turns out they would have been literally wasting the time of generations). So there is a side story about Johnson, how he was involved in a massacre on a belter station. As I remember, the show has the belters attempting to surrender and Fred ordering them in. Well, it wasn’t quite like […]

April 17, 2022

OpsLog – LM&O (Night Ops) – 4/16/2022

t’s 8:15am in the Cincinnati rail yards. I’ve got some SP F3’s coupled to the 244 consist (and some geeps stuck in, since my slow-rollers wouldn’t even get them out of the yard in my test pulls while waiting for go-time). But lights are on, engines are rumbling, we’re good to go. At half-past, two blasts of the horn and I’m pushing hard, fixed on making Carbon Hill for my first meet of the day. The F-units, one time my pride, are really running bad. They seem to need a warm up session to get them moving. By the time […]

April 14, 2022

Sound advice (DOG EAR)

was in the bookstore the other day and I saw a woman who appeared to be pregnant perusing a book on pregnancy. It wasn’t a for-dummies book, it was a fairly leaned tome, which means lots of words, not many pictures. But still, even though I’m a man without kids, I figured I should weigh in on this, just so she had my take on this whole “baby” and “birthing” thing. After all, I’m trying to help, right? So I went up to her and said, “Oh, you have one in the oven…?” Cringing yet? I’m giving you this allegory […]

April 11, 2022

OpsLog – TY&E – 4/10/2022

ough day on the TY&E. There, I said it. It shaped up to be a great day – glorious outside, perfect for a garage run. And JW had a huge crowd show up for the session, always a good sign. Train instructions were issued, the experts waked the newbies through their jobs, we all dialed up and then the difficulties started. Look, not faulting JW on this. We’ve had sessions at the club and at my home layout where things go to shit. I’ve had the Tuscarora, darling of my heart, stab me in the back (several times) with others […]