he best thing about retirement (among many entries) is the fact that on a Tuesday afternoon I could cruse over to Cocoa, spool some time reading under a tree, then putter over to buddy Jack’s house for a session on the Yosemite Valley Railroad, a neat little bedroom line that has recently added another ten or so feet of running distance. Greg managed to make it this time so it wasn’t me running everything. Now I got to run with attention to what I was doing and really enjoy it.

Not that I didn’t enjoy it last time, but I wasn’t carrying the session on my back alone.

I ran a long freight over to the central yard and while Greg sorted things out, I got a local to run over to one of the industrial yards (what was it called? Wanona? I’m lousy with names. Just go to my club and ask… well, whatshisname.

But this isn’t a blog on my diminishing mental capabilities – this is about casual running on a sweet layout. There were some neat switching jobs and with two people, Greg and I found ourselves running opposite, passing at sidings and all  that mainline stuff. Very fun and interesting.

At one point, Greg was switching an area and Jack and I started talking about (of all things) butterfly gardens and stuff. I’d destroyed my wife’s and she was still a bit pissed at me. I’m casually interested in the topic (casual in the “saving my life” way) and was amused to find out Jack had been launching more freshly-minted monarchs then Kennedy airport, something like 170 of them. So Jack gave me a big flowering plant and some milkweed seeds that were more precious than magic beans to my wife. We looked at his cages, his plants, talked over things, came in and Greg was still moving cars around. Shades of San Luis Obispo (private joke).

After that, I forced (and gunpoint) Jack and Greg to watch some Love, Death and Robot shorts. I try not to do that but I’m a bit addicted on showing things like that to others. Gotta control myself.

But it was a great day at Jack’s, the cookies were great, the butterfly plants were great, and the trains were superb. Thanks loads!

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P.S. Yeah, I need to bring a camera next time.