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Not to be outdone by the sexy newcomer that burns oil , an old stalwart of this thread from the beginning , 3864 , makes a welcome return on a down parcels train.

The view is almost non-existent. It was delightful earlier in the week but today we have intermittent downpours, thunderbolts and lighting. It's cold and we have low cloud. Yes, not a lot of spuds around here. They are in the opposite corner of the state which has a completely different climate. It's much more like British Columbia here. Many glacial lakes and giant conifers grow like weeds, in fact they usually are weeds. Just to the South are the fertile rolling farmlands of The Palouse. Lots of wheat, barley and pulse crops like lentils. This is a slightly obscure part of the US. Unfortunately its natural beauty been discovered recently but you can't blame people for wanting to live in a beautiful place. MrsID is returning from a oil painting workshop in Ogden (Utah) on Saturday. She was planning on taking the fast route up Interstate 15. It crosses the Continental Divide twice and they expect snow on the high bits on Friday. I might suggest an alternative route.

Took The Toe for its twice weekly visit to the practice nurse yesterday - still no better so she took a swab to send off for analysis to see what particular bugs have set up home in it. A GP was also consulted who said in the meantime to start another course of antibugtastics. One advance was the issue of a device for keeping the foot dry in the shower - not as colourful as a Sainsbury's bag and purple elastic band but more efficient. I queried why the promised appointment with a podiatrist hasn't yet come about and was told that they are understaffed and very busy. Friends are beginning to call me Hopalong. Chris, I wouldn't worry about the tomato plant. In my experience they are hardy little (or in some cases not so little) bu**ers and providing they get ample water they do well despite my ministrations, or lack of them. Our current ones are threatening to take over the garden. Many years ago a sewer broke under some waste land near where we lived and the following year, and for many years after that, tomato plants grew wild there, tomato seeds apparently often passing through people unharmed. Main things on the to do list today are path and drive de- triffidising and organising the catering for friends arriving this evening for the weekend. Exciting or what? Have a good day/night/something in between depending on your earthly location. Dave

That may be your perspective but there were numerous courteous posts requesting further information or clarification which went unanswered. There was actually more abruptness on the part of the person who could have benefited most from taking points on board. I even tried to help save him from himself but that went unheeded too. To blame us is ridiculous just because we didn't censor what you may not have agreed with. Any comments which breached forum rules were removed.

A good afternoon and a Happy Solstice to all. Whether that be summer or winter depends upon whether you drink your beer up or down Warm sun has been ventured upon us and we are threatened with more of the same in coming days with rising temperatures. And the threat of occasional yellow thunderstorms. I am parked outside with the first of Friday Drinks enjoying the twitter of birds, the humming of bees, the greetings and chit-chat with neighbours and in the knowledge that the launwet is fast becoming the laundry. Speed-dating last night was described as “okay” and “quite fun” though it seems no-one was of sufficient interest to Neighbours (Upstairs) to be worthy of further investigation. Tomorrow sees me demonstrating dirtying techniques to Joe and Joanne Public in Twickenham Library. Half ten until three if anyone’s passing. Sunday requires vegetarious sacrifice as SWMBO has invited a non-carnivorous friend to stay. Stay warm and dry. Be good or be careful.

We have an accidental wormery. It is supposed to be an ordinary composter but it is well populated with worms. This year the beans didn’t come up but the compost is growing well. Looks like cucumbers, or something similar.

SWMBO has a worm composter for generating large amounts of "stuff" from the garden & kitchen waste. Despite the little red wiggler's best efforts, rogue pepper and tomato plants appear in the garden from unaltered seeds. Last autumn she had one of the best crops of accidental tomatoes in years.

Morning all. Greetings from sunny West Midlands. We will be going home today via Burton Latimer (near Kettering) Where Aditi’s brother lives. Tony

Morning All I've been up early to catch up on yesterday I have about 2 day work to box up my stock Her has been and will be back Sunday to clean the house through for the estate agents photo shot She had a moan at me because the bank has put extra security for buying with the cards and could not buy some insurance for a new car, I left a pile of paper work including info about it on the table it's still there. Any way must get on I can't believe I've been packing this layout up for a week now. Welland Truipisstoff

Greetings all from that borough most boring. In local news the owner of London's first micro-pub is calling it a day. Whether he is selling, closing, or stepping back and letting someone manage it, is unknown at this time. Any of the 3 options will be an improvement. It wasn't nicknamed "Ray's twig emporium" for nothing. Only ever 3-4 beers on and all virtually identical. 4% twiggy, poorly kept, bland ales. Ray himself was a star graduate of the Basil Fawlty school of Hospitality. TFIF. This has been a shite week at work. Too much travel to meetings that could/should have been an email. Managed to burger my knee again Wednesday night. Will see what the quack says as I'm expected to be spending a lot of time in hotels & meeting rooms all over the country in the coming weeks. With luck I'll get signed off until this project phase is over. Enough boring waffle from me. Enjoy the day and have a good weekend.

Absolutely - together with working upper motion.

Morning, bits of sun and white cloud, so hopefully will remain dry, garden and greenhouse attended to and SWMBO is off to the borders with the daughter for a spa day or two, so 1 must get anniversary card or my life will not be worth living 2 get a hair cut(I did go for 25 years without one and still haven't got the habit of going to a barbers shop) 3 spend the rest of the day in TOSH building new layout, track and droppers to assemble..................... enjoy your day.

I went out for a long walk at 4am this morning as it is the solstice! Nice bright sunny morning in the North East and really invigorating start to the day. I suppose it's best to make the most of the long days when we can!

The early rain has cleared and sun is now bathing sunny Teignmouth. The outcome of my wife having two appts at the surgery yesterday is that she will be referred to that dept at hospital for a spot of none shaving surgery. The NHS us gradually working around her body, right shoulder bone shave 11 years ago, right knee replacement 3 years ago, left knee replacement 2 years ago ...........

Morning all from a su ny village but there are clouds in sight. Good to hear from Rick and good news about the cough, long may it's absence continue. I had never heard any Metallica until "Nothing else Matters" was played at a friends fu eral, and just hit the spot. I've got one of their CD's in the car. Don't complain about Douglas Fir. The wood is lovely to work with. We used it for the new underframe for the horse tram we restored. However it sounds as if it's like Cottoneaster is for us. It pops up everywhere. Various bits of gardening got done yesterday ands lots more remains to be done. However the strimmer wouldn't start. I did use the chainsaw to sort out a storm damaged branch. Today it's off to our monthly model railway meeting and the boss is coming with me to see the garden at this particular house. The garden happens to have various tracks in it but is spectacular. Regards to all. Jamie

I'd like to see a glacial lake grow like a weed. (OK I'm being naughty.) I was going to ask you what the dominant evergreen species was but Google is our friend and I was interested (but not totally surprised) to see the Douglas Fir at the top of the list. The Douglas fir is the dominant evergreen on the west side of the Cascades. It is truly amazing to see them immediately give way to Ponderosa when crossing pass summits to the east slope of the Cascades as the microclimates change. I frequently have to pull magically-appearing, juvenile Doug Firs from my garden, and they are very tenacious for such small plants. I do love them but my house will not if I let them grow. (Coastal Douglas Firs can grow 20m - 100m tall.) Those across the street from me are easily well above 20m and some may exceed 30m. Watching them tossing in a storm the other day had me doing lots of mental rudimentary trigonometry to make sure they were far enough away to not present a existential threat to my home. (I'm pretty sure they are far enough that they don't.)

Good evening everyone Well the rain didn’t last long, by the time I’d finished the water jug filter, it had stopped and the sun was out. So when I returned from the big orange DIY shed, I put my wetsuit out on the line to dry in the sunshine. However, my visit to the big orange DIY shed didn’t go 100%, they didn’t stock any screws long (M4 x 65mm long) enough for the job I wanted. They had plenty of shorter ones, but that would mean making a threaded barrel so I could join two together. But that worked out quite expensive (just under £5.00 for a bag of 10) and also involved a fair bit for of work on the lathe. So I ended up buying a length of M4 threaded rod, which cost just under £1.50 and cutting to short lengths and with a couple of M4 nuts, (I’ve got dozens in the workshop) and that worked a treat. After dinner I walked up to our local bookshop and placed an order for a couple of books which I’d seen in one of my model railway magazines. When the site of big strong ladies doesn’t offer a discount on books I’m interested in, then I give my custom to our local shop, that way everyone wins. After tea I went swimming at Salford Quays, the water was definitely warmer than on Monday, but there was more of a wind, making the water a little bit choppy. Also, when you swam faving towards the wind, there was a lot of spray, which made breathing, without getting a mouthful of water a little bit tricky. However, having said all that, I did a mile in my fastest time for the year, 47 minutes, so I’m very pleased with that. Goodnight all.

I was told, by customers (for computers) at Minworth Sewage Works (more than 30 years ago) that a gentleman came in and asked for sewage cake for fertiliser. that gave him as much as he wanted. He spread it on his pristine lawns. A few weeks later he had lawns with tomatoes.

Today we are between Winning and North Blyth on the Blyth and Tyne looking at the coal and alumina traffic once again. Winning 56103 Stora 26th Aug 97 C23106 Freemans crossing 56132 empty coal from Blyth Power station May 85 J8287.jpg Blyth Power station 56132 and Class 56 56135 29th July 87 C9036.jpg Taken from the bridge over the line by Cambois shed. Cambois 56125 08441 etc Sun 21st Sept 86 C8134 North Blyth 37212 Lynemouth to Alcan North Blyth 22nd Dec 86 C8237.jpg David

Good morning from a Sunny Surrey. Electrical installation to and in shed nearing completion. Hopefully later today I can watch TV or browse the web up there! Speakers are already fitted ready to wire up to the old hifi system that's will be put in there tonight. Cladding continues whilst they work inside. The PIR light even has its own remote control - disco light effects are even possible but might annoy the neighbours in the adjacent flats

Good morning everyone It’s a bit of a dull start to the day here in the northwest of England. Today will hopefully be a day of rest, but first I will tackle Asda and the Trafford Centre for a few bits and pieces that we can’t buy at Sainsbury’s. Then I will call at the butchers on my way back to pick up the weekly meat rations and hopefully a pastie for my dinner. Sheila rarely partakes in such things as too much pastry can have an adverse effect, as she occasionally suffers from IBS. Believe me when I say when that kicks in she can be very ‘IRRITABLE’. She had a bout last weekend and I didn’t half take a lot of flack, generally for things she’d usually ignore. When this happens I just duck or keep out of the way! Back later.

Mawning dawning ( well, it did a few hours back), In the grand scheme of things, nothing of consequence is likely to happen in the presently sunny and bright world of Kingzance. CowboysRUs are busy erecting scaffolding for the next levels of the concrete fish tanks/block houses/affordable housing across the way. Given the level of intelligence being shown, I wonder why they weren’t doing that during thunderstorms. The nice guys at our local garage called me regarding the SiL’s wheel around 3:15, enquiring which side of the car it belonged on and called again at 4 to say it was ready. Four cracks welded and a new monstrous (325/30R21Y) run-flat tyre sorted at less than daughter had been quoted for a tyre alone so a good result, hope next Tuesday’s service on mine goes as well and as economically. I must get the car washed and cleaned in preparation at some stage today. My local purveyor of delicious meats came up trumps again yesterday with the slab of pig for next weekend’s anniversary celebration. It is in a freezer now until Tuesday when it will be placed in a refrigerator ready to be cooked over a Friday night. A beautiful piece of slow, outdoor-reared pork shoulder on the bone weighing in at just under 6kg was acquired in exchange for £31 which works out at barely £5 per kilo. I will enjoy cooking that, even if I won’t be eating it. Like many others, I can’t help but feel moved by John Colby’s blog. We are but grains of sand on the beach of life but that won’t ever ease the pain of a close one’s suffering. Today would have been my mother’s 94th birthday but she was taken by pancreatic cancer a decade ago and last night our eldest grandson was mentioning his memories of her - he was three at the time of her death! I don’t seek sympathy as I think she enjoyed her life overall and both my parents instilled a sense of getting on and making the best of the cards you get dealt. Have a good day all and one, particularly Baz at Headingley as he warms up for the anniversary bash.

Evening awl, I've never quite understood the need to have a pedigree dog, especially when they are a pricked ear, flat ear different from the next breed. Also the present preference for a squashed nose with all the issues with breathing difficulties. As a family, we followed a mongrel with three Jack Russells. The first one was mine, purchased for 18 guineas from a farm on Exmoor. We were given full details of his parentage going back six generations. Loved cats, children, beating up German Shepherds, climbing trees and disposing of vermin. I spent Tuesday on the Swanley New Barn Railway, working the signalbox for a private charter. It is a 7½ inch gauge loop, no bells but a full size Southern Railway interlocked frame. Great fun! Signing off now because I have a minor medical procedure in Lewisham Hospital tomorrow morning. Keep well awl, Bill

Various mods to NRM ,Book Law , Flying Fox,Royal Lancer and Gladiateur versions.

Well not too bad a day, got my must do chores done, here's me going for brownie points and the delivery man has just delivered another flippin' handbag and no it's not for me, she must have nearly as many handbags as Imelda Marcos had and nearly as many as I have fishing rods lol.(I can feel some serious spending of modelling tokens coming on next week when me and a pal visit the Perth show). Sun keeps popping out, might nip out for a short'ish bike ride if the black clouds vanish.

Happy POETS! AWOL for a couple of days due to no-internet-itis at the cabin combined with, surprise, surprise, a huge amount of requirements from the Long Island client, starting while I was taking time off! Never ceases to amaze me how poor at planning any of these folks are Not much to report - lake cabin mosquitoes were horrendous, probably making up for a late start this season, arms covered in welts even after various and sundry precautions taken Supposed to be a quiet weekend, so I can spend more time at the new house doing "stuff", who knows I may even fit in some trains/modeling - FAT CHANCE. I KNOW we'll end up with a busy weekend in spite of currently having a fairly empty calendar. One bright spot will be the annual choir PARTY, Saturday evening, to celebrate whatever we managed to provide this past year An anonymous donor (typically one of the well heeled parishioners) has once again footed the bill for the event - we just BYOB 16 getting the newspaper (once AGAIN miles from the front door ) with light drizzle falling, expected to make 24 but rain most of the day. Back to work - POE if you can, enjoy the start of the weekend...

Morning all from Estuary-Land. Bright and sunny this morning and no sign of the (predicted) humidity. Tomato seeds do pass through humans and other animals unharmed, thats what they are designed to do. As a propagation strategy its perfect, the seeds are distributed over a wide area and with their own package of fertiliser. Muggatee to be drunk, be back later.

Good morning all, Sunshine and clear blue sky here and a warm and dry day is forecast. Some domestic tasks to do for a couple of hours and then I hope to head to the shed. The mitre saw has been tested and does what it is supposed to and will come in very useful. All digits are still attached. Have a good one, S.T. Illhobbling.

Mooring Awl Inner Temple hare, A poor nights sleep of 3 hours then intermittant dozing on the sofa not good, Ben the Border Collie, Decided he was a deer hound this morning, chasing several deer out of the garden. I then lost him in the jungle and started calling him, only to find him stood behind me, looking at me as though I was mad.. Quite chiily this morning with just the odd white fluffy cloud. The car windscreen condensated on both the inside and outside for a couple of miles until the heater did it's stuff.. I'm working my way through the reserve master set of shunts I think there is 24 of them 1mA to 100A. In the outside lab everything has been fully cleared back from the wall to be knocked down. they should put up temporary partitions on Monday. Time too... wait another couple of minutes for this current shunt to finish warming up.

Evening all from Estuary-Land. Just spent an enjoyable evening at the home of one of the SEERS members who has a large garden railway that also occupies his garage and a large shed. I took my friend and the boy with me, the lad thoroughly enjoyed himself being allowed to operate the layout. Earlier today when in Tesco's I had a rummage in the reduced price box and found a DAB radio reduced from £25 to £6.25 due to the mains connector having gone AWOL. However it could also operate on 4 AA batteries. A further rummage discovered the required number and type of batteries also at reduced price. So I now have a brand new working radio at a quarter of the price.

Bullfinch is just about done, apart from some small but enjoyable final touches such as crew, glazing and some suitable lamps. Here it faces off against City of Truro! The plates are from 247 Developments and It's numbered for the post-1912 numbering scheme. The kit has been terrific fun and while the end result is more impressionistic than anything else, it does look different enough to the City to represent the small-drivered 4-4-0s and is certainly a nice runner. I can't remember if the City was sprayed with a rattle-can or airbrush, but it would have been done using Railmatch's later shade of GWR green, whereas for the Bird I opted for Precision's 1906-1928 shade, and applied it with an airbrush. The black bits were then brush painted with Lifecolor "weathered black" which dries quickly and is a very matt, almost dark grey shade. I've still to give the tender a good going over. There are a few things I'd do differently if I was building another one. My rivets are rubbish - must try harder - and the boiler bands are a bit on the heavy side, albeit matching the ones on the Airfix firebox. A job I might get around to sometime is moving the cranks in-board a bit as they don't need as much clearance as they've got here. However, I'd be loathe to alter the quartering so that might be a job that waits until there's some other reason to take apart the chassis - hopefully not for a while! Of course I would like a curved-frame Bulldog but I have to be realistic and say that I'm already at capacity with GWR engines - not that there aren't a few more in the kitbuilding queue, including such lovelies as a County Tank, 2021 class, Armstrong goods, a De Glehn compound and a few others. Better get cracking!

Afternoon, The vacuum has been cleaned to the satisfaction of the management who was meanwhile moving on tomato plants to gro-bags and putting out the surplus for the delectation of passers-by, no doubt the usual folk will be along to select the ones they fancy and return the empty pots. Incidentally herself's tomato plants normally grow up to the greenhouse ridge but are prevented from going any higher by the glazing. Newspapers and sundry shopping duly acquired. Meanwhile in overseas news the Good Doctor this morning completed the penultimate journey in her round (part of) eastern Europe tour this being the only leg by ship, from Piraeus to Rhodes - whence she returns to dear old blighty next week. Enjoy the rest of your day one and all.

I've now fitted most of the handrails but ran out of short knobs having ordered too many medium ones by mistake. While waiting for them to arrive, I have got on and done a bit of plumbing. There's a gap at the front as I won't be able to fit the vacuum and steam heating pipes there until the final fitting of the chassis to the body.

Good morning one and all Something came over me yesterday – an outbreak of proactivity. I phoned the surgery and asked when I might expect an invitation to the diabetes clinic, adding that I had had the required blood test ages ago and hoping that I had not been overlooked. Between you, me and the gatepost I reckon I had and I don’t think I should have had to ask for an appointment. The date on which the riot act will be read to me happens to be the day on which I have to submit my next prescription request so I would have been going to the surgery anyway. It is two days after my nice leisurely walk through the cheering crowds of London. Perhaps I should wear my Welsh Stonewall T shirt, fresh (?) from its starring appearance at Pride. Whatever will Nurse Denise say? My friend Mike has kindly given me a tomato plant which he has raised himself. I’m not sure that giving it to me is a kindness to the plant given the unfortunate state of my garden, for growth has more than undone all the hard work I did a few weeks ago. I would have expected nothing less. I appear to have plenty of free time this weekend, during some of which I expect to tackle the triffids, provided there is no rain. Enjoyment is not an option. In a free moment I booked tickets for a concert at the Union Chapel in Islington later in the year, featuring the fabulous combination of June Tabor and Oysterband. I would not be at all surprised if the tour has something to do with a new album which might have the title “Fire and Fleet”. Detective? Moi? I returned to the LGBT+Faith group last night. It tends to be held on nights when I cannot attend but there are odd exceptions. Parts of the interesting discussion were remarkably candid. Two of those there will be on a float – well, a bus - at Pride in London so we will keep our eyes open in case a brief encounter is possible. Best wishes to all Chris

I am very good at hitting short golf shots...... half the distance they are supposed to go. So it is back to 400 yards in two, and four to get the ball the last ten yards into the hole. This can be alittle irritating. Here is 60133 in the dark. and back out into the light again. Photoshopping lattices which are superimposed one upon the other is great fun, almost as good as those short golf shots. Still, are we downhearted? Yes we are a bit, actually.

https://johncolby.wordpress.com/2019/06/20/sandys-treatment-day-184/

It's like a Government health warning. You look at the can, see it's ar5e about face and think you have had too much.

Why do they print the name backwards on the can? Is it so the driver in front can read it in their rear-view mirror?

Completely off topic, but sights to lift the spirits. Your annual peony. and a newly unfurled and pristine water lily bloom.

But I bet you choose to select Something of, Middle chrome green,* Apple Green, * Malachite Green,* Crimson lake,* or some shade of diseasal. and not have any old thing running round your layout.. * other colours of soot stained paint are available. The Collie Rough Breeds , Rough, Smooth, Bearded, Border, have hardly changed since they were classified back in Victorian times, and they definately don't have squashed noses.

Find your nearest Screwfix or Toolstation, either of them is much better and much cheaper than the big sheds for small items like screws.

In the old days you had a pedigree or a mongrel. No more mongrels now. These days it is all Shihtzpoo, Cockerdoodle, Labrasatian etc. No luv, you have a mongrel! Our Twatzen Izen hound is an Irish terrier crossed with A N Other, we've had him just over 2 years and in his first 4 years of life he had 4 owners. He hates cats, dislikes couriers footwear and tries to attack our neighbourhood hedgehog.

Yes it’s a Snapchat screenshot. A case of having to speak a language understood by the non-wrinklies in order to communicate!

Apparently that's why tomatoes regularly grow on railway lines. Though with the fitting of retention toilets that will be on the decline. Jamie

In that case I'm confident the body moulding is accurate and detailed. I also did a pattern for the bogie frames. This is the pattern, moulding should be identical.

Happy to oblige, Tony, now I'm back home. Two in preparation for Grantham later this year: 2557 is a simple renumber/rename of a Hornby Flying Fox. Plates from 247, numbers HMRS. There are some bits from the Brassmasters detailing pack to go on before it's weathered. There's been rather more work put into 2580, which began as an NRM 1980s Flying Scotsman. For almost all the 1930s she carried an ACFI feed water heater and all the associated pipework. I had started building the pump, but Al Turner is now making this 3D print available, which will save me some work and be much more detailed. Replacement chimney and dome courtesy or Mr. King and the usual 247/HMRS identity change. Tender kindly supplied by Tom Foster.

Just one pic before I go to sleep, 66713 in rugby on the car train, it’s a long old thing, 2500ft long

G'Day Folks

Golf went well. Seniors league home against Berrington. My regular doubles partner is on holiday, so I teamed up with another today. Hole wins were swapped until the 9th when we went on to win the next five and finally finish 4 and 3 winners. Team score was 5 matches to 1. Tomorrow is club singles knockout game against one of our team who were the only losers today. There will be much ribbing/ sledging...... I filled in my passport renewal form online last Friday night, including uploading my photo taken at home. Old passport posted late Monday night 2nd class. Emails today at 1210, 1330 and 2100 saying received, approved and sent! Can't complain at that. School prom parking duty has started - 2 events so far. Top eejit so far goes to the woman in a Q7 that very carefully reverse parked in between a number of no parking cones. She was asked to move and then when she did, ran over one of the cones claiming that she didn't see it. Have a good Friday folks. Cheers Mick