Getting Ready for the Weekend

            Even on a good day some things though make me sad, wrench my guts a little, so I shouldn’t hang around here for long given the events of the past few months.  Better just to move right on past this place.  Maybe go see the fellow’s at the elevator..

            This lane behind the warehouse was where I met Loree’ for the first time and while it was just a quick hello and an offer of directions she might as well have hit me with a post.  I wasn’t going to forget that face or that smile anytime soon.  I slept with it for a long time but soon relegated it to the history bucket.  Then a meeting at work, and some serious conversation, made it all real again.  Even the rusting snow machine is in the same place and those kids are standing right there – in our spot.  Crap!!

            Way back in June of 2000 I came down stairs and I was faced with a big 42 x 45 foot empty room with one corner full of boxes.   Someday, I figured, when people who came down here they will be immediately introduced to the Canadian prairie.  A ceiling high grain elevator, the back of an old trackside warehouse, a dirt road and a small fenced field.  Everything would come together right from the start.

            Both the grain elevator and the shed were outside for two years and survived quite well.  They were given two or three coats of clear Varathane, inside and out, so that helped.  The snowmobile and figures are indoor toys.  The fence is simply basswood.  The field is carpet and the dirt read is….dirt.

           Taking some time off work on a Friday afternoon will do wonders for your own small world but out in the larger world, we have grain cars being loaded with clean, hard Number 1 Northern for the Midwestern US.  American wheat, though plentiful, is softer and doesn’t make the pasta that the even larger world is looking for.  To accomplish that, the valley has starting getting regular visits from shiny new Trudeau Hoppers - in a number of colourful paint schemes.  Aluminum for the lightest rail.

            I know the CN working here crew today.  Well, just about every day.  But these guys are friends of mine.  We’ve watched a lot of football together in the local pub.  Hockey too from time to time although I’m not a big fan.  Too much crap going on in hockey.  Players have no respect for each other.  Football players will hit you hard and then hold out a hand to help you get back on his feet. 

            The yard in Winter Valley is the largest and longest on the layout but never big enough of course.  On the left is the ‘industrial’ track.  This track serves the Co-op grain elevator and it’s annex, the WV warehouse and the scrap dealer/bike shop in the old machine shop. The long one on the right is the station track.  In the past it also served the water tank.  On the far right there is a short siding serving a bulk fuel dealer and a farmer owned grain transfer.

            I’ve said it before but it’s worth saying again.  Paint your track.  The brass looks horrible in pictures.  Wish I’d done that.

            It’s true!  I always feel a lot better when they’re busy down at the elevator.  They’re busy, the railroad is busy (despite a problem or two every day) and if the railroad is busy people are getting paid and spending their money.  More work = even more money.

            The first of the 88-ton cylindrical hoppers came out of Hawker Siddeley in 1972 and they made their debut in the valley a couple of summers ago.  The old 40-foot boxcars, complete with grain doors made in Grande Prairie, are still the order of the day but we can all see their end.  The new lightweight cars are bigger, faster to load, faster to unload and just as light on their feet.  Someone got it right this time.

            One of the most difficult projects I ever took on was the construction of a Hawker Siddeley cylindrical hopper.  I was quick to realize that I would need an existing frame and hopper kit.  Either 4 or 6.  Three wouldn’t do.  The LGB hopper was therefore rejected outright despite it’s construction.  The sides came off.  The USAT hopper was a more prototypical length and had four much better hoppers.  But the sides did NOT come off.  Willingly!

            1/29th scale plans were done for me down at the local print shop buy using HO drawings and a handy photocopier enlargement formula.  Accurately shaped forms were made out of plywood and large commercial sized sheets of styrene were wrapped around the forms.  The rest is pretty much self evident.

            So I decided to spend the evening in the park.  There’s a public BBQ tonight celebrating something or other.  I’ve been too busy to know why but I’m sure it’s important enough to attract local politicians and other minor dignitaries.  Oh cynical me.  Just enjoy yourself for God’s sake!

            I grew up within a stone’s throw of a park just like this.  No rules.  Just pick up after your dog.  Kids do frisbees and golfers practice their short game.  There’s T-Ball and flag football, soccer and on nice days in the summer there’s yoga classes outside and curious watchers on the sidewalk.  Traffic on Station Street slows to a crawl  when Edith Pringle is a part of that group.   If she’s just wear decent cloths is all….

            Everyone wants me to fill the park with ‘stuff’.  No one wants it empty.  Of course it’s not empty at all.  The area, about 34 inches by 34 inches has a statue of the towns founding father, there are stone gates, there is a young lady heading out for a tennis match and there are a broken set of swings.  Hardly empty at all.

            The whole feature of a Canadian prairie town is that it isn’t crowded out.  Vacant lots are the rule rather than the exception.  Some are turned into parks and playgrounds.  As is the one above.  So no three ring circus and no international airport.

            Anyway, by early evening I’m down at the park and all cooled out.  The pressures of the week are behind me somewhere and I can smell the fresh cut grass.  Moths flit around the lampposts and I watch them for a little while and it reminds me of what I’ve been doing all week.  Flying around to no good end.  Looking for that bright light with all the answers.

            Well the grass is deep and clean and wet.  I take my shoes off and dig my toes into the green for a while.  Funny how that sucks all the trash out of your head and makes you well again.  Do doctors prescribe this?  Do they send trains past the park so you can watch them and listen to the clickity-clack?  Perhaps not.  But they should. 

            I can’t emphasize enough how important a few lights can be.  In this case, a few LEDs.  They are very easy to experiment with and cost’s run in the 80-cent range around here.  Add a 10 cent resister and there you go.  Car lights are particularly effective and in this case they do serve a secondary function.  With lights turned off they illuminated the beach and the swimmers.

            Streetlights too of course.  In this case the lights are actual lamps.  I’ve used 12v lamps attached to a 9 to 10 volt buss under the layout.  They’ll last forever and keep that warm incandescent glow.

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