Random Photos

[jtbell]

More from Scranton…

On the other side of the Steamtown parking lot is the Electric City Trolley Museum. Its exhibits include a Birney streetcar that ran in Reading, Pennsylvania from 1920 until 1947. It’s been cut open in various places to show its construction details.

This is a small car with a single 2-axle truck (“bogie” in Brit-speak) under its center. Part of the floor has been removed so you can see the electric motor mounted on one axle.

Another exhibit shows equipment from an electrical substation that converted alternating current to direct current for powering streetcars. These were scattered at various locations in a system to reduce power losses in DC transmission, and were able to turn on automatically when a car entered a section of track.

A map of the streetcar lines in the Scranton - Wilkes-Barre area:

Why the “Electric City”? Scranton’s factories began using electric lights in 1880. Electric streetlights came a few years later, and the first electric streetcars in 1886.

Other cities had converted horsecar lines to electricity, but Scranton had the first line that was electric from the beginning.

(skip to the next post in this series)

 

[berkeman]

You Public Service Announcement for today about why we need to remember to chain up all pressurized cylinders...

https://fb.watch/upBFP9kx3X/

 

[jtbell]

Today I walked downtown again, and got a closer look at the buildings that burned last week.

The building on the right, above, was an optical shop where my wife and I have bought eyeglasses. It’s moving into a building in the next block.

The big empty space in the middle was the restaurant where the fire started. They have another location about a 20-minute drive away, in the next town. We’ll go there the next time we have business in that town.

 

[BillTre]

 

[pinball1970]

Manchester yesterday.

Two pianos at the station, occasionally a classically trained person will jump on do a little bit before their train.

 

[pinball1970]

The rest of the images show parts of Manchester, red brick, Victorian, industrial and bit ugly in places.

My favourite building in Manchester

Old and new.

 

[pinball1970]

River Medlock.

 

[BillTre]

 

[collinsmark]

Mittens, my neighbor's cat, popped over to visit the other day. Well, I assume her name is "Mittens." But I don't really know for sure; I'm just assuming that's her name. I don't even know which neighbor she belongs to. But she's well fed and appears to be well taken care of. If my back door is open, sometimes she'll stop in for a brief hello.

I neither feed her nor encourage her to stick around. But she's welcome to loiter if I have no plans to leave the house.

I do say hello when she stops by. I'll pet her a little (she demands it) and make a purring sound, which she reciprocates. I'll reassure her that she's a very good kitty. Then I'll just leave her be and go back to whatever it was I was doing.

I'm guessing I'm the only person up late at night (astrophotography and all), so she finds me curiously intriguing. My mostly-nocturnal sleep schedule (if you can even call it a "schedule") is probably not too different from her own.

When she stopped by the other morning, I got my camera out.

 

[collinsmark]

Mittens update:

• I now know which neighbor owns Mittens and have been in contact. All is well.
• As it happens, Mittens is a "he" (not a "she.") Mr. Mittens, as he's sometimes called.

 

[DennisN]

Mittens, my neighbor's cat, popped over to visit the other day.

Lovely photos of a lovely cat!
Amazing sharpness in the photos too!

 

[Flyboy]

Appropriate deployment of googly eyes in the wild…

 

[Rive]

Mittens, my neighbor's cat, popped over to visit the other day. Well, I assume her name is "Mittens." But I don't really know for sure; I'm just assuming that's her name.

A decent (outdoor) cat has at least two 'owners' and three names anyway

 

[DennisN]

Some random shots, first two shots with my smartphone:

My lovely cat:

A fun sticker I got from the music store Thomann...

...in the package with a new instrument I bought, a baritone guitar...

...which are very cool and quite unusual instruments which sits harmonically between guitars and basses. I had never played anyone until now, and it's very, very fun to play on. It feels like neither a guitar nor a bass, it feels like a completely new type of instrument to me.

(Sidenote: If you can play guitar, you can also play a baritone guitar; it's the same string configuration as a normal guitar, but the strings are thicker and it is usually tuned down 4-5 semitones below a normal guitar.

For those who are interested in hearing how they sound, one good clip here, and another one here, with some very nice playing from two youtubers)

 

[Flyboy]

 

[morrobay]

Composition, Jomtien Beach

 

[jtbell]

Tropical Storm (formerly Hurricane) Helene blew through here a couple of nights ago. This was at 5 AM yesterday:

Our power went out a half hour later. It’s still out, about 27 hours later.

We’re OK, no damage to the house that we can see so far, just a lot of litter in the yard, and some water came in through a leaky window frame.

Several large trees are down within a couple blocks from here, impacting at least two or three houses.

This is probably what’s cutting off power to our neighborhood:

Looking through the gap in the limbs:

It may be a while before we get power back.

Even our cell phone service was out from about noon yesterday until sometime last night.

At least our car has a full gas tank.

 

[pinball1970]

A local team, 315 attendance at the game I attended. (About 1000 employees at Manchester United and 76,000 attendance for a quick comparison)

A quick beer after the match.

A nice place to go for a football match Mossley, Pennines in the background.

 

[pinball1970]

Hyde, Cheshire

Hyde Town hall.

Ashton town square, I liked the cross in the sky.

Manchester.

 

[jtbell]

I drove around town yesterday to charge up our cellphones. Power was out everywhere. The only businesses open that I could see were a few gas stations, two hardware stores, and a Waffle House.

I haven’t been out yet today, but I suspect things are pretty much the same.

Lots of trees down at the college. Classes are cancelled until October 9; there was a scheduled fall holiday on the 7th and 8th anyway.

 

[pinball1970]

Manchester Deansgate.

I know these look a bit samey, I must have taken about 50 images at three locations but most do not come out. These buses just kind of lined up for me.

 

[pinball1970]

@jtbell I feel guilty posting these as we had some rain and wind in Manchester yesterday but that was it.

A few weeks ago.

 

[jtbell]

I went on another cellphone charging drive yesterday. Some traffic signals are now operating. In the next town, the county seat, some more restaurants were open, and one supermarket.

One of our friends who lives across the street from from the college reported that his power is back, so the city is making progress on that.

Most of the fallen trees have been cleared from side streets, including the one near our house that I showed you two days ago. They still need to be removed, however.

Likewise for a neighbor’s driveway.

More power lines down:

 

[jtbell]

Our power finally came back yesterday afternoon, after four and a half days. Everything in the house seems to be working OK.

This morning I saw power crews working at the college. They're from Santee Cooper, the company that serves the Charleston area. One of them told me that they've had crews from the Upstate down there many times, so they're glad to take a turn up here.

The situation is still pretty bad a couple hours' drive north of here, in western North Carolina.

 

[jtbell]

More from the campus cleanup at the college today...

 

[jtbell]

A view of Lake Lure, North Carolina, five years ago, from Chimney Rock State Park.

The Broad River enters the lake from lower left, with the town of Chimney Rock strung along its banks. Shops and restaurants hugged the road running through town, with riverside patios. You can see a couple of them at the right side of this picture from last spring.

A week ago, tropical storm Helene flooded the river and pretty much washed the entire town into Lake Lure. The debris damaged the highway bridge near where the river enters the lake, and took out half of the adjacent old bridge which had been repurposed as the "Flowering Bridge", which I showed you last spring:

I saw a report on a local TV station tonight that the road and town will have to be redesigned because the river has carved a new path through the valley.

 

[BillTre]

 

[morrobay]

Good raining afternoon

 

[DennisN]

Autumn colors, all shot today:

...and a white rose with morning dew, a shot I got very pleased with (also taken today):

(Gear: Sony A6000 + Helios 44 (13 blades) + CPL filter)

 

[pinball1970]

Autumn colors, all shot today:

View attachment 351883

View attachment 351884

...and a white rose with morning dew, a shot I got very pleased with (also taken today):

View attachment 351885

(Gear: Sony A6000 + Helios 44 (13 blades) + CPL filter)

Beautiful detail.

 

[jtbell]

I'm on an overnight trip to a nearby city. Can anyone guess where I spent part of the afternoon?

 

[Ibix]

I'm on an overnight trip to a nearby city. Can anyone guess where I spent part of the afternoon?

In a bookshop that specialises in having two copies of foreign language texts?

 

[jtbell]

In a bookshop

Not a bookshop, but another kind of shop... a big shop.

 

[Ibix]

Not a bookshop, but another kind of shop... a big shop.

Ah - I thought it was an odd layout for books if they were selling them. It makes more sense if they're selling the bookcase.

 

[gmax137]

I've been away from this thread for a while. Some random comments:

Now I no longer say "I never saw a purple cow..."
View attachment 349893

You should visit Williamstown, Mass

From the Connecticut Trolley Museum in East Windsor, today:

I used to live not too far. A good buddy still lives just east of there.

Today I took the train to New Haven from Windsor Locks CT. Surely this is one of Amtrak's smallest stations.

I have boarded there for NYC. My wife and I reserved tickets, when the train stopped we were the only ones there (early sunday morning). The train door opened and the conductor knew our names.

Remember the fish-slapping initiation ritual we had for newcomers, a long time ago?

I have wondered why that tradition petered out. I think maybe @Evo was keeping it going.

River Medlock.

I love photos of the old brick buildings. I used to prowl thru Holyoke and Chicopee Mass. Lowell is a real treat. All of my photos from those places are analog negs and prints, I will have to dig them out.