The Royce Files

Above we have another mystery freight car. This one took me a while to obtain due to an Ebay seller messing up shipping for over a month. What we have here is a fenced flat car. At first glance you may think- hey this is that horse car from one the Lionel General outfit or the later  Lionel Jesse James outfit . But no, this car is not from either of those. The really strange thing about this car is that it has "fake trucks." Basically what you are seeing in the photo is a plastic mask in the shape of trucks a la Marx Trains. There are only 2 axles on this unit and if it were not for the underside Lionel stamp I would think this came from Marx. I never thought Lionel would drop quality this far for a car- but they did and especially during the period they were owned by General Mills henceforth known as the MPC era. A sharp contrast to the ever collectible and solid Post War era. So from...

Well, the holidays have a way of sneaking up on you and trying to pull you into the pit that is not the holiday itself but the Bizzaro holiday world. You know what I mean- the stress inducing things, the unrest, the traffic, the crowds. Really if somebody was searching for holiday cheer they'd be totally missing it. But today I bring you the thing I like about Christmas- the music. Sure you get sick of it after a while. Some of it is like Skittles- I can't eat too many of those before all fruitiness is ruined for weeks. Here's some songs I enjoyed this holiday season: Josh Wilson's "Noel" or "Jesus is Alive" Josh is a multi-instrumentalist but this arrangement on piano is simple but elegant. The song does speak to the reason I celebrate this time of year- the birth of Christ. Josh please come to Fargo Next a gem from Bebo Norman I unearthed. Released back in  2008, I have only heard this tune once on the radio. And I have only foun...

A trifecta of Johnny Cash on Blog Action Day and throw in a reference to Jesus, too. I was pondering how much of Jesus' ministry involved water. Let's list a few: Baptized Performed water into wine miracle Frequented boats Walked on water Claimed to be living water Spoke of springs of living water coming out of people Asks for a drink of water from a woman at a well Taught about blessing of giving a cup of water in his name Washed disciples feet with water Wouldn't it be great if Jesus performed a miracle of turning poor water into clean water? Well he is actually doing that these days through his followers. Samaritans Purse is doing just that with their water projects . I will also plug Wine To Water efforts to get clean accessible water to One Billion People. They currently are working on getting water filters to Pakistan where flood have plagued that region recently. In Israel and most of the Middle East, the main water source is precipitation which can be ...

  Johnny Cash once again sings for Blog Action Day 2010.  And here we  talk about floods. I've lived through a few. Nashville flooded too. I blogged that.  In this case water proves to be the threaten-er. People and property are harmed by rising waters. There were no flood fatalities in Fargo with caveat that 2 people died due to exertion during flood prevention. Millions in damage was accounted. Flash floods appear to be killing more people that tornadoes as of late. Urbanization appears to be one of the culprits as water run-off has no place to pool up but on roads and in neighborhoods. Floods also have the potential to contaminate water sources as run-off cannot be controlled as easily in a flood situation. Sewage systems could be overloaded and intermingle with water sources.  Long term flooding in the Devil's Lake basin of North Dakota has been hotly debated. Even Canada is concerned because a potential outlet would send water into the Red River Basin an...

In the film Walk the Line, Joaquin Phoenix portraying Johnny Cash in the scene of the concert at Folsom Prison takes a glass of murky water and throws it to the ground before breaking in Cocaine Blues. In reality the scene did not happen that way. It seems that Cash did do a comic bit about the water at Folsom Prison in both morning and afternoon shows. I don't think he broke a glass like Joaquin did in the film but he made the a comment to the effect that the water looked like it ran off his guitar player's boots. Either scene made the water quality at the prison appear rather poor. In the video above Johnny does another water bit during the San Quentin concert. Whether the water quality at Folsom Prison was as poor as Johnny Cash suggests, I can find no evidence. However, Folsom Prison is not without its water issues. Back in 2002 there was a sewage spill at the prison which may have contaminated water in the adjacent American River. Tests were made but none proved conclusi...

Prairie Chicken WMA wasn't much to crow about. It just provided us with a small spot to camp. Not recommended but for the most hard core of bike tours. After eating one of the many oatmeal creme pies that the Man of 3 Names brought, I eagerly loaded up the bike to blow this WMA. It was almost blistering hot last night and the bugs were very thick. It was a pioneer experience. We discovered just before we left that a majority of the flatland grass good to camp upon was on the other side of a "moat." that surrounded most of this land. We were on a slice of land a few feet from the "moat." At night the discovery of unexpected water makes one stop. For all we knew it was one large wetland. Tip: Do not camp on wetlands, you will regret it. We hopped back on US 81 and pedaled north going through Ardoch, Minto and stopping in Grafton to eat and seek out the means to fix 3 Names' rack. While traveling I thought of some songs to go with the towns a...

More editorial stuff. Although this story continues to smolder and I suppose the news will look to other fires to talk about Nonetheless, the burning of religious texts has been put on hold only after some deal to move a religious structure near Ground Zero was allegedly made. And get this, Donald Trump is also involved in some way! Sounds like mis-information will be we everywhere. Even this religious structure isn't as close to Ground Zero or as religious oriented as media make it out to be. In fact I think no one is sure what happened. Maybe the texts will be burning in private. (Personally, I would have called for Snooki to be thrown in jail.) Still, the huge reaction to the burn/not to burn debate has me wonder exactly what is important to those religions involved in the fray. So much value and emotion is placed in things which ultimately will fade away ( and even burn)- buildings and books. I thought religion would value the intangible- charity, perseverance in the the mi...

A bit of an editorial slant today. Did you know someone plans to burn a particular holy book in of all places, Florida? And get this:  a certain government official wants to stop it . To me the whole burning issue is a red herring. In particular how such an act by a few citizens could jeopardize foreign policy, really has me wondering how our government is picking its talking points. Thanks to the media attention this thing got (thanks CNN), it has turned into something bigger than it should have been. I guess it is just part of the time we live in. Will it anger folks? Sure. Will it lead to further killings and extremist recruitment ? Possibly but that's giving one event too much influence. Those things would probably have continued. There is ignorance on both sides. Altough I like the speech writer's choice of words- "recruitment bonanza." Which reminds me- the son of Laden apparently likes the television show. Too bad all the cast is dead. Pernell Roberts died...