In the Springs

Last Post on Blogger

2010-02-14T14:27:00.000-08:00

Well, this is my last post on Blogger. I'm working on a wordpress blog. Check it out at http://www.livininthesprings.com. Hope to see you there...

Samuel Smith Organic Raspberry Beer

2010-02-07T17:35:00.000-08:00

Next, I tried Samuel Smith Organic Raspberry fruit ale. This was a good beer, but like I said, I like fruity beer's. When poured into a frosty glass the red tint of the beer is very evident. I sniff of the top of the glass gives great hints of the raspberry which is present on the first taste. This beer was almost like a fruit drink instead of a beer. There isn't as much of a hint of raspberry as there is a hint of beer. I liked it a lot and I would like to try their cherry fruit ale as well.

Baltika #4 Dark Lager

2010-02-07T17:26:00.000-08:00

After the honey beer I tried the Baltika No. 4 Dark Lager. Definitely different from the sweet beer, this beer was a thick dark beer with a definite bitter taste. Not that it was bad, thats just the type of beer it is. The Baltika website says it has a hint of bread and slight bitterness. I guess I didn't really think of the beer as tasting of bread, but I could taste the slight bitterness. It isn't that the beer isn't good, I guess in general I don't care for bitter beers, but it wasn't bad after you start.

Dundee Honey Brown Lager

2010-02-05T18:39:00.000-08:00

Two weeks ago (yea i'm not updating often enough) I tried the Dundee Honey Brown Lager. Infused with pure clover honey, this beer falls in line with my "sweet or fruity" beers that I like. I thought I could taste the honey just barely but thats probably the point, just a hint. It was a very drinkable beer and I would buy it again. Check out their website for info on the Honey Brown Lager.

New RTP Railfan Site

2010-02-03T18:20:00.000-08:00

I really enjoy creating websites, so as I've learned new things I try to incorporate them into my websites. I have completely re-done the RTP Railfan website. It has a new layout and I think a better look to it. I'm still putting the final touches on it so some of the links probably aren't working but its pretty much there. Check it out.

Abita Abbey Ale

2010-01-16T14:39:00.000-08:00

The next beer on the list is Abita Abbey Ale. I normally drink Purple Haze made by Abita. This is also a wheat ale like the apricot ale. However, purple haze has raspberry infuzed in it. A description of the Abbey Ale can be found at the Abita Website. This beer is a nice dark brown and has a thick head. I can definitely smell cloves and hints of what seems like banana bread to me. Defintely smells of fruit. A very different taste from the apricot beer though, thicker and richer. This is fairly good. I would rate it a B in my book.

ResearchTriangleParkNC.com

2010-01-16T14:05:00.000-08:00

whatstodotoday.com is officially gone in two days. Oh well. I have created the new page http://www.researchtriangleparknc.com to take its place. Its already shown up in the search engines so its defnitely doing better than the last site. However, one of our favorite places to eat in Holly Springs, La Dolce Vita, closed down. They had really good pizza and we hate that they are gone. They have another resturant in Sanford but we never really head that way.

Total Wine

2010-01-16T14:00:00.000-08:00

So I hit the Total Wine with the wife this afternoon for some beer. I was overwhemlmed by the types of beer they have. So I got 12 or so random beers for $40 (no one said they were cheap). So I think I'll use this blog to keep track of these beers and how they are. I actually got the first beer at our local Lowe's foods. The first time I had this beer was out in Seattle on a vacation. Pyramid Breweries makes the Audacious Apricot Wheat Ale and I'm a big fan of it. You definitely get apricot taste (I really like beer with fruit flavors). I'll start with this one tonight and see how the evening progresses.

RTP Railfan Website

2009-12-28T13:32:00.000-08:00

I'm actually updating the website more than my blog. I put in a new features section (flash takes some work). Also added an article on the new antenna setup that I installed for the RTP Railfan radio installation. I can not hear down to Sanford, NC and downtown Raleigh quite well. The other night I heard the Amtrak call out well north of Durham, but I think this was because of atmospheric phenomenon. Check out the site, I have really got back into it and I'm adding new stuff all the time.

http://www.researchtriangleparknc.com

2009-11-29T15:35:00.000-08:00

I now have a new site that is the replacement for the http://www.whatstodotoday.com site. The problem with that site was AJAX is very difficult to get listed in the search engines. So, now I have a new website about the Research Triangle Park area. http://www.researchtriangleparknc.com will be a site that tells users about all the interesting things they can do in the RTP area. It will start off small at first, but I hope it will grow over time. I will also link the mapping application within this site so users can still use it. We'll see...

www.whatstodottoday.com

2009-11-06T16:07:00.000-08:00

Well, I learned a good lesson about AJAX from doing the whatstodotoday site. The original purpose was to have a mapping application that users could put pushpins and enter comments about cool places to visit. Well, AJAX is horrible for getting crawled and I have had absolutely no users for a year. I think I am going to get rid of that domain and pick up another about the Raleigh/Durham area. I'm taking a C++ class so its eating up all my spare time but I'll try to put one together.

Updating www.rtprailfan.com site

2009-11-06T16:01:00.000-08:00

Well, its been quite a while since I've posted anything. Actually I wasn't doing much railfan stuff over the summer. I usually turn the scanner stream off because of the computer in the attic and just doing other things. Recently I turned the stream back on. Right now I have this wierd setup in the side yard. I got the traintenna omni from DPDProductions but I have it mounted on this pole in the yard because I haven't figured out how to get it on the roof yet. In addition, I don't think my HOA would like me mounting it up there. Anyways, I have it connected to a Maxtrac in the garage, not a bad setup but it would be better if the antenna were on the roof. I have also been upading the RTPRailfan site as I have let it go for a while now. Hope to be adding some new material but probably won't completely overhall the site. Talk more soon....

Hamlet Railfanning

2009-06-06T15:36:00.001-07:00

Hamlet Railfanning
Originally uploaded by WISCHMI2

Hamlet, NC is a great place to go watch the trains pass, although today was kind of slow. You can usually see 15+ trains on a good day. A lot of freights come by the station. Make sure you check out the station, they have a nice model train setup of the area.

Rockingham Railfanning

2009-06-06T13:15:00.001-07:00

Rockingham Railfanning
Originally uploaded by WISCHMI2

West of Hamlet, NC there is a nice quiet road where a person can sit and watch the freight traffic from the Hamlet yard come and go. Its in PeeDee just west of the PeeDee River. The picture was taken near a bridge that passes over a local road.

Alexandria Amtrak

2009-05-29T15:27:00.001-07:00

Alexandria Amtrak
Originally uploaded by WISCHMI2

Alexandria, VA Amtrak Station after getting off 92.

Richmond, VA Amtrak

2009-05-29T10:50:00.001-07:00

Richmond, VA Amtrak
Originally uploaded by WISCHMI2

Richmond, VA Staples Mill Road via Amtrak 92.

Rocky Mount, NC

2009-05-29T08:19:00.001-07:00

Rocky Mount, NC
Originally uploaded by WISCHMI2

Rocky Mount, NC stop on Amtrak 92. Looks like a nice station although i couldn't get a picture of it from where we stopped.

Raleigh by Amtrak 92

2009-05-29T06:53:00.001-07:00

Raleigh by Amtrak 92
Originally uploaded by WISCHMI2

Made it to Raleigh!

Amtrak Cary

2009-05-29T05:04:00.001-07:00

Amtrak Cary
Originally uploaded by WISCHMI2

Waiting for the train to show up!

Love PeiWei

2009-05-27T16:03:00.001-07:00

Love PeiWei
Originally uploaded by WISCHMI2

Dont you just love peiwei. They have the best honey seared chicken. This peiwei is in Cary, NC.

Trying through message

2009-05-26T19:02:00.001-07:00

Trying through message
Originally uploaded by WISCHMI2

Multimedia message

2009-05-26T17:39:00.001-07:00

Multimedia message
Originally uploaded by WISCHMI2

2009-05-10T06:46:00.001-07:00

I still haven't figured out how to post pictures/video to my blog but ill figure it out soon. I've been taking lots of pictures with my new HTC Fuzi. Its very nice, u can do a lot with this phone.

Tehachapi, CA

2009-04-11T17:07:00.000-07:00

I am fotunate enough to be writing this post from the tehachapi loop in california. i had a 2 week business trip and decided to come up for the weekend. what a beautiful place. i highly recommend this spot for all railfans to visit. i wosh i had my camera!!!

Railfan Locations

2009-03-02T18:01:00.000-08:00

I took the same basic usage that I have on http://www.whatstodotoday.com and applied it to http://www.rtprailfan.com. Essentially users can register with the site and post their railfan sites. I have posted several of my sites around North Carolina. Even though its centered around North Carolina, you can post locations for anywhere in the world. Pretty cool....

whatstodotoday_

2009-02-05T18:49:00.000-08:00

I still haven't figured out how to get the adsense operating correctly but I did add Greensboro, NC and Winston Salem, NC to the database set. I am going to add Wilmington to the database set and then move on to Virginia. Hope the site gets picked up by Google soon.

Railfan Radio

2009-02-01T18:28:00.000-08:00

Hi again,

RTPRailfan radio is up again. I've had it running for a few days and it seems like its operating correctly. There seems to be a lot of good scanning around the middle of the day, and during the day on weekdays is good. You can catch the Amtrak going through at 8:30 and 9:30 at night. Weekends are kind of slow sometimes. I'm still working on whatstodotoday.com. I'm having issues getting the Adsense to do what I want it to. I'm trying to figure out how to update the Adsense based on the updates from a MySQL database. What a pain.

RTP Railfan Mapping

2009-01-29T17:47:00.000-08:00

Hi everybody,

Well, I haven't done much with the www.rtprailfan.com website much lately because I've spend 3 months on my new site http://www.whatstodotoday.com. This is a dynamic google maps site that required me learning the basics of javascript, php, mysql and refreshing my html and css. That was a lot to learn. I'm definitley not an expert but I have a better understanding of how they work. Anyways, one of the things I added to www.whatstodotoday.com is a "railfan" type. I don't want to go into the specifics of the site, check out http://www.whatstodotoday.com/about_whatstodo.html to see a quick overview. However, the point is railfans currently in the Raleigh or Charlotte area can post google map locations with comments to the site. I think it would cool to add the radio frequencies of trains applicable to this area as well. I think I might add a function like this to www.rtprailfan.com, but this might be a while, as I'm still developing the whatstodotoday site. Anyways, check it out and let me know what you think.

RTPRailfan Forum taken down

2009-01-18T05:39:00.000-08:00

Hi yall,

Been a while, been working on a new website. I took the RTPRailfan forum offline because it was getting to much junk and spam on it. It wasn't used very often anyways. I did put the RTPRailfan radio back up. I'll probably leave it up until summer when the heat is too much for the computer in the attic. By the way, I'm setting up a new site called whatstodo_. Should be an interesting site for the Raleigh area at first. I'm just getting the last issues worked out and then I should be good to go.

See ya soon...

Google Maps and railfan pictures and videos

2008-11-18T16:41:00.000-08:00

A new feature on http://www.rtprailfan.com/, there is a page that allows you to mark your own photos and videos on google maps. I just started this so I'm not sure if its fully operational but feel free to give it a try. Here is the web address. Hope you enjoy it, I'm sure I will.

Site being update...

2008-10-30T17:27:00.003-07:00

I'm in the midst of updating my site. I haven't done any Dreamweaver in a while so I'm relearning....

man...i'm bad at this

2008-10-24T09:55:00.000-07:00

I just don't write in my blog enough. To be honest, I've been out of the railfanning for a bit. I got that Traintenna in that I paid $170 for and I can't get it to work. It operates horrible and I can't find a thing wrong with it. I gave up so in the mean time I built a new computer. Its pretty nice...

Intel 8500 dual core
4 gigs ram
G260 EVGA video card
750i NVIDIA EVGA MB

It whups my old computer. I play Crysis at 1280x1024 at very high settings with no problem. Awesome computer. So pretty much all I've been doing is gaming for about 3 weeks. My railfan setup is currently using the original radioshack vhf antenna. I've just been recording stuff, not broadcasting but i really should kick it to broadcast because i don't even listen to it....I think I'll do that now.

Gotta love remote computer....http://www.rtprailfan.com....there is a link there to railfan radio. You just have to click that and then click on the "listen" link above...

Railfan Scanning

2008-09-26T04:53:00.000-07:00

Well, I received my Traintenna LP but I haven't had much luck in getting it going. Well, by that I mean it seems to be working but it doesn't pick up any better than my VHF antenna from RadioShack. I'm don't think I have anything setup wrong, I just think it doesn't pick up any better and I'm fairly disappointed because that antenna was $170, my other VHF antenna was $25 and does just as good of a job??? That makes no sense to me. As soon as I get that thing setup the way I want it I'll put the RTPRailfan stream back online. Till then....

Fall is coming!

2008-09-10T09:03:00.001-07:00

Time to get back to railfanning! This summer has gone by quickly. Had some good times and bad. LeeAnne's grandfather died back in July, that was not a good time. He is missed. On the positive side, both LeeAnne and I have gotten promotions recently. Its always good to feel like you are doing something right. Just this past week I got back from a Washington trip that included some railfanning sidelines to the longest tunnel in the U.S. (Cascade tunnel), hiked up some of Mt. Rainier, and checked out the raillines along the Columbia River. It was a great trip and I plan on updating it on www.rtprailfan.com. In addition I recently ordered my Traintenna from DPD productions and I will be getting the server back up and running now that it should be cooling off. See you at RTPRAILFAN!

Facebook

2008-08-17T14:19:00.001-07:00

I had never really done anything on Facebook but LeeAnne signed me up for it. Its kinda interesting. I've been playing around with that lately. Not much else going on. I think I'll try to update my website soon and we have the Seattle trip coming up. We went to see LIVE last night, that was really good. I'm ready for Fall.

AudioBlog

2008-07-13T15:05:00.001-07:00

So I was thinking after the summer about putting an audio blog or something of that sort together for the scanner stuff down here. I'm not sure how I would do that, I guess my scanner feed would be good enough now. I was thinking more of something you can put on an ipod to hear the previous days action. This would be really great around my area given the scarcity of transmissions sometimes. I went walking around Morrisville today, up near where Park West Village is suppose to go in. Doesn't look like there is much going on, maybe the housing downturn has put that project on hold?? We had a big layoff last Monday but I survived. Hopefully I can make it though this recession. Just got back from a vacation at the Outer Banks. It was really nice to get away.

RTP Railfan Radio Down

2008-06-28T16:54:00.000-07:00

I had to take the railfan audio server down for the summer. For some reason the computer keeps shutting down (maybe cause its in the attic and its about 130 up there). In addition my power bill was very high in June so this will also save me some electricity. I'll probably pick it back up in September. Maybe by then I can get a Traintenna for better pickup. I haven't been doing much railfanning anyways. Talk more soon...

Too hot for railfanning

2008-06-10T16:19:00.000-07:00

Man, I have been really slacking on my railfan stuff. I got a promotion at work and I have even less time for railfan stuff. I guess I have also just been lazy about updating the site and blog. I'm planning on a railfan trip to the northwest this summer so that should be fun. Got the DPD productions map of the northwest so we just have to plan out a route. Should be fun!

Man, Slacking!

2008-05-09T09:11:00.000-07:00

Work has been crazy. Seems like I am getting more people to the site and thats great. I have some free time this weekend, maybe I can get some work done on updating and more pictures. Radio is down now too, I think I just need a reboot. Power must have went out. See you later!

Spring is here....

2008-04-23T09:46:00.000-07:00

That means lots of yard work to do. Thus the lack of posts, not to mention hectic at work. I haven't been getting out to see much lately, but I did catch a freight today at Clegg. Soon I hope to get a Traintenna for my attic setup. I don't really listen to it much but it seems to be working ok. I'm wondering if I'm going to keep it going through the summer because it gets pretty hot up there plus the cost of running the computer all the time. I'll let you know when I get the new antenna set up.

RTP Railfan Radio back online!

2008-04-01T05:28:00.001-07:00

I went ahead and put the RTP Railfan scanner stream back online. Seems to be working so far. Let me know if you have any comments! Scanner Link.

Looks good so far

2008-03-31T15:15:00.000-07:00

The new antenna seems to be working quite well. The only bad thing is it picks up more that is unintelligible. However, it does pick up further than my Yagi. Picks up Cary pretty well, the defect detector all the time. Its pretty nice.

Updated Website

2008-03-30T14:28:00.000-07:00

I update my website with some small new stuff and got the links working at the top. Just did a page about the Yagi antenna I have in the attic even though I don't use it now. I'm using the RadioShack VHF antenna. It seems to pick up better than my 5 element Yagi. I still can't pick up the NS defect detector in RTP. I'll get a traintenna eventually and I hope I'll pick it up then.

Testing Railfan Scanner Feed

2008-03-29T08:36:00.000-07:00

Currently the scanner feed is down. I'm testing a new VHF antenna I got from RadioShack. This is to replace the Yagi I build that was in my attic. This was the $26 VHF antenna from RadioShack. Seems promising right now, I could hear the Amtrak this morning at the Fairgrounds in Raleigh and all the way to Clegg on the H line in RTP. Eventually I will get the traintenna from DPD Productions but its about $175 for the log periodic. I also need to get the correct Maxtrac installed that allows audio out of the accesory connector. On another note, I heard the Moncure defect detector from Apex, some 20 miles away. First time I've ever heard that one go off.

I'll do more research next time...

2008-03-25T17:34:00.000-07:00

Well, it turns out that I bought the wrong Maxtrac. I need the one with the 16 pin accesory adapter, not the 5 pin. So I have no way to connect this radio the the soundcard of a computer. Great. Well, I guess I'll have to get another one. Its ok, I think I would have gotten another one anyways. Hopefully I can do some more railfanning soon, haven't gotten to do much lately.

Motorola Maxtrac

2008-03-24T05:25:00.001-07:00

I bought this Moto Maxtrac 300 because I heard commercial radios are better than scanners. I can belive that. So I got it and it does indeed have better receive sensitivity. I had to gather all the equipment to get it going, radio interface box (RIB), Rib to radio cable (I built), Rib to computer cable (came with the RIB). Then I had to find the software. Took me a while to realize that the way Motorola and others define pins 1-8 on an RJ45 connector is backwards. Anyways, to the good stuff. Last night I hooked it up in my car and I could almost hear a train in Raleigh and I could hear the Cary defect detector no problem. This is a far cry from my scanner where the best I could hope for was Apex. I'm not sure what people have that say they can hear 35+ miles. I can only hear 20 with my maxtrac and a antenna tuned to 160 MHz. How much better can you get than that. Anyways, I'm hoping to get another one of these on the cheap and install it in the attic with the Yagi. This will definitely get better range than my current scanner.

No more Western Digital Hard Drives

2008-03-18T05:44:00.000-07:00

Well, I went to Hamlet, NC this weekend and caught the 92 Amtrak running 7 hours late. I was going to post some pictures but my external hard drive failed taking all my old pictures with it. This is the second WD drive to fail on me in the last 3 months. I have had it with them. And to top it off it failed just out of warranty. Of course thats easy to do with a 1 year warranty. The drive started making a wierd noise and now it just does 3 clicks two times in a row and doesn't try anymore. My computer doesn't pick it up at all. We are trying to freezer trick, but to no avail. I guess I'm just out of luck. I'll try to post a pic or two once I get that stuff back in order.

RTP Railfan Radio

2008-03-06T18:52:00.000-08:00

So, I have this server up in my attic connected to a Yagi antenna and scanner. Its not the best setup, I can hear Apex, Cary, Raleigh dispatch. I'm getting a Motorola Maxtrac so hopefully this will have better reception. Try it out. You will need WinAmp to listen to it. Doesn't seem like much is going on at night but during the day it picks up a fair amount of local traffic. I'll see how it goes with this server and see if I'll keep it up. Let me know if you have comments. It doesn't have nearly the traffic that the radio servers have around places like Hamlet but it still works.

Slackin

2008-02-21T05:11:00.000-08:00

Man, I have been slackin on the website. Went over to Raleigh and Selma over the weekend, caught some action. Couple freights, couple Amtraks. I will have to post some new photos to the website soon. I caught the lunar eclipse last night and got some pictures. I needed a telephoto lens for that though. Work is still keeping me busy.

Too much to do...again...

2008-02-12T13:02:00.000-08:00

However, this time its work thats the hold up. The last three weeks have been crazy. I haven't had time to work on the website at all. Hopefully things will calm down soon. I got a GRE superamp but it doesn't seem to help the signals i'm picking up much. I'm trying to build a filter for the railroad band but its slow going.

Selma, NC

2008-01-23T12:45:00.000-08:00

Caught some action in Selma the other day. Seems they were doing some repair work out that way and they had a lot of traffic caught up. I even saw the juice train coming up from Florida. Cool stuff.

Busy Week

2008-01-19T14:11:00.001-08:00

This was a really busy week at work so I haven't worked on the website or done anything on the blog. Not much railfanning either. Its snowing here now, kind of a dreary Saturday. I'm going to go work on the website, see if I can get some stuff done.

Visit to Hamlet, NC

2008-01-14T04:57:00.000-08:00

This weekend I spent Saturday visiting Hamlet with my brother. Hamlet is quite the railfan mecca. I saw at least 5 other people just hanging around watching the trains go by. We were probably only at the station 5 hours total and we must have seen 10-15 trains. They just kept coming and going. Its an ok place to walk around. We also went wandering in the woods west of Hamlet on the near the tracks by the Pee Dee River. That was very interesting. Our feet were caked with about 3 inches of mud and the briars were merciless. Worse so for me because I was wearing shorts. We did see two freights out there, but there isn't a good place to view the bridge. All i all a good weekend though.

RTP Scanner Radio is ONLINE!

2008-01-10T15:07:00.000-08:00

I finally got the RTP Railfan radio online. I'm having some problems with the intermods that find there way into the railroad band. Its pretty good though, I've only had it online a day and I can here the Cary, NC CSX detector. I would really like to be able to hear the NS detector up in Clegg, NC but I haven't heard anything so far. I need to work more on rtprailfan now that I have the railfan radio online.

Can't work on website, building Yagi Antenna

2008-01-09T18:44:00.000-08:00

Well, I read online that some people were using Yagi antenna's for receiving talk over the AAR channels. I have two monopole antenna's but I thought I would try building a Yagi. I sort of got it working I guess but I still don't think its as good as it should be. I guess I'll give it a while and see how it does. Hopefully I can get it optimized and then I'll leave it be. I haven't worked on the www.rtprailfan.com site for a while because i've been wrapped up in antenna design. Hope to post some pics soon.

Its been a while

2008-01-02T18:09:00.001-08:00

So I was on vacation and I haven't updated my blog in some time. I took some railfan trips, to Hamlet, Aberdeen, followed the Durham and Southern from Apex to Dunn, NC, went to Selma, NC on the old ACL mainline. It was quite a vacation. I have a ton of stuff to update http://www.rtprailfan.com/ with. Also, the search engine optimization we did is paying off, for some reason i'm highly ranked for "amtrak cary." I guess because of the one article I have on amtrak and Cary, NC. I went there also. I also am working on a video page but I did some stupid stuff the other night in Dreamweaver and I screwed up one of my CSS pages. I need to fix that tonight. Hope everyone had a good holiday and check out the page, I'll have new stuff soon.

Morrisville NC Development

2007-12-17T07:26:00.000-08:00

I have to say I am rather upset to see this. Not that i'm suprised because of the ridiculous amount of growth that is going on in Morrisville. I heard there are going to be no trees left there an I believe it. Recently I saw this in a news article and its rather depressing. I large section of an area that I use for walking/railfanning is going to be used for a retail development. I hate that they are doing this but I guess there isn't much we can do. Castro Lifestyle Properties is developing this section of Morrisville that I have visited many times. I hate that its going away.

Park West Village Morrisville NC

http://www.castolp.com/lifestyle/profile.cfm?proID=14

http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/2016249/

View Larger Map

Railfanning in Cary

2007-12-16T17:51:00.000-08:00

Cary, NC is a nice place to go because its quite, and more importantly, its close to where I live. Sunday's are pretty lite on traffic buy you can usually see an Amtrak and a freight train. Today wasn't a very fun day to go because it was pretty cold so I didn't stay forever. I did catch the Amtrak 80 though. I worked on the webpage some more. I also got a lot of help on SEO which I really appreciate. I think I'll work on the forum some more though, it still needs work.

RTPRailfan has a FORUM!

2007-12-14T10:26:00.000-08:00

http://www.rtprailfan.com now has a forum for people to chat about railfanning in our area. It can be reached at http://www.rtprailfan.com/rtprailfanforum/ . Feel free to stop by and chat for a while, leave a picture, etc. I'm still setting it up but the basic stuff is up and running.

Almost time for vacation

2007-12-14T04:34:00.000-08:00

And what better way to spend a vacation than doing some railfanning. Actually I will only probably get in a day of it with all the other things I have to do. Oh well. My railfan site is making progress each day, although I have taken a bit of a break recently. I need to get the title navigation bar working and the site map built but other than that I think its pretty much laid out. For my railfan site, I want to have it be interactive for users. The way the site is set up is you have articles and every article has a description of what you saw and what the area was like. Along with this you have a picture gallery and a google map to show exactly where it is. I am going to create, somehow, a main page that is just one big google map with place markers. Every place marker will pop up a balloon when you click on it and the balloon will have a link that goes to the article. I think that will be really cool for seeing railfanning locations around you. The problem right now is getting traffic to the site. Time to do more search engine optimization. On a different subject, I think the railroad people must know I sit out and railfan at lunch because I haven't seen a train in more than a week and a half. Its getting old, I think I'll have to switch times.

RTP Railfan

2007-12-10T08:56:00.000-08:00

Finally, I have something to show for my effort. http://www.rtprailfan.com is sorta finished. I have some bugs and some of the links don't link to anything but I have the main page up and 3 articles. Hopefully I can get the last of the articles that I wanted to do completed soon. I took a break for a while, had other things going on. In antenna news, I got my Smiley antenna tuned to 160 MHz in. Its pretty nice, I can definitely hear more of what is floating around the airwaves than I could with my Diamond. I think I heard the dispatcher in Raleigh the other day but that my have been a fluke because I haven't heard anything recently. I also have a mag mount for my car that helps when I'm driving around. Pretty nice. Well thats about all thats happening. I should have more of my website together soon!

Research Triangle Park

2007-12-04T09:14:00.000-08:00

Now that I have a good idea of what the rtprailfan site will entail, I think I'm going to start trying to get the rtp area things to do site together. Although, I'm not sure what I'm going to call it yet or even exactly what the content will be. I'd like to do something similar to the railfan site, something with interactive maps and good photography. Maybe something that includes outside/inside activites, places for couples. Any one have suggestions for what they would like to see?

Keyword Searches

2007-12-03T09:29:00.000-08:00

I wonder how difficult it will be to get any traffic to this blog. I've been reading about keyword association with your site and it seems difficult. I guess it just takes time. I'm still working on my website but its slow going. I don't know how to use the programs very well so there is a very steep learning curve. I'm still trying to figure out how exactly I want to lay it out. I'm thinking if I can just get the page overview together, I'll go ahead and launch it. On a different subject all together, I'm still waiting on my mag mount antenna with BNC connector. I also got a 5/8 wavelength antenna custom build for 160 MHz resonance frequency. I'm hoping this will do much better than my Diamond antenna hooked to my scanner in the car. I just don't think I'm getting the range I'm supposed to be getting. Went out at lunch today looking for trains in RTP, no luck.

To much to do, to little time

2007-12-02T15:34:00.000-08:00

I'm probably biting off more than I can chew here but in addition to my railfan website, I want to create one that highlights things to do in the Research Triangle Park area. I'm still trying to figure out what that will be about but I'm thinking something that links video/photography with google maps and a good description of what there is to do.

Got the flash part finished

2007-12-01T19:08:00.001-08:00

Well it took me about 5 hours but I got the flash portion of the website done. It was fairly difficult for such a small bit of the website but i think it was worth it because it looks pretty cool. Hopefully I will get the video portion of the website up soon. Then I can focus on content instead of layout.

Railfanning around Apex, NC

2007-11-30T10:29:00.000-08:00

Apex is a pretty good place to watch trains. Although I never really see the Amtraks because they are during work hours and later at night (about 9:30 if its on time), I do on occation pick up a freight train going though. I can usually pick these up on my scanner from Holly Springs. I'll post some pics when I get home. By the way, I believe I will start having monthly articles on railfanning locations around the area. These won't be posted here, I am setting up a site, http://www.rtprailfan.com/ that will hopefully be up soon.

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Web Page Design and AdSense

2007-11-30T09:05:00.001-08:00

Wow, developing a webpage is pretty difficult if you haven't done it before. You can get really cool results though by using Photoshop. I have a Nikon D80 camera and I have some cool shots of train related stuff. I incorporated some of those photos in and it turned out really good. I think the website if gonna be cool. I think its just a matter of me coming up to speed with the programs. I hope to have it up soon. I'm going to incorporate some flash and movies. Hopefully that won't be too difficult. I also hope to get enough traffic to make some money from adsense. I need to get a domain host too.

2007-11-29T09:25:00.000-08:00

I think I am going to take a more active role in the internet. I've been reading about Google AdSense and I really want to see what its all about. I'm going to create some webpages about specific topics that interest me and see how it goes. Specifically railfanning in the Research Triangle Park area. This will include my interest in scanners and all things RF. My brother has become quite the artist in the past few years and I want to see if I can setup a website to sell some of his work. Maybe I can get him interested in painting railroad scenes. I think he wanted to do that anyways. I should also be posting to this blog more often.

By the way, In the Springs, come from the area I live. Holly Springs, NC, one of the up and coming areas around Research Triangle Park.

E62

2007-08-26T11:14:00.001-07:00

I got this E62 about a month ago from Cingular and man was it a piece. Nothing worked on it, except the internet. Got to reading and found there are ways. I guess there are always ways. Just needed some different firmware. Now the phone is working great. I had to go around Nokia because they were in cohorts with Nokia to kill this phone. The wouldn't update the software at all, I guess they just wanted it to die. Sweet interface though and coupled with GPS you can see exactly where you are on a satellite view. Now I just need to get google maps to have GPS for symbian.