Happy Fourth of July!

I was going to post a picture of my favorite bicentennial steam locomotive from 1976 but today marks another, more important anniversary. So that picture will have to wait until 2021 (stay tuned!). Instead, I was sitting in bed Wednesday night and I realized that this Fourth of July was special for a more important reason: it was 10 years ago from today that I actively started researching the Colonie Main for my layout. At that time, I had officially abandoned modeling a B.N. branchline in N scale and started to look at the building on the Colonie Main. I didn't jump back into HO scale though for a couple of months.

That July in 2010 found me in sweltering heat photographing, mapping, and measuring buildings that I might put on my layout. As it turns out, the section I focused on isn't currently going on my layout but perhaps it will sometime. Anyway, while I was out taking pictures a C.P. train "snuck up" on me. Running trains on a national holiday seems unpatriotic, but it was a Canadian Pacific painted train (likely with US crews though) so I will give them a pass. On the end were a bunch of connected tank cars, which I frequently see. They are always painted white and always have burnt rust weathering patterns along the top that always make me thing of ...

Zweigles hot dogs! In my opinion, the very best hot dogs made. And not because they are from Rochester and I am from Rochester. Well, maybe partially. But they taste great. They come in red and white varities, and the white ones confuse people who aren't from western NY. They taste a lot like bratwurst, so if you like that you will like Zweigles. They have natural casings that "pop open" on the grill, and they stay juicy. One of my personal slogans is "If a hot dog is option A, I don't need an option B" and Zweigles is a big part of that. And I take them with ketchup only, thank you very much. Yum!

Happy Fourth of July!