Two seperate photo batches here. First, the latest photos – The Kennedy Compound had a little accident in the laundry room which caused water to flow down to the basement, I took Depot Caretaker duty on Saturday’s Amtrak 4, and the Midland Railway ran their Labor Day run… oh yeah, some changes involving the new US 59.
And this batch of photos from December of 2002:
During the weekend, while over at the Shop (better known as Kennedy Glass) the BNSF send some trains my way.
Today was primary day in Kansas. Here’s who I voted for in the Republican Primary
US Senator: Jerry Moran
Basically, the two leading candidates are fairly close policy-wise. What sealed the deal for me to break for Moran was the way Mike Shanin and Scott Parks of KMBZ felt of the way the candidates handled themselves while being interviewed on their program.
US House of Representative, District 2 – Lynn Jenkins
With Moran and Tihart running for the senate seat, and Dennis Moore deciding not to run for office again, Lynn Jenkins was the only incumbent house member running for the seat they held during the current congress. Dennis Pyle ran on a campaign indicating that Lynn was not conservative enough.
Kansas Govenor – Sam Brownback
Senator Brownback is, of course, the front-running candidate overall in the current race for govenor.
Kansas Secretary of State – JR Claeys
I’ve actually received messages from the Claeys campaign for a while now. I didn’t pay that much attention. However; the front runner, Kris Kobach, doesn’t excite me that much. With all of the hubub regarding the immigration bill, among other things…. Kobach seems to be ‘Damaged goods.’
Kansas Attorney General – Dereck Schmidt
In reality, whoever I vote for in this race didn’t makea difference. Something tells me the incumbent, Democrat Steven Six, will get elected for a full term, especially after the controversy with the two previous AG candidates.
Kansas State Treasurer – Ron Estes
Free Pass to November – Mr. Estes ran unopposed on the Republican Primary.
Insurance Commissioner – Sandy Preager
Basically, this is the de facto insurance commissioner race, with no opposition from democrats or third parties. Her opponent ran on the fact that he is n insurance agent, and that Preager is a RINO. I have not seen a problem in the Insurance Commissioner’s office, however
Knsas House – Lee Tafenelli (unopposed)
Kansas Board of Education – Dawn Weston (unopposed)
County Commissioner – Lynn Luck
Haven’t seen much debate on this one.
Back on July 9, one of my fellow road enthusiast friends came up to Kansas. While he was there, he wanted to do some “sightseeing.” Since I happened to have the day off from work, I was happy to oblige. 
On Memorial Day, I took a road trip to explore a couple of roundabouts, as well as parts of the new US 69 freeway in Linn County.
As a Consequence of my raodtrip, I’ve also updated the US 69 exit guide to reflect the actual signage out in the field (I wasn’t *that* far off regarding the final segment of the freeway between Fort Scott and Kansas City.
http://www.route56.com/exitguides/us69.html
I also added a conceptual exit numbering scheme… the new 2009 Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices mandates that all major freeways have milepost-based exit numbering.
In addition, over the past week, there were protests over the removal of a Beaver Dam in the Baker Wetlands done to prevent 31st Street from losing integrity. Therefore, I wrote a Letter to the Editor:
Last weekend was the Free State High School class of 2000 reunion. Since I was a friend to quite a few in the class, I was welcomed to “crash” the party.
I typically post the entire set from reunions, therefore, I won’t show the thumbnails in the blog post. Here, however, are the links to the individual photo pages. There are 20 photos to a page, and most of the photos are what the camera took, with no retouching. I may edit out some pictures later.
For being on the web for 15 years, I composed this video slideshow.
(Note: since I used a commercial piece of music, you may see ads in the video. That’s the price you got to pay to keep it on youtube…. I’m not going to complain.)
There was a presentation regarding the future of Amtrak service at the Lawrence Visitor’s Center, which is located in the former Union Pacific Depot. While I was there, there were a couple of UP freights that came through.
I’m starting at the end of Saturday’s Depot Redux train day presentation with Hank Booth M.C.’ing the drawings. The prizes were: a massage, 3 bottles of wine, a set of luggage, and two round-trip first class train tickets to Chicago.
