Once a student reaches the eighth grade, in some ways summer needs to be more strategic. I’m not talking about adding yet more busy work to your soccer-filled schedules. I’m talking about developing a new filter through which you do things. I want you to start living in the “big picture” of being college-bound so you’ll start doing things now that will help shape your college experience later. Here are seven smart summer strategies for college-bound kids and their families:
All right, stop worrying that this sounds like a lot of work! Instead, really envision reading on your front porch, shooting serious hoops every day with your friends, and scheduling one day a week to work with a conservation group to beautify your town. Then imagine telling your roommate all about it freshman year in college. That’s a big picture you’ll want to frame.
There are a few things to remember when designing custom layouts for HO scale model railroad trains. First – enjoy yourself! There is lots of room for creativity, just stay with in a few basic guidelines.
Some very useful online tools including free software to design your own railroad model layout; search for it – it is even fun to use. You can also do it the “old fashioned” way, using pencil and paper with a compass for curves and a ruler for straight-aways. Keep in mind that no matter how exact you are in your design, when it comes to laying the materials, some adjustments will always be necessary.
You can also design your layout right on location, placing track pieces and switches loosely in place to get a feel for what it will look like. You can move things around until you have it exactly the way you want it. This is known as “going free-lance.”
It’s helpful to deliberately leave openings for later changes and additions. Leave some space for a train yard you might be able to add later, or other details you might not have the time or money for in your railroad model right now. This makes for a rewarding, multi-stage project, growing in complexity over time.
There are several different types of yards you can add. A “hump” yard has a gentle slope with an uncoupler, allowing uncoupled cars to gently roll away from the mainline. A staging yard is a section of track deliberately hidden from view, where you send your trains to wait. It’s useful to simulate long-distance runs, or simply for storage purposes.
One important guideline to keep in mind is the minimum radius for your turns, which in HO scale model trains is 18 inches for 4 axle diesels and 22 inches for 6 axle diesels. As a general rule, things will look and work best with 24 inch radius turns. For a full circle, this means 48 inches diameter, so you will need slightly more than a 4 foot wide space for such a layout.
Another important guideline is the maximum grade, which for HO scale model trains is 4%. What this means is that you should take 100 horizontal inches to rise 4 vertical inches. And that’s a maximum. Try to keep hills somewhat less steep than that. And test your engines to find out what they can handle and how many cars they can pull up that grade you’re creating.
To simulate greater height, instead of creating a steep climb for the rails themselves, drop the ground level underneath. You can create some breathtaking gorge and valley scenery, or even just send a road or another track underneath.
For getting started with your first layout, it’s probably best to stick with sectional track, which is fairly easy to snap together. More advanced modelers of HO scale model trains prefer to construct their layout from flex track. It comes in bundles, so it’s generally cheaper, and, as its name implies, it is a very versatile option, with greater opportunity for customization. It will make your railroad model look good. You can create small, brief curves with more natural lead-ins as opposed to being restricted to standard radii and straightaways in the snap-together sets.
A final point to consider in your design is to be sure you will be able to get to all parts of the finished layout for maintenance purposes. Some advanced modelers constructing larger layouts will even make “access hatches”, large holes covered by a movable portion of scenery, where they can come up from beneath and actually stand in the middle to work on those less accessible portions. Be sure the opening is large enough to comfortably stand and move around in. The scenery on the removable section should be light and durable for ease of handling. You may also want to create a screen of trees or some other visual obstruction in front of the removable section.
Here are the basics of single ply roofing systems.
When you are talking about getting a single ply roof, there are quite a few things you are going to want to take into consideration. Although these roofs are chemically superior to other roofs, they also happen to be much thinner and susceptible to puncture should someone drop a hammer or throw a bottle up there. It is important that people weigh the pros and the cons of single ply roofs before deciding what is going to be the best option for their own building.
The biggest downside to single ply roofs is that they can get punctured easily. If somebody is walking on the roof, or if somebody drops a hammer or a knife when they are on it, then you are going to have a leak. So that is a problem, especially with lower buildings where people can easily throw things up there.
If you are building a one-story, fourplex home, where people might be climbing up on the roof and making a mess, then you definitely do not want to go with a single ply roof. In that case, you are going to want to choose a two or three ply built up roof or a modified roof simply because those options are physically stronger. There are multiple layers to those roofing styles, which means they can physically take more abuse before wearing out or causing leaks.
Because single ply roofs are chemically superior, though, they can be a great alternative to restaurants that might have animal fats building up on the roof. The chemical properties of these roofs allow them to stand up well to things like animal fats or acid rain, along with inclement weather like wind, snow, or extreme sun. So all of those are reasons why a business would certainly choose a single ply roofing option.
Another industry that commonly asks for a single ply roofing system is hospitals. If you are a hospital, you really don’t want a hot tar roof material that is going to be seeping through and producing noxious fumes, especially once heat and temperature changes are taken into consideration. So instead, what you would be looking for in that type of situation is a single ply roof that is going to be chemically superior and cleaner at the same time.
There are many grades of single ply roofs, and depending on which grade you have chosen, you may need to get your roofing maintenance done more or less often. Generally, you can get a good 10- or 15-, even 20-year manufacturer warranty on commercial projects with these roofs.
Meanwhile, the average life span for a single ply roof is no more than 16 years on average. And after 16 years, people should plan on needing to do some re-roofing or some other type of major repair. One good aspect to single ply roofs, in this regard, is that the roof’s lightness means that you can overlay the roof a lot of times before needing to tear it off entirely and start over. So people who have a single ply roofing system in place can just go over the areas where they need additional layers of roofing, which can be cost-effective.
Finally, I should explain that a lot of people prefer the single ply roofs for climate reasons. The single ply roofs are usually white in color, which can be reflective and therefore beneficial for those living in hot climates thanks to its thermal properties. So environmentally speaking, that is another reason why single ply is favored.
There are a million factors why you would or wouldn’t choose a single ply roof, and all of the above reasons only start to touch on those factors. Most important, though, is that each homeowner or building owner knows the specific needs of his building, because that will be the biggest determination when choosing between a single ply or another roofing system.
In an editorial several years ago, I described a tree house in the backyard of a local restaurant. I wrote, “The entire structure has been pieced together from recycled lumber, much of which still bears the paint, logos or posters of the original walls from whence it came. The generous platform is ringed by a sturdy fence that includes branches of the tree itself, random two-by-fours, wooden signs, and even a pair of moose antlers. The ‘house’ is more of a lean-to, tall enough for kids (but not adults) to stand up inside, with a screened door and two screened windows positioned so occupants can easily spy on the diners below or out over the adjacent parking lot. A green padded bench that looks like it had once belonged in a diner adequately furnishes the space. Underneath the tree house hangs a rope swing, from which kids can fling themselves into a thick layer of hay on the grass.”
Fast forward to this summer. The restaurant revamped their backyard, including the tree house. The railing now consists of uniform boards about three inches apart. The house is reached not by a ladder and trapdoor, but via a bona fide staircase. The screen door is gone, the windows are covered in glass, and several of the tree’s branches have been pruned back to discourage climbing. But the worst part, according to my 10-year-old, is that the rope swing has disappeared. Matthew declared the whole structure “boring.” In today’s world, kids have far less freedom than in previous generations. Their lives are more controlled-sometimes because of parents’ fears of an increasingly dangerous society, but often because we’ve somehow come to believe that to grow into successful adults, children’s activities must be channeled, scheduled and programmed from infancy.
Danger comes in many forms, from a stranger encountered on the way to school (who may be a neighbor out walking his dog, but you never know), to free time not filled with “enriching” activities. But, in my opinion, kids need a little danger in their lives. They need to test their boundaries, to learn how to climb a ladder and squeeze through a trapdoor. They need to hurl themselves into a pile of hay and learn it’s best not to land on your face. If grown-ups clean up their world too much, kids will never learn how to push themselves. They’ll never have the satisfaction of trying things that are a little scary, a little off their parents’ radar, and accomplishing something that belongs just to them.
One of the few places kids can still push their limits is with books. It’s possible to step outside your safe life with a story, or try new ideas on for size. But many adults want to clean up their kids’ reading choices as well. I know parents who abhor Barbara Park’s perennially popular Junie B. Jones chapter books because the spirited Junie isn’t a good role model, or won’t read Winnie the Pooh because Christopher Robin can’t spell very well. I also know a lot of authors who are afraid to write books that are slightly subversive because they worry editors won’t publish them. But for every parent who insists on only “safe” reading for their child (and it’s every parent’s right to do so), there are at least two parents who believe it’s okay for kids to wade into the danger zone through fiction. I’m not advocating murder mysteries for preschoolers here, just books that might be considered slightly uncivilized, or more entertaining than educational. Let’s look at some popular examples:
When I first saw Walter, the Farting Dog by William Kozwinkle and Glenn Murray, illustrated by Audrey Colman (a picture book whose plot needs no explanation), I was worried that children’s publishing might be sinking a little too low. But as it started winning awards and spawning sequels, I changed my opinion. Let’s face it: farting makes kids laugh. And if your child finds this book hysterical, you should be glad. In order to get the joke, kids need to know that noisy bodily functions are considered impolite. Laughing about them is one of the perks of childhood. Don’t worry, they’ll outgrow it.
A picture book coming out this December that’s already creating a buzz is 17 Things I’m Not Allowed to Do Anymore by Jenny Offill, illustrated by Nancy Carpenter. The heroine utters such statements as “I had an idea to staple my brother’s hair to his pillow. I am not allowed to use the stapler anymore.” She also glues her brother’s bunny slippers to the floor, and shows Joey Whipple her underpants. Both big No’s. This ingenious story should satisfy two camps of parents; those who want kids to see consequences for inappropriate behavior, and those who don’t mind letting their kids live vicariously through a curious, mischievous character. A pop-up book due out later this month from three publishing powerhouses-Maurice Sendak, Arthur Yorinks and Matthew Reinhart-lets young children face the monsters hiding in their closets and come out on top. In Mommy?, a young boy wanders into a haunted house looking for his mother and encounters creatures like a goblin, a mummy, and Frankenstein. Instead of running scared, the boy pulls pranks on each monster, deflating their power and showing how humor conquers fear every time.
Speaking of scary, if you haven’t read any of the enormously popular Series of Unfortunate Events middle grade novels by Lemony Snicket, do so. With titles like The Bad Beginning, The Miserable Mill, and The Penultimate Peril, and cautions from the author such as, “If you are interested in stories with happy endings, you would be better off reading some other book,” these are clearly stories where adults dare not tread. But children brave enough to venture between the covers will find hilarious plots full of nail-biting twists. The intelligent Baudelaire orphans have unusual skills (Violet for inventing, Klaus for reading and researching, and baby Sunny for biting) that make them admirable heroes.
Lauren Myracle enters the private world of teen girl talk in her young adult novels TTYL and TTFN. The titles alone might raise some parents’ suspicions because unless they’re well-versed at IM (instant messaging), they won’t know what the abbreviations stand for. In fact, the entire novels consist of conversations between three high school girls written in emails, text-messaging and IM’s, using the standard computer shorthand that includes abbreviated spelling and quirky syntax. If you’re not an IMer yourself, you’ll find the books somewhat difficult to read. But you and I aren’t the target audience here. And though the format might keep adults from examining the books too closely, the plots are standard upper young adult fare-relationships, family trauma, peer pressure, even drugs and alcohol-handled in a believable manner that conveys growth of character by the end of each story.
As an author, if you’re inspired to delve into the slightly dangerous, dark or subversive corners of childhood with your books, feel free to do so. Don’t limit yourself to all that’s bright, safe and up to code. Allow kids places where they can wander away from their parents’ watchful eyes and have an adventure. If the adventure’s in a book, they’ll always come home safe and sound. And if you’re still not convinced, consider this: In the backyard of the restaurant, the tree house now sits empty. But the books I’ve described above are flying off the shelves.
This article excerpted from Children’s Book Insider, The Newsletter for Children’s Writers. More information at http://write4kids.com