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Carpal Tunnel
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And the crow caws thrice at midnight [interrobang]
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Mamas, don't let your babies grow up to be gandies!
...or bindle-stiffs.
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Better a bindle-stiff, then a yard-bull!
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Carpal Tunnel
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>You gotta know stuff, though. You need to watch and see which one of those three lines has got the Empty-Canadian-Returns (boxcars that can't be loaded
lawfully in the US) and. of course, the Boeing cars,
most likely from Wichita. You really need to board something in this line! because when the MStar makes
it to Auburn, they're gonna break her in two and backram the head end into the yards there. You'll be wishing you picked the denominator if you get caught
in her numerator, and the only sure way of avoiding that is to do what I said. If it's the right time of
the year, sunrise will meet you at the King Street
Station.
Awesome, MFA, simply awesome. I can almost feel the clickety clack of the wheels and the cold blowing over my rag-wrapped feet as I try not to freeze to death on the rods.
TEd
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Carpal Tunnel
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all those legendary trains-- and you left out the wabash cannonball? Listen to the whistle, the rumble and roar.. I thought all good railroad bums treaded/hoped for a ride on wabash cannonball? for those of you who are unfamiliar--here one link-- google had others, but i had trouble getting a server responce. http://www.ukans.edu/carrie/docs/texts/wabash.htm i have heard other verses, and other words.. but this version starts out right..
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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The New Zealand rail system is unique in that it is what most of you would regard as narrow gauge (3ft 6in). This was because of political shenanigans in the 1870s between two individuals in government one of whom is an ancestor of mine.
The weight of the tractors (engines) able to operate on a narrow gauge line is limited, and so the steepness of a climbable incline is constrained. It so happens that I used to live in Port Chalmers, just north of Dunedin. Across the bay, the main trunk line rose from sea level to about 200 feet above sea level in one one-mile long (approx) incline. It is reputed to be the steepest incline on the New Zealand rail system. All would go well unless the rails were wet or covered in ice. I used to lie in bed about three in the morning and hear the trains have a go at the incline in the frost. You could tell when they were starting to lose traction, generally about half a mile up the hill, because the engines were working harder, but the sound of their efforts did not diminish ...
They'd back down the hill to Sawyers Bay and take another run at it. Generally the second run worked, because the first run had melted the ice on the rails as far as the train had managed to get the first time. Backing down was the noisiest part for the residents because the fans on the resistance breaking units on the diesel engines would scream their heads off trying to dissipate the heat being generated in the resistor banks.
Earlier, in the days of steam, they'd have two engines on the front of the heavier goods trains and another smaller loco pushing from the back. This generally meant that the train would make it first time, every time. The pusher would uncouple at the top station and then back all the way to Dunedin, some ten miles. It was a great thing to see, three steam locos working hard. The downside was that on calm days there'd be a pall of coalsmoke hanging over the town for up to an hour afterwards and all the washing on the clothes lines would get grubby. On the days that this happened the Port Chalmers stationmaster would hurry home after work by the least populated routes to avoid the angry housewives. I remember a tale, possibly apocryphal, that one woman was so annoyed that she bundled her newly dirty washing up and dumped it on his desk, demanding that he wash it by hand and hang it out as she'd had to do.
Sorry, just seemed relevant and perhaps interesting in the context of this thread.
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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Very interesting, thanks CapK. I think this is the only thing I have understood in this thread in a couple of days. We should have a dazed and confused emoticon for situations like this  .
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