I’ve known a few that were pretty decent. I don’t believe having ground experience automatically makes you a good trainmaster, RFE, dispatcher, yardmaster, etc. either. It can help, but there’s more to it than that. (I know you know this Carl, that was for the benefit of the rest of the lounge readers).
I still see big gaps that need to be filled in management in the next 10 years. No wonder CN is resorting to ads on facebook. Now if they could just stop bouncing managers all over the system, or expecting them to be on the job 24/7 and micromanaging every aspect of the railroad, it wouldn’t be bad. Play your cards right and you can retire at 55 with my carrier, or so I’m told…
You’re absolutely right, Z. I’ve had good ones from “the class” and people I’ve worked with for years who made rotten officers. (When they get busted–which they almost inevitably did–revenge could be sweet.)
Safety glasses. (Hard hat if in the engineering departments. Boots, too, but since his feet aren’t shown, I’ll presume that he complies there. Also, hearing protection, but he could have the foam rubber plug-type stuffed in his ears, and they wouldn’t show in this view, either.)
Congrats, zardoz: “59 - the new 39” (don’t ask how I know . . . [:-^] )
Thanks, Dan! I hope to spend a lot of the day trackside, since Pat will be otherwise occupied for the morning.
But today’s also the day we add another ring to the Tree…happy birthday to Larry. I didn’t abuse this past year too much, so there’s plenty of 62 left for you to enjoy.
So far, so good, but I do have to attend a meeting this evening. Dinner with daughter and family (and their new pup) is next Monday.
Of course, it’s happy birthday right back to Carl. Last year I gave him a cab ride and a book…
They say that if you have a gathering of at least a certain size you’ll find at least one person with whom you share a birthday. Here on the forum it’s Carl, and there’s a member of my FD with whom I share the day.
I also share the date with my parents wedding anniversary, and my mother’s parents wedding anniversary. I ran into the date while working on the geneology, too, back in the 1700’s or 1800’s, but I can’t remember if it’s a birthday or another wedding.
You’ll just have to come west, young man, so’s I can somehow reciprocate.
As far as I know, I’m unique with this date in my family and Pat’s. There used to be a church member with the same birthday, but she’s been gone for twelve years now. At work, there was a CRO “probie” with the same birthday, but that didn’t help him survive.
I’m still at Elmhurst, and the trains have come by fairly heavily. However, we’re now in a lull, so I’m considering going back home and letting Pat have the computer for a while. Of course, you know what will happen the moment I leave the tracks.
Really! There seems to be quite the bevvy of birthdays around this time of year.
Larry, Carl, I hope you get some of what you hope for.
WMNB4THRTL, Paul, Zug (the other “Z”-man), thanks much for the good wishes.
Had too much [pi] and [^], but not too much in the [G] department (one can never get too many presents). Now I need a few days away from the tasty stuff so my blood sugar can get below 1000…
The other day, I saw a covered hopper with outside bracing marked for Western Pacific with WP reporting marks at the local glass factory. Are those reporting marks being used today, or was it an older car?
James, there aren’t too many series of Western Pacific cars left, but the car you saw, built by the FMC Corporation in 1980, was part of one of them. The series was WP 12051-12100; 36 of the original 50 cars are still left, and I’m willing to bet that most of them carry their original lettering. UP may repaint these cars eventually, but–if current practices are followed–will not reletter or renumber them.
I used a westbound stack train on Track 3 (four GEVOs, two of which were in the 8000 series) to run interference for me as I left Elmhurst this afternoon. If I could have held my cell-phone and biked at the same time as I was pacing him, it would have made a spectacular enough video–even a sound recording would have been neat. After he cleared me at the gravel-pit crossing (West Street), the signal on Track 2 changed to high green for an inbound (my prophecy fulfilled!). I was able to see that inbound (coal) train from a distance as I was headed into Villa Park.
Zardoz, what are the odds that two people not only share the same date, but are the same age? When I was growing up, another boy in town was the same age as I was, and when I was in seminary, the assistant librarian was the same age as I was (she married one of my classmates, who was younger not the same birthday than I). She would not tell me her age, but she did tell me that she also was born on a Friday–which enabled me to calculate that she had to be the same age.