Fast away the old year passes
Still have a couple of hours left “before the ball drops”. Enough time to weigh my possibilities and decide if watching other people party is relevant. I do have an invitation to a house party, thanks to son #2, but the logistics of getting there and back again are a heady barrier. I mean, the year would change, if I stayed late.
I read Cinderella; the midnight risk was made clear.
Meanwhile, I’ve found that old safety videos, done for the railroads a full seventy years ago, keep me enthralled. Let’s face it; few other industries maintain such a continuum. Rails, wheels, danger! The various films were done to instil fear in new hires. A wrong step could mean death. Still can. There’s just fewer employees involved in getting the consist from here to there.
With a lifetime of observation, I still didn’t realize just how physical the job of brakeman could be (and that with the death of a cousin as evidence). Although there’s less need to run along the ridgeline of a moving boxcar, the action of NOT setting handbrakes can have deadly consequences. There’s a red covered book of standard operating rules around here, left from my father; in it, the rules that you either obeyed, always, or risked a sudden change in your career path.
YouTube has hundred of hours of content, from across the globe. The common element is that railroading is procedure driven. No place for experimenting. And the whole thing works, extremely well.
As I said, I’m letting this year run out. The next one promises to be full of changes. I’m looking forward with interest.
