Sephy’s Platzish

I don’t know how many of you took a second to take a look at the picture I posted a link to yesterday, so here it is, full size

As simple as this photo seems, there is actually a story behind it. For the first time ever, I was able to take advantage of having a license and access to a car in order to do something for my own pleasure (I’ve gone out to drive a couple of times on my own before - the first was just an acclimation drive, and then on Wednesday, I had to go to an appointment during the day).

I can still remember one Sunday morning when I saw a train heading north and thinking “If I had a license I’d go and follow that train”. So, when I saw this steam engine heading down the tracks yesterday, my thought wasn’t “darn, I hope I’ll catch it later”, it was “OK! Boots on and off I go to catch this train!” I was so much of a hurry that I didn’t bother putting socks on and put the boots on my bare feet.

So, anyway, I get into the car, start it up, and head out of the driveway, dodging the trashcan which was almost in the middle of the driveway (I’d later find out that this was the week when our “G-Man” left his Christmas card, labelled “Happy Holiday’s”, but the card did say Merry Christmas), and down to the first photo spot, kind of keeping an eye on the smokestack from the train as I was going along.

I then got to the spot, and pulled completely off of the road (though not too far), and got out. I waited about a minute or two and then the train started to come around the corner, which was my prompt to start photographing. Here are a couple of shots that I took as it was approaching the crossing -

After that, it was on to the next location (where the photo at the top was taken) - at first I was going to stop by that crossing that you can see in the photo, but then I decided to go around to the next crossing. While on the way over there (which isn’t that long of a drive), a guy driving a green car with dealer plates came hurtling through a corner and we almost collided. However, I slammed on the brakes and he did as well, and all was well (even though my heart rate was slightly elevated).

I then pulled up behind an SUV with Illinois plates on it, and behind me a smaller SUV pulled up with Iowa plates on it - can you tell that word about these trips gets out nowadays?

But I digress; within a couple of minutes, the train came into sight and the folks who were there along with me started shooting, and about a minute later, it was all over, and it was time to move on for me.

I had a choice to make - either go to one more crossing to take a few more pictures, or just to head home with the photos I had already. I decided to go ahead and head to one last crossing. By far, this was the least populated crossing I stopped at - only the fella from Iowa was there, stopped on the other side of the tracks than I was. I grabbed a few more photos (one of which I put as my wallpaper straight after I got home, I liked it that much), including this one - the train steaming away onto its final destination.

Hmm…now if it was summer I think I could see myself heading out to some new photo locations other than my usual ones I’ve had for just about ever.

First off, yes, I am posting this after 4pm - it’s been a bit of a busy day these last couple of days, so I haven’t had a whole bunch of time on the computer.

We got a lot of random housework done (including putting all the VHS tapes into two shelves of a bookshelf, two deep), and over the weekend we should be getting a bit more done.

One of the projects that we’re working on is cutting a, well, bush which has turned into more of a sprawling tree back down to its size. Just as a gauge of how bad the tree is entangled in itself, I cut a branch that goes over my head apart. However, it didn’t fall, in fact it didn’t move at all. However, the next branch that gets cut will loosen both branches.

I’ve already run once to clear a falling branch, I can do it again. I hope.

I’ve talked about the fact that I live by the railroad, and that there is a box right here. In the last few days, they’ve been doing some work on the box apparently. The other day, I heard a train go through and the box announced the temperature as minus 42. Now, a crew truck has shown up in the same place that it had back in July and they’re doing some repairs to the box.

I say repairs because as there is a train going over the sensor, it put out an alert only seconds after the engines crossed over it. I think the fella manually turned it off to keep everyone from hearing the beeping for the duration of the train.

I’m heading out to walk now, since the train has a caboose on the end of it!

While reading through my Google Reader this morning, I spotted this item on Google Operating System, about the “new new Blogger”, called Blogger in draft. The first new feature is video uploading. So, here goes, with a clip of the CP2816, a steam engine, recorded two years ago from a public location.

Enjoy

In case the video doesn’t work, here’s a picture of the engine -

And now the video -

Since Snoskred has tagged me and anyone else who reads there (by the way, if you haven’t been there recently, take a look - she redid the look on there and it’s brilliant), here are my 6 weird things about myself. As far as tagging along the chain, I’m not entering into the politics of it either, so if you have a blog, feel free to do it; just leave a comment and I’ll note it here.

1) I’ve always been fascinated with, of all things, the phone book. I think this is based in the fact that my mother would bring old books home from time to time, usually because they were out-of-date. Even worse was when I’d go to the library and actively seek out the section of the reference section that had the out of town and out of state books. In fact, I still remember flipping through the Nashville phone book a few years ago and seeing all of the mobile phone providers (this was before everybody and their uncle had them; I didn’t get my first mobile until 2004, and I still have it); it seemed that they all had phone numbers ending in -2355 (-CELL for those who don’t have a phone in front of you ;)). Ironically, there are more phone books here now than there have been for a while. I’ll spare you the details of them though.

2) This is something that comes as a result of living next to railroad tracks for most of my life, but I am a railfan. In other words, I like to catch trains in sight, either just with my eyes, or with the camera. Probably the weirdest thing I ever did with this so far is going to Illinois for a railroad festival, only to find out that it had ended the previous day and all the displays were gone. I did, however, manage to get a picture of a train that day. From the driveway at home, obscured by trees.

3) Most folks, when they go out and travel, will take photos or buy a little trink et to mark their trip to that city. It could be a small spoon, or even a larger piece of memorabilia. However, if I am the person who is in charge of getting the trinkets, there is a great chance that I will return with a newspaper. I have a collection of a lot of papers from around the country, from the LA Times to the Washington Post. The thing is that this isn’t like just the front pages but the full paper for the actual day.

4) Another fascination I have is with the roads. Not just where they go and how you get there, but the signs that you see at the side of the road. Most folks would call me weird, but there is a term - roadgeek. I can spend hours looking at sites like AARoads or OzRoads. I’ve even gone so far as to email a photo of a sign and explain the significance of it (the sign is no longer there).

5) When I was young, I used to be scared of a jingle for one of our major insurance companies, American Family Insurance. It is a devilishy simple jingle that is just the name of the company sung out. Nevertheless, I was absolutely terrified of the advertisements. If I had to guess what the fear came from, it might have been the graphic they showed on screen at the end of the commercial - just the company’s logo along with the walking fingers for the yellow pages. Thankfully, I’m over that now.

6) This is probably the most unusual, so it fits perfectly. I have this odd tendency to daer sdrow sdrawkab, or read words backwards. This is another of those things that I just started doing and kinda never stopped. It doesn’t hurt anybody and I always do it just to myself. However, if you start hearing me saying redrum, it’s probably not because I’m thinking of its mirror.

Waiting at the post, originally uploaded by sephiroth.blog.

This is something that I don’t mention often, but I live about 50 feet from a major railroad, where trains can go by at speeds upto 60 miles per hour (approximately 97 km/h). Ironically, it was the rails that led me into two things - digital photography (the vast majority of my photos are of trains) and scanning.

Some of my photos are, admittedly, not the greatest in the world, but others, like this one, are pretty cool. I had taken a photo of this signal standard back in January with about the same lighting conditions, and I had been looking through my photos recently and found that picture. So, on Sunday (when I was Out and About) the train happened to be doing some work with switching its loads between side tracks and the such. I actually waited for a while (because I had my handheld scanner with me, I had some clue as to what they were doing) until they got the front end of the engine right where I wanted it.

The best part is that they stopped right where you see the engine - in the perfect spot for me

I’ll be digging through my train photos to find some of the best (and even some of the not-so-good ones) ones to post here