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Jan. 3rd, 2023 10:13 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
scrottieBrambletrack again has me on a bus, this time due to system delays and an excessively late Empire Builder. Fallout from the ironically named "precision scheduling" of the private tracks they run on seems to be leading to more and more of this. Precision scheduling refers to employees being almost always on call, having to be there within an hour or else getting fired, even while they're massively understaffed, not to any precision in scheduling actual trains.
Bus is so quiet. People will be chatting latter after being on here a while, but buses full of Minnesotans quietly reading is a thing I'm fond of. It's snowing. Everything is white.
One of the Christmas rail engineer stories was of a plough detail with two engines. Each engine had its own crew. They'd get going as fast they could and hit banks of windblown drift snow, which are reportedly *hard*, and lose almost all of their speed. The engines would shake violently. The second engine kept dumping its emergency brakes when the shaking shook the emergency brake "anglecock" loose, making it that much harder to get up enough speed again. The crew in the first engine was mad at the crew in the second engine and were begging them to tape it or wire it open or just stand there and hold it or something. Another snow story, of getting stuck in a blizzard and being rescued by heavy construction equipment, they couldn't get the crew out of the front door, snow was backed in so deep and hard. They had to dig them out of the rear.
I was reminded that part of my independent streak comes from my mother's chaotic attempts at organizing things, that have in the past left me stranded at friends house she dumped me on to offload childcare, and once, in a whole other town. Long walks and city bus trips are often much faster and always less chaotic.
Amtrak didn't check my luggage yet so I was carrying the big box 'o Christmas up to the platform level then down to the bus. The ticket agent was also the gate agent. There are no "red caps". The bathroom was closed. Unlike the dirty dog, there are enough buses to get everyone on. There are power outlets.
Gabe the old man cat got more or less a line cut. Groomer said it can be like doing surgery than that it was like doing surgery. Big mats removed, no nicks, big tip. Gabe was making the biggest grumpy face when I picked him up but he didn't yell once on the ride home. Maybe he knew the ordeal was over and that's what he was upset about on the way there. Cat groomer was an absolute saint (deities don't get saints but animals do). My father needs help too. During the height of the eviction crisis, more than a little selfishly, I was trying to recruit someone to go live with him, room and board paid. That didn't work and now I'm not sure what to do for him.
Think R suggested hiring a task rabbit for my mother. Having the cat brushed for an hour once a week makes a lot of sense but my mother would either miss the appointment or else ask the task rabbit to do a large number of other things instead. Maybe I'll try it.
Bus is so quiet. People will be chatting latter after being on here a while, but buses full of Minnesotans quietly reading is a thing I'm fond of. It's snowing. Everything is white.
One of the Christmas rail engineer stories was of a plough detail with two engines. Each engine had its own crew. They'd get going as fast they could and hit banks of windblown drift snow, which are reportedly *hard*, and lose almost all of their speed. The engines would shake violently. The second engine kept dumping its emergency brakes when the shaking shook the emergency brake "anglecock" loose, making it that much harder to get up enough speed again. The crew in the first engine was mad at the crew in the second engine and were begging them to tape it or wire it open or just stand there and hold it or something. Another snow story, of getting stuck in a blizzard and being rescued by heavy construction equipment, they couldn't get the crew out of the front door, snow was backed in so deep and hard. They had to dig them out of the rear.
I was reminded that part of my independent streak comes from my mother's chaotic attempts at organizing things, that have in the past left me stranded at friends house she dumped me on to offload childcare, and once, in a whole other town. Long walks and city bus trips are often much faster and always less chaotic.
Amtrak didn't check my luggage yet so I was carrying the big box 'o Christmas up to the platform level then down to the bus. The ticket agent was also the gate agent. There are no "red caps". The bathroom was closed. Unlike the dirty dog, there are enough buses to get everyone on. There are power outlets.
Gabe the old man cat got more or less a line cut. Groomer said it can be like doing surgery than that it was like doing surgery. Big mats removed, no nicks, big tip. Gabe was making the biggest grumpy face when I picked him up but he didn't yell once on the ride home. Maybe he knew the ordeal was over and that's what he was upset about on the way there. Cat groomer was an absolute saint (deities don't get saints but animals do). My father needs help too. During the height of the eviction crisis, more than a little selfishly, I was trying to recruit someone to go live with him, room and board paid. That didn't work and now I'm not sure what to do for him.
Think R suggested hiring a task rabbit for my mother. Having the cat brushed for an hour once a week makes a lot of sense but my mother would either miss the appointment or else ask the task rabbit to do a large number of other things instead. Maybe I'll try it.
