The Train Bush

Just south of the RV park we're staying at are some railroad tracks. Once in a while, a train goes by.

Relative to some we've experienced, these are quiet, mostly; far enough away so we can hear a low rumble of the engine and, when they approach the nearest intersection, the whistle is not annoying.

Yesterday, a big long train came by. It came by slow. And slowed down some more. And stopped. It stopped right across the intersection.

This was a long train. Both ends extended past the point where I could see it, behind a hill on one end and behind some building on the other.

Must have been a guy had to go.

That's the thing about working on trains. You have to map out the bushes, so you know when you're approaching one. Because when you have to go, you have to plan for the stop.

If you wait until the bush is visible, you're going too fast to stop. You must know where they are, ahead of time, so you can slow down and and be stopped just as you get to the bush.

The intersection is more or less just a town street, not a thoroughfare. Even so, there was a block's length of stopped traffic before the train started moving again. Must have been a dump.

That's the thing about working on trains. You have to to plan ahead. There is no such thing as "when you gotta go, you gotta go." It's more like "when you think you might have to go in the near future, it's time to consult the map."

Slow Children

Driving the RV along on red roads, one drives through a small town now and then.

("Red road" being paved highways, 2-lane, less trafficked than freeways or expressways. On our maps, these 2-lane highways are drawn with a red color.)

A certain sign seems to have taken a hold of the local governments' imagination. I see it in lots of towns.

It's a rectangular sign, yellow/orangeish background, with the word "Slow," then a silhouette of a long-legged child running, with large strides. Below that is the word "Children."

I think they should change the silhouette. That running child doesn't look very slow to me. A silhouette of a child just shuffling along would be more appropriate. Or change the wording on the sign to "Fast Children."

How Map Makers Make More Money

Mari and I were driving down the road, a freeway, no less, intending to exit at a certain town. Mari was reading the map.

Let me tell you how it was.

The exit for Orionburg was printed on the map as exit 263.

Well, there was no exit 263.

In fact, the Orionburg exit was about 20 miles back. We had driven right past it.

(Don't say we should have noticed it. We weren't looking for it 20 minutes before we should have been there!)

It's clear what happened.

It's another of those cases where map makers conspire with communities and highway departments to obsolete their maps.

I don't know how much they pay them, but I hope it's plenty. One would think moving a whole community 20 miles toward the south would entail quite a bit of expense. Removing the freeway exit is paid for by taxpayer money, of course.

Or maybe the community did it for the thrill of it and the perk of imagining the faces of all the people they fooled.

We'll probably end up buying another map.

But it gripes. One doesn't feel all jolly inside when one is taken advantage of, and there is nothing one can do about it, all for someone else's profit.