Well, it's 2am and i have had a heck of a day. I cant sleep, so I figure I'll blog about one of the worst days I have ever had.

This day was prefaced with the death of my 90 something old grandma dying a couple days ago. It is sad, but she's been wanting to die for a long time. She is now with my grandpa, who preceded her in death. She was a sweet woman.

Anyway, my grandma died. the funeral was set for the 21st at 10 oclock in the morning. I had it all worked out that me and my four year old daughter were going to drive up to worland, where the funeral is, and have a fun time and maybe teach her a little about death and what happens to you when you die. Well, I only have one functional vehicle so I borrow my dad's car, which he drove to rawlins to drop off earlier today.

So I get home from work at about noon, pack up all my stuff and all leah's stuff, and we are on the road, baby. To get from rawlins to worland you have to take US 287 north. It's not a very good road, but hey, what do you do. I've been to worland a few times but I am a little fuzzy on the exact way how to get there. I have a handy dandy gps navaigation system I just bought which should help me on my way. (make note of that because that gps comes in later in the story) Me and Leah drive towards worland and she is watching dvds in the back seat and everything is great. My dad's old car is great too, aside from a noise coming from somewhere. I get past muddy gap and the gps tells me to take a left. I take a left. I am on the right road. How did we ever live without gps? I'm going down the road and leah is asleep. her head is drooped over and she is totally snoring.

I am almost to riverton when my gps tells me to take a left onto a dirt road. What the freak? Why is it telling me to go on a dirt road? Well, it was a very nice dirt road so i took it. it said to go two miles and then turn right. whatever. Here i go. well the road got worse. And Worse. I realized I was in trouble. the mud on the road was getting thick and my car was getting bogged down. To make a short story long, I got my dads car very very stuck in some sticky mud. Leah woke up and was a little concearned when i had trouble opening my door. There was a lot of mud.

I took a minute and assessed the severity of my situation. I'm screwed. We are a mile from the road, which is barely travelled probably even on the fourth of july. I have no signal on my cell phone which is about to die anyway. Leah told me I shouldnt have gotten our car stuck. she is so cute. I get out of the car and decide to walk the mile to the road. I had about 3 hours till dusk.

I get leah out of the car and it is muddy as all hell. i am muddy to my ankles in my brand new white sneakers (I was trying to keep them clean to look good.) I am not going to let my little girl get dirty so I pick her up and start for the road. Leah suggested we pray to jesus so he could help us. I prayed and asked for help. I had a hard time standing up because of the mud. it took a little while but we got to the road. We were standing by the road for all of two minutes and the huge diesel dodge ram came upon us, which I flagged down. There was a woman in it and she stopped. She got out of the truck and shook my hand. She asked leah her name and leah said: "My name is Leah and I have a baby sister!!!" This lady, Jeneen, shook leah's hand and offered to get my car unstuck. Is this for real? Did I say a prayer and get an answer like this?

As we drove to the car Jeneen told me she was LDS and from Dubois. We talked for a while and then we came up on the stuck car. we were going to have to pull it out from the rear, but the mud was so bad we werent going to be able to do it. this truck was making noise and throwing rooster tails of mud. I was afraid 3 different times that this big diesel truck was going to get stuck. Leah started crying so I held her. I held my baby and she stopped crying.My car is no longer silver. It is brown. I better wash this car before my dad sees it

Me and jeneen decide to go to riverton where she would get me further help. It is only a couple miles away. Her truck is covered in mud. I have to call my wife and my dad and a tow truck. I stop at a large gas station and start looking in the phone book for a tow truck. You know what? at least a dozen other people, including Jeneen, whip out their cell phones and phone books and called every freaking tow truck place from lander to thermopolis. They were calling their brothers and their uncles and anyone else they knew with a truck. the girls were playing with leah and it was a beautiful thing. But you know what? there wasn't a single tow truck that had four wheel drive, much less a policy that would let them leave the road.

About this time I call my wife, and she is upset. She is so mad at me. She is worried that leah is not safe. My wife is crying and is spitting nails she is so mad at me.I had bought leah a big lollypop and a bottle of water. She is safe and happpy and never out of my sight. I know how to keep my little girl safe. Jeneen suggested I call the sherriff and have them get me out. But first she drops me and leah off at a motel, because it is after dark now, and leah needs to go to bed. I was for sure I was missing the funeral, but my cousin is coming down to get me and leah at 7. The sherriff is going to activate their search and rescue unit to get my car out in the morning. they will drive it into town for me and when i get back from the funeral we can just drive home. So now it's 2am and i'm sitting here on my bed next to my snoring baby. Let's see if tomorrow can be better than today.

Earlier today I was deadheading home from green river on a train. Usually they give us a van and they drive us home. Today It was snowing like crazy and the roads were horrible, so we road on a train bound for North Platte. When you deadhead on a train the whole idea is to sleep as much of the way as possible. We were lucky today, it only took four hours to go to Rawlins. That's an awesome time.

Anyway, somewhere near wamsutter, my engineer, sitting in the engineer's seat, knocked the air brake lever and threw the train into emergency. (we were riding on the third unit). This woke us both up and he immediately realized what he did and felt really bad. The train came to a screeching halt and we heard the conductor on the radio calling out our situation. The crew thought they had separated an air hose, since we had just gone over a road crossing bunched. Louie, my engineer, radioed the fireman and told him what he had just done. We recovered our air and we took off, laughing at louie. It was funny.

So the other day in Green river a fellow conductor stole a guys wallet and then went shopping with his credit cards. within hours they tracked him down and went after him at the motel that all of us stay at. they hauled him off and apparently didn't let him get dressed. All he had on was his tighty whiteys and they arrested him and took him to jail. He might lose his job over it, not to mention going to jail.

That's not the funny part. The funny part is hearing the rumors ab out it from other railroaders. I heard everything from stuff of homosexuality to stories about the fbi with other railroaders. You have to understand. The railroad is like a group of old ladies. gossip gets out of control and you don't know what to believe. The railroad grapevine is like no other!

I'm Back!!

Well, as of the first part of september, I'm back to work. I was pretty discouraged in my last post. It got ugly, and I was out of work on and off for nearly a year. Being cut off really sucks. It's humiliating and embarrassing. But, I'm okay and making money. I was cut off for less than a week a little bit ago but was quickly put b ack to work.

The railroad is turning nicely right now and I am loving it. I just got a five percent raise and I'm making some good money. I just missed fireman training this time, but a guy with seniority this sucky can't expect to get that kind of stuff.

I'm going to post scary situations and near death experiences on this blog, hopefully i can stay employed for as long as possible.

Sick of the Railroad

I lost my job with the railroad today. I don't like the railroad anymore. I have a college degree, maybe I could do something with that, worthless though it is. Stupid railroad.

My railroad wife

My wife has been very supportive since I started with the railroad in 2006. She likes the retirement plan and everything. She doesn't mind the job either I guess, I'm gone half the time when I'm working. She doesn't even complain when money is tight, she doesn't get discouraged when I come home and tell her I'm cut off again. She is always there. I'm the one that doesn't have the patience so she ends up putting up the the railroad and me at the same time. She's like a rock. If I didn't have her I would be up a creek. Sometimes I don't treat her like a should, so she pipes up. She doesnt' care what the railroad is doing and she shows tremendous strength with everything. She won't tolerate being mistreated though. Come on. a person can only stand so much, right? She's my railroad wife though, so she needs some consideration, some love, and understanding. She really doesn't ask for much.

The railroad is notorious for breaking up marriages. When I got hired they asked us if we were married, and the ones that answered in the affirmative they asked if they were happy. They said if your marriage sucks now, it will end with the railroad. I know guys that have been married six times or more! I don't want that to be me. I think if I lost my sweetie it would make my life very dark indeed.

If you've read my other posts you'll soon find out how frustrating detectors can be on the railroad. One time we got hit by a detector that said we had dragging equipment 18 cars back. I wouldn't have minded, but our train happened to be on a very steep hill. So steep, that I had to hold on to the cars as I went back to keep myself from falling about 150 feet through sage brush almost straight down to a big thing of mud. I started back, making my way to that stupid car. About halfway there I got brave and thought it would be faster to just walk. No sooner had I let go of a car that I tripped and fell down the hill into the mud. (It was snowing, and 2am). My engineer had seen it happen and laughed at me on the radio. So I walked in the mud until i could see the 18th car, and then I started to climb up the hill, grabbing sagebrush to pull myself up, in knee high snow. I was thinking to myself that there better be something wrong with this car or i'm going to freak. Well, I got up the the car, and upon inspecting it thoroughly, there was absolutely nothing wrong with it. I was disappointed, but relieved that I didn't have to deal with any problems.

Now I had the problem of getting back to the unit without taking all day. The engineer said I could walk between the two tracks and that he would tell me if a train was coming so I could get out of the way. I got on the other side of my train and started to walk between the two tracks. Keep in mind that if a train came while I was walking, it would pass within 3 feet of my train.

When I was about 200 feet away from the head end of my train, I saw another train bearing down on me coming in the opposite direction. Knowing I didn't have time to run up there, I had to lay down on my belly right next to my train and wait for the other train to go by. It was going pretty fast and loud, and I was scared, but it went by and I finished walking up the the front of my train.