Toot, Toot, Four

Riding the rails

Or

Riding the Rails

It is amazing how quickly a train can move along, then crawl at a snail’s pace when climbing.  It is also amazing how comforting it is to know it does not matter.  However, I wish I had thought to bring a book or two, to help while away the time.  Dinner was quite good, in addition to the stew; we also each had an apple, and some crackers, too.  Linda was not too thrilled, didn’t know she was not fond of stew.  Whine, whine, whine. Tomorrow I think shopping will be her assignment.  Cleaning up after dinner, we were being lulled by the rocking of the car (kind of like a side-ways rocking chair) and getting ready for sleep, when the sound of a harmonica broke the silence.  It was Tall Dude, he’s not much of a talker, but, whoa doggies, he is outstanding when it comes to bringing a heart-break song to life on his harmonica.  We were all spellbound, the concert was beautiful.  Tall Dude was so cute, was kind of “aw shucks” and digging his toe in the ground with all the praise we gave him.  Was talking to Marie this afternoon, and we are going to try to come up with some kind of a stove.  Trouble is we can’t have a fire in the car, and we couldn’t possibly cook in the Yard, so maybe we’ll have to find community parks and have a cooked meal during the day, if we happen to have layover time when we stop.  Mostly, I miss a good hot cup of coffee.  Looking forward to the ‘sticky buns’ for breakfast.

Okay, I admit, I was freaked out.  I didn’t know Cheyenne and Lincoln were only 300+ miles apart,  so when we pulled in to Lincoln during the night and train began to go back and forth, and seemed to be switching tracks…I did have a ‘not so good’ reaction.  Thank goodness for Ernie.  He  explained to us this is not unusual, that we were moving to a ‘Hold Track’, which generally meant either another train needed to use our track, or perhaps we were waiting for some cars from a train that had not arrived yet.  He said we should be as quite as possible because a “Yard Dick” and “Yard Foreman” would be coming by to check the train.  Have you ever had to keep a bunch of dogs from barking?   Oh---my---gosh!  Not easy, but somehow we survived the inspection.  We overheard them talking and it seems we have to wait for a train to arrive from Canada with some cars filled with grain and we won’t be leaving until late tonight.  Wonderful, finally a chance for all of us to get a few hot meals, and some cheap rooms to clean up.  For now, it’s back to sleep.