Jockeying For Position and Doing A Bit of Railroading To Boot

17 Mar 2020.post update

The Zeph, Amtrak #6, was seen pulling a consist and re-arrangement of normal car order. The usual car behind the second engine is the mail car. Today, it was at the end being the 8th car, not the normal 11 in the consist.

American Coot. Best know for the baseball farm team that is known by its name---The Toledo Mud Hens [1]

Two years ago a squirrel jumped from this plant and knocked seed onto the brim of my fedora. That seed, today has come up in one of my flower pots on the porch and is about two feet tall. It's looking good, healthy and I hope that it blooms this fall just like mom! We will see. And my trees in pots are now about 7 feet tall and have never looked so good. I didn't even give them a dose of my Vitamins this year. That shot two falls ago is still showing results. Originally, I had thought that the bottle was Centrum but looking more closely at the front of the bottle rather than the back ingrediant label, I discovered that it was Mature Multi from Member's Mark. That's Sam's Club brand label like Costco's Kirkland brand. All I know is that it worked better on my trees than it did me! Ha!

So what is so strange about that. Well, First of all it's the Zeph. Secondly, one must remember that the US Mint is in San Francisco. Thirdly, The train also stops in Denver on its way east to Chicago. Guess what? There is also a US Mint in Denver. So, by deduction and past history, The US Mint ships coins from San Francisco and Denver to Chicago. The Zeph ends in Chicago but the Lake Shore Limited starts in Chicago and ends in Boston.Also in Chicago, the Amtrak route can split off the Limited to go southeast, south, and guess what, it has covered all the districts of the Federal Reserve. I love watching trains more than airplanes. The term used when things like this happen is Railroading. The train line is doing a bit of Railroading....that's switching from this track to that track or in layman terms, jockeying around for position to get where it needs to be.

When I was a kid, the little town where I grew up (pop. 1498) had a train station that still carried passengers. I would ride my bike down the hill from where I lived to the station and sit and watch the trains come and go. The first thing that I remember that was the show stopper was seeing a casket taken from the baggage car,placed on one of the old rail carts that were used for luggage, and then, pulled around the train station to a ramp and a waiting hearse of the local funeral director. It was a treasure hunt the rest of the summer and summers that came after that.

There was a nomenclature for that happening that afternoon. It was called the Pullman Express. Funny thing about that was that years later, I was at an airport and watched the ramp rats (not a derogatory term use) bring a casket around and load onto the plane that I would be my flight. It was the second time and second mode of transportation that I had witnessed  human remains being shipped elsewhere. Even later, I knew a funeral director that called the meeting of a plane with a human remains the "Tampa Express". It was a term that meant that instead of the family calling the funeral home where they would have the funeral rite and burial to handle the return of the remains, they would called the funeral home where the death occurred and have the loved one shipped in a casket back home, costing the family hundreds of dollars more than needed. It was snowbirds being sent home and the Florida funeral directors were the winners.

That is when it clicked that business commerce was what made the world turn so to speak. It had me in its grips and over the years, it just gets in your blood and you love every minute of it in the long and the short of career terms.

To this day, I still enjoy watching trains come and go and doing their "railroading". So seeing the less than normal consist of cars and the out-of-position of cars, is an eye catching experience, much like photography that trains your eyes to pick up on things that the average Joe misses.



[1]
The American coot (Fulica americana), also known as a mud hen or pouldeau, is a bird of the family Rallidae.
Thanks to the Cornell Lab's, All About Birds https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/American_Coot/lifehistory

Mail Truck, a Pumper and a Zephyr

This is a story about a U.S. Mail truck. The same kind you see going up and down neighborhood streets, or parked behind the local post office branch in your town or neighborhood. Nothing unusual about that. The other is a full size red fire truck. The same kind you see at your local fire station and a historic Zephyr east bound (6) and west bound (5) from California to Lake Michigan. and the Windy City.

About a month ago, when all the nesting hawks, ospreys, owls and eagles had fledged their nest, most of the web cams were turned off for the balance of the year. The experts say that it only takes 30 days of doing something routinely before it becomes a habit. And, yes, after the birds were gone from the nest, it was more difficult to find a good web cam to watch. The resorts are rather dumb. The airports pan to much and don't focus on the action stuff. The scenic sites are no where near as good as a good IMAX movie so those are out. Then, I'm thinking, my  like for watching trains is still active. Why not look for live web cams of trains coming and going. It didn't take long before I had found  a link to some pretty neat train cams. Freight trains are good because they are made up of all kinds of cars. Then, there are coal trains that are hopper car after hopper car after hopper car for more than a mile. At least watching a container train you get variety. Twenty-footers, forty footers, red ones, blues ones, green ones, white ones, rusty ones and once  in a while a slip deck that is all open on the bottom except where the container sits on rockers.Those are unusual and can be rather interesting.

But, the best part was that an Amtrak came through twice a day. It runs from  Emeryville, California to Chicago. It's known east bound as the California Zephyr No. 6 and its known west bound as the California Zephyr No. 5. The little thing to remember here is that I have actually ridden this train. It was a delight years ago and I have a deep yearning to do it again. However, there is not an arrive time but there is a departure time. The reason for that is that Amtrak shares the Union Pacific  tracks through the mountains to Denver and shares the tracks with Burlington Northern Santa Fe from Denver to Chicago. And where that happens, one must remember that freight revenue over passengers is always Trump (nothing to do with the elections, thank goodness). However, being a good student of transportation, it didn't take long to get the system down to where you could be more accurate than the station boards.
 The west bound is always able to make up 7 minutes, so if the station boards say that the train is running 32 minutes late, he will actually only be twenty-five minutes late. You also learn that it takes on that section of track 1 hour to go from point A to point B. So when you do the calculations--which my train friends call "railroading", you can actually plan, go put away the dishes  or start dinner or load the dishwasher and not miss  seeing the cool blue and gray engines pulling  the 9 cars, sometimes, even twelve or thirteen. The eighth car is always the dining car. One of the coolest cars on the train. Amtrak does carry certified chefs on board that actually prepare the meals. The week before Labor Day, he was pulling 12 cars. Even had a  club car one day and a scenic vista car one day. He also had an old private Pullman car, which is the way to travel for sure. Those cars are fantastic and private. They are of the vintage of presidential campaign cars where you see the bunting on the back deck and the candidate waving to the crowds! A rather romantic version of a time gone by and most unfortunate it only survives sporadically. At one time, you could have the railroad pull your car anywhere for a dollar a mile. Still cheaper today than a private jet, flight crew, but certainly more  laid back and enjoyable than a jet.  That's for sure.

So, in this little town seen via web cam, there are two gas stations on a very wide and well planned out street corner just up from the rail station. The stations face the cross streets with their "C" store operations  and their pumps in this beehive California town.  The town is up in the Sierra Nevada Mountains  and is a typical vacation spot for camping, skiing, boating, hiking, back-packing, hotel and restaurant fans along with daily local activities.

So, a couple of days ago, this mail truck pulled into the one station that is more for the townies than the other one. The other:  a name brand station and people off the interstate. Travelers can use their brand credit cards there. But, generally, the business is pretty equal but weighted to the local station 3:2. It's  judged by the number of fill ups ordered up by the station more than anything else. I was a bit shocked to see a mail truck getting gas at a local gas station but when you think about where this is, it probably make more sense than maintaining a tank and dispensing facility at the post office. Plus, maybe you don't want that around the trucks or what ever.

Two days after seeing the first mail truck come in to get gas, a second mail truck came in to the station across the street. Being struck as funny, I said out loud, "Oh, look at that, an equal opportunity gas pumper!"  Two days later, the mail truck was in at the local station again.

Today, while getting gas at my Kroger gas station, I was pulling in to my regular side that had no one at either pumps, but the middle and far right pumps were full. So, not being a total jerk, I pulled up allowing someone to come in behind me normally instead of having to jockey around to get to the empty pump. As I was getting out of the car, this big red fire truck pulled in and was going around the station. Not to worry. He must be doing an inspection or something I though, until he pulled up right behind me. In my many decades of filling up my car, I have never had a fire truck pull up behind me, get out of the truck and do the same routine that I'm doing. The fireman walked up to the door of his truck after beginning his fill up. I said to the fireman, that," I had seen on a web cam that I watch trains on, a mail truck get gas at one station and then go across the street the next time to the other station and get gas and I had called him an equal opportunity gas pumper. When I saw you pull in it reminded me of that! I had to chuckle." He acknowledged the humor.

Upon leaving the station the thought occurred to me that no one is going to believe me that I had just gassed up at Kroger's next to a full size fire pumper. So I went back to get a shot. As I was driving on to the lake to see if the pelicans had arrived ( and they had)  another thought occurred to me that they shop at Kroger's and like anyone else, get fuel points too.  I wondered if they do, indeed, get full points for diesel. So, long story shot, I have seen another equal opportunity pumper for real and this one really was a pumper.

Equal Opportunity Fuel Points!

The Pelicans have returned and greeted by the turtles

100 cars of this is rather boring. Seeing 8 engines pull a mile long train over the mountains wasn't.

24/09/2016:edited for clarity

Funny Thing About Businesss

While I am not a big fan of gossip television shows, I do enjoy the spots were they talk about the massive houses of the stars that are up for sale, sold and re-sold and re-sold. You see the point. Real Estate changes hands daily but there are certain landmarks that age with a history of it own. I read the stories in the New York Times, LA Times, Miami Herald  and others about the sales and the storied past that goes with the article.

Recently,  the story of El Fureidis, 631 Para Grande Lane, Montecito,California appeared.

Even this A-380 can move a house or a steel coil Funny Thing About Business

It is one of those homes with a long storied past and an architects dream floor plan. It is the fabled home known as the Old Scarface Mansion. The house was listed for a mere $35 million but was marked down to $17.9. Roughly, a half price sale.

That article got me to thinking. Again. The real estate market can be a fickle business. The instability in the market and especially to the attachments and/or affections of its owners, move houses and also let them sit on the market, sometimes for years. While I was doing all that thinking, the eureka point finally materialized this morning as I was pouring my first cup of coffee. The real estate market is just like the steel business. If these two businesses are not twins, they most certainly are brothers and sisters to each other.

Over the years, I can recall one coil of steel sitting in a super large warehouse down off Jefferson in the old warehouse section of near Downtown Detroit. The coil sat in one bay, right on the corner of a cross isle were trucks would pull inside to load under an overhead crane. Nothing so unusual about that at first glance except, that the coil had been produced at the River Rouge Plant of Ford Motor Company's steel plant, which at the time was the 9th largest steel mill in the world. Another thing about those coils were that they were massive for steel coils, with 60 OD and weighing in 48,000 pounds. I have seen some that hit the 50,000 pound mark. The point being is that in the coil world, a coil that size is like having a 7-foot 6-inch center on a basketball team of 5-foot 8-inch players. It stood out like a sore thumb.

As I would walk through the warehouse, I would look at the tag. The names on the tag was always different. The coil had not moved an inch on the floor of the warehouse but the tag information told a whole different story. Going into the office and pulling up the information on the tag would bring up the coil sale price. That was where the story came about.

Sale 1

The coil came into the warehouse at a price of $18.00 per cwt (hundred weight). It sat for several months. Tag change. The coil now was sold to a steel company in Chicago for $13.00 cwt but the coil remained in the warehouse with a new tag showing the new owner.

Sale 2

Several more months went by and there was another tag change. The coil had been sold to a steel broker in Cleveland, Ohio at $15.00 per cwt. Once again, the steel coil never moved out of the warehouse.  At this point you are thinking that someone should be charging rent on that thing. Well someone did. The warehouse collected the rent fee. The typical rent went like this: $1.00 in;$1.00 on; $1.00 out. That translates to one dollar per cwt when the coil came into the warehouse. One dollar per cwt added on each month of storage and one dollar per cwt when the coil shipped out of the warehouse. Does not sound like much but there are no expenses. The storage bay can be under roof for more than a quarter mile, It's hot in the summer It's cold in the winter. The lights are provided by the day and at night it is a place where  horror movies sometimes got filmed.

Sale 3

The coil had another tag change. This time, nearly two years later, the coil was sold back to the original owner by the broker in Cleveland. The price was entered as $ 17.00 cwt. The original owner had repurchased the original coil, that he had sold to a Chicago warehouse at 13.00 cwt, for $17.00 per cwt. In essence loosing $5.00 cwt the first sale and spending $13.00 to repurchase. That is, if the original owner really did have $18.00 per cwt in the coil when the coil came into the warehouse the first time. Chances are he purchased the coil either from River Rouge or from a broker at $7 to $8.00 per cwt. Things like that happen in the steel business.

It's time to also mention that financial market conditions, supply and demand in the steel business, production at the mills, imports, exports, the automotive industry, the metal furniture business, the appliance industry all played a part in the sale of steel coils sitting in a warehouse owned by steel distribution centers, steel warehouses, steel brokers, individual fabricators, contractors and who knows who else excluding the scrap dealer.

The final sale

The shipping tag was finally placed on the coil some 5-years post arrival. It shipped to a steel ware house/service center near Richmond,Indiana where it was used in a small stamping plant that hammered out pieces for a metal casket company. The coil was a good buy at the time for both the seller and the end user.

So, in the long haul or in the short haul, steel coils sit as the unglamorous sisters of the real estate market. The are much the same, while being their own beast. The steel salesman, the warehouse owner, broker all have brothers in the real estate market. In the family of business every thing is much the same.

It was not so strange to find  steel industry people in a Federal Golf League; a bunch of steel salesmen, warehouse owners, steel processors playing golf weekly with partners that were FBI, IRS, US Customs, Postal Inspectors, US Attorneys,US Marshall's. My partner, Barney, was IRS, God Rest His Soul. As it turned out, Barney was the best golf coach I ever had. He even knew my neighbor, an attorney husband and wife that both worked for the IRS.

Funny thing about business.

20 July 2015 edit to change type points and take out a sentence to combine with another for clarity.

Shinola Detroit

If you haven't yet heard about Shinola Detroit, like me, you have missed a lot. It was by accident that I stumbled upon the most amazing shop to open in the Dallas area in sometime. Oh, Uptown has some interesting shops. The upscale malls have their gig as well, but even when you are outside,looking in, the romance of the Shinola Detroit shop draws you in. The gravity pull is a delight because once inside, you are not disappointed. Not even the slightest.

The staff were friendly, warm and welcoming. There wasn't that bottom-line mentality, although with this fairly new start up in major cities, the bottom-line mentality does come into play. The shop is spacious. Floor space is airy and vaulted. The 38-star American Flag, which probably should be in the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn hangs respectfully from the second floor to the first floor with only inches to spare. I was informed that the owner is willing to sell the flag to a collector. It should not be a hard sale.

The shop is unique because the products are all made in American and if not made in Detroit, they are at least assembled there. Those familiar with Detroit will recognize the Midtown Cass Corridor near Wayne State University.  Bikes, watches and leather goods seem to make up the collection in the store that I discovered in downtown Plano.It was the bicycles that caught my eye because I am of the generation when those bikes were common place. One of the staff explained the watch and when I ask about the clothing in the one-story room, the explanation was once again delivered with class and dignified explanation. In short, this shop; this concept; this product line; this desire to announce that you were fanning out from the once great, yet declining and mismanaged city that  lost nearly half its original population of over a million proud people and yet stands ready again for greatness, is not only gutsy, its a quality American greatness was built upon. Hip.Hip Hurrah. Hip,Hip Hurrah. Hip,Hip Hurrah, for Shinola Detroit. May you grow and be well rewarded for your courage.

One of the store windows at Shinola Detroit.

Remembering United Flight 232 on this Day 23 years ago.

The following is a comment posted today in response to an article about teenage vandalizing of the United 232 Memorial in Sioux City.




It's always hard to lose a close friend. I lost one on United 232.The number of times I have seen the video of the plane tumbling down the runway in an orange ball of fire is vividly imprinted on my mind to this day. George was on his way home to his high school reunion. We would have been in the same high school but a new school was build and a line drawn in the sand. George stayed at the old high school and I went to the new one. We knew the same friends, we went to college together. Over the years we didn't stay in touch though not as much as we should have but we still thought of each other as friends. In high school I had four close friends. Over time, they have passed one,by one. Three in accidents, one of a nasty cancer. I've also lost a son who at 27 was in his prime of life having done everything right. Over the years, this date, this crash, this United 232 has come to be the anniversary of my friends and my son.My son came through Sioux City with his grandmother en route to my niece's wedding in Nebraska just a year before his death. Sioux City is so dear to me. Life is somewhat odd how various parts of life meet as in its own reunion or wedding. The people of Sioux City remember a terrible plane accident. I remember the loss of a very good friend who seems to call out once a year that the Sioux City Reunion Club is calling the membership to order. Grief is slowly turning into healing though the losses still show as scars in my soul, but pain is growing less severe. Thank you Sioux City for being the guardian of a bigger memorial than you can ever know you watch over.

Thanks to Amy Hynde at the Sioux City Journal for taking care of a technical problem earlier in the day.
www.siouxcityjournal.com