Sidetracked Sunday Sermon

[Jimbaux’s got discipline, baby, whether you do or not.]

Ah, yes, and I want to thank The Cajun Porkchop for turning me on to Gangstarr some years ago.  It being St. Patrick’s Day in New Orleans, I spent plenty of time with the Porkchop and some of his pals yesterday, and I even, brace yourself, went to the French Quarter!  It’s at least a year since I’ve been there, I think.  I generally avoid it, but I somehow ended up there last night!

I Got Discipline, Baby, And I Use It A Lot

On this somewhat glorious Sunday morning, I chose to watch CBS Sunday Morning, which incorrectly defined the term “foamer” as overly enthusiastic train passenger, in its entirety instead of going foaming, meaning that my pictures today suffer from a little bit of high sun that I’m still having trouble accepting has returned.  Yeah, I’m finally paying for television service once again, though I’m not sure how much longer I can take of this.  I can’t turn on CNN without being pissed off at its mind-sucking stupidity, and, no, for those of you who are wondering, I don’t even bother looking at FoxNews; maybe I should, since I’ve largely forgotten how much it sucks.

After both Charles Osgood and Bob Schieffer signed off, I decided I’d make a little trip to the gym, where I hadn’t been in a month ever since this sickness stupidity started, preceded by professional stupidity that thankfully has finally come to and end thanks to my decision to simply finally walk away and pursue opportunities, but that’s another story for another time.  For now, we’ll see what I saw while I was on my way to and from the gym.

Sidetracked

I hadn’t taken a picture on the western part of the New Orleans Public Belt Railway in a really long time (actually, I did one a few weeks ago, though I haven’t published it and likely will not do so), but Kansas City Southern Railway train M-SHCX with a fresh NOPB crew gave me a chance to do just that, ironic since I spent so much time in this part of town yesterday.

The M-SHCX is a solid interchange train for the CSX in New Orleans that KCS builds in its Shreveport yard with a few pickups along the way, including Baton Rouge.  Here it is by Dublin Avenue along the river.

Y’all remember back in football practice when we were teenagers that the coaches used to make us do those “lateral” drills where we moved sideways like as if we were crabs? that drill that’s really good for linebackers and safetys?  Well, sickness, not being at the gym or working out much for the last month, and the inevitable aging haven’t taken away Jimbaux’s ability to do that, as he did that almost the whole way as he was snapping other pictures (that you’ll never see) between the one above and this one below:

Now, that’s something I’ve never done before.  I hope that you like the dwarf signal thing.  Part of the reason why I don’t shoot much here is that it gets a bit boring with the straight track, and the lighting is tricky with all of the bright ballast.

While the M-SHCX was passing, a really long westbound NOPB train behind all three of its GP40s came on the westbound mainline.  The NOPB is now handling the interchange between Canadian National and Union Pacific and between Canadian National and BNSF.

Gratitude For Variety, And Another New Shot

As much as there is to not like about this place, like the fact that it’s already uncomfortably hot in the middle of March, I truly am grateful to live in a place where I can see such a diversity of railroad action within just a few miles, with six of the “Big 7” railroads serving this area, something only a few other places have.  Above, we saw KCS’s solid CSX interchange train, and, below, a few minutes later, we see BNSF’s solid CSX interchange train, the M-DYTCSX out of Dayton, Texas.  Almost 24 hours before the below picture was taken on the CSX just west of Gentilly Yard, Perry texted me that he saw it pass through New Iberia, and what a variety of motive power paint schemes we see here?

How about the palm trees, eh?  They greatly help for what would otherwise be a terribly lame picture, a shot that I would have otherwise not likely taken.  I guess it’s really just a picture of two palm trees with a train behind them, and I guess that’s okay.

This is the train that normally does the Schriever setout, which can take awhile, I guess.  The M-DYTCSX had just pulled up to this point after being given permission by the NS NO&NE dispatcher to cross the NS and pass a red signal at NE Tower; CSX Gentilly yard told him to stop at Louisa Street, where you see him here.

Now, it was time to go to the gym.

New Cars, And Even More Variety

(But it’s still only trains we see.  Shut up!)  Anyway, after I got out of the gym, I swung by the Back Belt again, and I was greatly pleased to see this:

That’s Union Pacific train UEGCXR-16.  This is a unit train of fresh, new, March-2012-built CSX hopper cars from the Trinity plant in Sabinas, Coahuila, on the Ferromex, hence the Ferromex locomotives.  This train came onto Union Pacific rails when it entered the USA in Eagle Pass, Texas, and was on its way for delivery to the CSX, presumably for use in unit phosphate trains.

That’s really all that I have for today.  How about that, though?  Although you didn’t see any CSX action in this post, you saw three trains, each for a different railroad, on their way to be interchanged to the CSX.  That’s the best kind of CSX ‘action’ by me!  😉

NS Has Class

I guess y’all already saw the beauty that emerged from the Altoona shops a few days ago.  I like it.

Y’all be good.

James