Death And Stupidity
Today started with death – well, more accurately, with the dead, but, more broadly, with the concept of death weighing on the mind – and ended with human stupidity. Nihilism is a terrible philosophy, but the rest of humanity surely does validate it for me.
The Duke and I ate shrimp poboys from Food Etc for lunch today, and then I went out in search of a new shot of the Union Pacific Railroad’s New Iberia Turn.
There are 13 empty rice-mill hopper cars in New Iberia! Surely, we will get a train on the line to Abbeville soon.
Death And A Train In Jeanerette
I went…..
Unable to find anything else in one of the last areas of the Lafayette Subdivision that I had not previously combed for shots, I came up with this.
It’s okay.
But it’s also unsettling, and I don’t think that I will ever do it again.
Yes, I am that insecure and fearful, but at least I don’t allow that insecurity and fear to manifest as social dominance and structural violence, as the majority of white people around here do.
I really ought to be going to the gym instead of doing this.
Sugar High
Anyway, I went and checked out the QLF Jeanerette Loading Facility, I think the first time that I get out and check out the place (though I think that I drove past it at least once.)
So, what happens here is that local sugar mills that don’t (any longer) have railroads directly serving them truck their molasses here for loading onto railroad cars.
In the background of the above image, you can see the bit Patout sugar mill, the biggest sugar mill in the state and the end of this railroad branch; so, the Louisiana & Delta Railroad job that serves this branch moves plenty of tank cars loaded with sugar products and from multiple mills.
Anyway, I went to New Iberia, and something stupid happened.
I Don’t Care Whom This Offends, Because The Problem Itself Is Highly Offensive
A few minutes before 19:00, I am at the South Landry Crossing in New Iberia and I’m using my scanner to listen into the conversation between the two L&D trainmen – one in the locomotive, and one on the ground – switching the eastern end of the interchange yard.
As the crossing got blocked while the crew dragged a cut out of the yard, I walked up to the gate in front of the automobile that was stopped there just to look into the yard and see what was happening, holding the scanner by my ear.
The guy on the ground radios to the engineer, “we’ve been on this crossing for just three minutes? This dude is on his phone at the crossing,” suggesting, cynically and disingenuously, that I was at the crossing because I was angry about the crossing being blocked and that I was on the phone perhaps calling or expressing a complaint to someone about it.
Like, if you can “see” that I am “on my phone,” can’t you also see that that “phone” is my big rectangular scanner with the big rubber ducky antenna?
No? You can’t? Then don’t lie about another person’s activities or intentions.
Also, he mentioned how people in this area have been living here for a long time, they ought to know to avoid this crossing if they are worried about being blocked by a train. I’m like, dude, I agree!
This is not an innocent misunderstanding; I mean, it is, because no actual material harm was done, but this is exactly the kind of thinking, unwarranted and baseless cynical assumptions, that does in the real world lead to frayed relations and material harm, to grave and inexcusable injustices.
I seriously hate when people do this stupid, immature garbage that is appropriate for chimpanzees but not for human beings; you saw a man standing at a crossing with a device in his hand, and it was wrong to make up a meaning or motive behind it.
A Railroad Town
The eastbound Sunset Limited passed, meaning that I saw trains from three of the four railroad companies that operate in this area today.
I just photographed Amtrak coming through, and now I hear a train coming off the MoP. So I had a Pat Flory moment, realizing what it must have been like for him to hear horns all over town all day all the time.
So, eventually, the LDRR 1717 left to go back to the depot, and the yard got dark. So I, too, left, as I was tired, filthy, and being attacked by bugs, a far cry from the cool cloudy weather of this morning. I never figured out what the purpose of that switching was but it appeared to have nothing to do with the Abbeville cars, as they are now just as separated as they were before. I don’t know when the branch will be served, especially as the siding apparently is being taken out of service for as much as maybe 10 hours for some work to be done there.
I really need to stop taking pictures!
In Conclusion: Don’t Do That Crap
It’s really messed up to make cynical, unwarranted assumptions of people; in this case, no actual harm was done, but it’s a really bad practice, because it can be very destructive.
Remember that.
Merci.
Jim
