Photography and random writings from some crazy Cajun with a camera!

Day 4 of our Close Up 2009 week was Independent Study day.  It was a Thursday, and the length of the program had been reduced by one day from years past.  Capitol Hill Day, which we had wonderfully experienced the day before, had historically been on the Thursday with Independent Study day on Friday and […]

The bloodiest day in US history took place on 17 September 1862 near the town of Sharpsburg, Maryland, at a creek called Antietam. On Tuesday 10 February 2009, five days after I had witnessed what I knew to be the second-to-last train on the former Southern Pacific Railway branchline down Bayou Lafourche and the last […]

Greetings, and welcome to Jimbaux’s Journal, be thee friend or foe; for those who missed many of the January offerings, a check of the January 2014 archives will reveal some interesting posts. Hello Yes, kiddies, this is my first Sunday Sermon in a long time, the last being nearly 10 months ago.  The long-term forecast […]

Jimbaux wants you to let him live his life alone, or maybe not? No If you are here only for my high-speed rail initiation proposal, scroll down until after the last picture to find that essay. Welcome To 2014, Good Netizens Many of you have already seen a sampling of my southern Mississippi work from […]

Same Old, Same Old Hi.  Here are a few repetitive pictures taken on Saturday 17 January 2009. This is Norfolk Southern Railway train 393 slowing to a stop for a crew change at Bayou St. John in New Orleans. These pictures were taken in front of the LSU Dental School on the NS Back Belt. […]

Jimbaux knows that this house is not a home. These 21 pictures – nearly all of which were taken of locations heretofore not seen here on Jimbaux’s Journal – were taken on Sunday 4 January 2009, two years to the day after a very memorable day in western Nuevo León. Something Different Hello.  A cousin’s […]

[Jimbaux knows that the highway song is as lonely as the road he’s on.] Now For Something Very Different On Monday 29 December 2008, I traveled to a part of the southern part of my home state to which I had until then never visited, and my goal was to visit an obscure railroad line, […]

[Jimbaux wishes you comfort and joy.] Happy Christmas, people.  On Wednesday 24 December 2008, I got a few pictures at Chacahoula, one of a train and three of a sugarcane fire.  First, here is the train, Amtrak’s westbound Sunset Limited, which I have photographed here many times. Also, one year to the day prior, I […]

[Jimbaux would like for you to do as he did and experience the warmth before you go.] The Essence, The Genesis, The Soul Tuesday 23 December 2003 was one of the most memorable days of my photographic and railroad enthusiast life; back then, I was still shooting on this ancient medium known as film, and […]

[Jimbaux is playing another game of putting things aside, as if we’ll come back to them sometime.] Hey!  How are you doing?  Let me know. This is the first posting of new material in a long time, the last time being in September when I published some June and July leftovers; everything else that I have published lately […]

My pal BobE arrived in New Orleans via air on the evening of Friday 5 December 2008 in advance of a work-related conference the next week, just as he had done the same weekend the year before when we met up so that he could see what action KCS had to offer in the New […]

[Jimbaux was spending his time waiting for the one . . . or the four . . . or the five.] Another 2008 Thanksgiving Week Day on the Mudbug Sub We are back where we were yesterday, with local trains and such on the Lafayette Subdivision, and, yes, we have more from Death Magnetic. 4 […]

Where were you when the 45-year anniversary of President Kennedy’s assassination took place?  If you are like Jimbaux (and pity to you if you are), you were foaming, and that’s what we see here in these pictures taken on Saturday 22 November 2008, my first train pictures in almost a month, the previous being the […]

Classic New Orleans Railroading Today’s visual trip to the past takes us to the Norfolk Southern Railway’s “Bernadotte Line” that diverges from NS’s “Back Belt” line across New Orleans at a place called East City Junction.  The Bernadotte Line, under NS successor Southern Railway, once had a roundhouse at Scott Street in Mid-City and went […]

You saw an NOPB passenger special on the first day of Steam Fest III yesterday, and now you actually see the SP 745 – actually see steam – here on day two of the festival, Sunday 5 October 2008.  First, on the way to the festivities, we see some streetcar action on St. Charles Avenue. […]

[Jimbaux wants all of your hopes to turn to wishes, and all of your wishes come true.] These pictures were taken in June and July, but this post is being typed in late September; so, the pictures represent the time two and three months before the mood reflected in the writing does.  We are now […]

And The Only Pictures Taken Were Taken In The State In Between After my epic last full day in Memphis the night before, when we saw the Lorraine Motel, the FEMA-Amtrak train to New Orleans to bring the Gustav evacuees home, many MATA trolleys, a few Norfolk Southern trains,  and Central Station and the sinkhole, […]

Day 2 of my Memphis Hurrication Gustav started with my friend HAFMO at work, me out on my own taking pictures, the remnants of the hurricane from which I escaped catching up with me, and a train that normally passes through New Orleans detouring through Memphis because of the storm.  Last time, we got some […]

[Jimbaux is wondering if you are wondering where do we go now?] Or, The Beginning of My Out-Of-State Gustav Hurrication For the second consecutive post, the headline might be confusing to some.  A full reading of this piece should explain it, and subsequent posts should remove all doubt. Where Were We? Last time, you saw […]

Hurricane Gustav was approaching southeastern Louisiana on 28 August 2008 when I took these few train pictures in New Orleans before train movements stopped because the floodgates that cross the tracks were closed.  Hurricane Gustav was a big deal for me and for folks back in the homeland – Cajunland – southwest of New Orleans, […]

The Mid-City Marine and his wife JMS were in town at the beginning of August 2012, and my woadie and I got together for an entire Sunday, beginning the day with a Sunday Sermon of yet-to-be published photographs (but that may be published by the time some of you are reading this), then a trip […]

[Jimbaux can’t pass up this opportunity to make himself absurd . . . ] Or, The Consolation Prize? The Northtown To Grand Forks Manifest The real kicker about today’s story is the great opportunity that I gave up by going on this chase and taking these pictures, and today’s song is very appropriate on many […]

[Jimbaux is deprived of his conscience . . . ] Okay, so, it was Independence Day, and TI and Zzannie had us over to their house in West Fargo for a celebration.  So, that’s where our pictures are.  Before we get to the train pictures, here’s your correspondent pouring caramel on some ice cream in […]

[Jimbaux knows that when you’re on the edge and falling off, it’s all over for you.] On the evening of Friday 29 June 2008 in North Dakota, Jimbaux photographed his first moving Canadian Pacific Railway train, making at least one train of all of the “Big 8” railroads of North America his photographic subjects, the […]

This is Day 4 of Jimbaux’s five-day outbound trip of his Great Northward Pilgrimage of the summer of 2008.  Just like with Day 1, Day 2, and Day 3, most of what is written below was written in North Dakota a few weeks after the pictures were taken, and, as stated before, photo essays like […]

[Jimbaux knows that it’s not too late, it’s never too late.] Yes, “Never Too Late” – a brilliant song indeed – and the rest of the Three Days Grace album One-X was new at the time of the Great Northward Pilgrimage of the summer of 2008, and it played plenty in my truck on that […]

So, yes, the UP 1983 – the Western Pacific heritage unit (the “heritage” fleet came about a decade ago when UP honored several of its predecessor railroads by painting one locomotive in each of the selected predecessor’s paint scheme, well, actually, an new paint scheme to honor the old paint schemes) – made its way […]

[Jimbaux is expecting just a little bit too much from the wounded, but he sees, sees through it all, sees through, sees you.] Yeah, so, as you saw yesterday, I was in Monroe along the KCS’s Meridian Speedway the first weekend of June 2008 for the KCSHS convention.  The Stroe Man and I foamed together […]

[Jimbaux knows that success is his only option; failure is not.] Back To Trains So, you didn’t care for the sentimental pizza post?  Hey, I’m going to miss my whoadie William, but although we do have trains in this post, we also have several other indoor pictures of another project as well as some pictures […]

[Jimbaux knows that everything changes.] Hey, everybody!!  How are you doing?  Jimbaux has been up and down, and Wednesday was his first day in the weight room since January, the first time in the weight room since the back issues were bad.  Rest assured, we are only doing light weight here.  There are some exercises […]

[Jimbaux is almost fine again . . . or maybe not.] May You Live In Interesting Times Hi.  It’s been a few weeks.  Even though the condition with my back seems to be improving thanks to two epidurals, I’ve just been too busy to write here.  Times that I would normally have spent blogging and […]

Warning: Too Many Pictures Welcome to Day 2 of Jimbaux’s 2012 Spring Road Trip.  All of these pictures were taken on Saturday 31 March 2012.  Day 1 can be seen here. From Heavener, Up Rich Mountain, Back to Heavener, Northward Through Pittsburg, To El Rancho Grumpo Hello, there.  Yes, I will present a ridiculous amount […]

So, y’all liked those 2006 northern-central Texas pictures?  Well, I did too, and it made me miss being in places like that.  Tonight, I’ll take you back even further, to the latter half of 2005 to the very beginning of my DSLR camera days, and we’re going to go across the length of the “Lower […]

No, there aren’t 2,006 pictures in this post.  There are only five.  They were just all taken in the year 2006, June 2006 to be specific, and all on a trip to Texas and northern Louisiana.  Texas has been on my mind plenty lately, especially northeastern Texas, though plenty has been on my mind lately, […]

Does This Count As A Hat Trick? You tell me, as we will see three trains in one afternoon – the afternoon of 20 March 2008 – circular commute, but you’ll only see the head ends of two of those trains. Raising Cane’s First, we see the ILBNO – which would become CSX train Q192 […]

[Jimbaux is digging his way to something better . . . ] Except that, one year after these pictures are taken, digging would probably be against the orthopedist’s orders.  Then again, maybe not, if done the right way.  Heck, I don’t know. Anyway, here are some pictures taken under cloudy skies on 12 March 2012 […]

[Jimbaux is just giving you the same old story, same old song and dance . . . ] Same Old, Same Old . . . These pictures were taken Sunday 24 February 2008. A photographer friend writes to me . . . Ah, after a few years all your train photos look the same to […]

[Jimbaux reminds you that a pretty face can hide an evil mind.] Do you think that Johnnie Rivers intentionally pronounced the “g” weakly so that people would think that he was saying “secret Asian man”? Beware Of Pretty Faces That You Find Here are a few pictures, not really all that great but also not […]

Jimbaux sees you at the crossroads, crossroad, crossroads . . . Here’s a look at the railroad action in New Orleans on Saturday 9 February 2008, a post that is brief but which shows some variety despite its brevity.  Much-if-not-most of the railroad action in New Orleans is interchange traffic among the major railroads that […]

The early afternoon of Sunday 29 January 2012 finds Union Pacific Railroad train IAVLB emerging from the siding in Baldwin, Louisiana, on the BNSF Railway’s Lafayette Subdivision, formerly of the Southern Pacific Railway, and appropriately, therefore, a patched SP locomotive – UP 6345 – is the sole power leading this intermodal train (hence the “I” […]

[Lately, Jimbaux finds that he should be the one behind the wheel.] The End Of The End (But Not The End Of The End Of The End) One month ago, you saw the last ever railroad delivery to Valentine Paper, not only some of my best train pictures, but, put all together and with the […]

[Jimbaux is crawling in the dark.] After our Tennessee-Mississippi trip (Day One, Day Two, and Day Three) I spent that night in bayouland, but the next day, I headed back to Woadieville and got these pictures along the way, as is my customary fashion.  We’ll start with a westbound train at Chacahoula, specifically westbound BNSF […]

[Jimbaux visited the Lake of Fire, well, at least something terrible like it.] This is Part 2 of a three-day journey that The Duke and Jimbaux took to northern Mississippi and western Tennessee in late December 2007; Part 1 can be seen here. And Now For Something Completely Different I have for you today something […]

[Jimbaux never cared for what they do, never cared for what they know . . . ] A Heavenly Time of Year So, how do you like the Sully Erna on piano version of that song? And Jimbaux Said, Let There Be Light, Homie Though not quite like my shots of the Transit of Venus […]

[Jimbaux is going home, knowing that on this day Earth shall ring.] Well, It’s A Nice Story, At Least Yes, kiddies, it’s the feast of Saturnalia, as the winter solstice is upon us, or as some ultra-modern and hip people like to call it, Christmas.  It’s a nice story, and it has helped to inspire […]

[Jimbaux wants you to smile and pretend that he’s not here.] That’s not an erroneous use of a double negative in the title of this post, my friends, as you will hopefully understand when you read the brief story below, but, if you haven’t already done so, I implore you to check out what I […]

[Jimbaux is the master of disaster, wondering if all his dreams are dead inside.] Hosting A Canadian-American Shadowing the KCS For a Day BobE is a big KCS fan, and he wanted to see everything on the KCS in New Orleans that he could in one day here, which gave me as his host the […]

[Jimbaux is wondering how much difference does it make?] I’m Still Here This one will be quick. I have plenty to say, both in words and photographically, but that will have to wait. I need to publicize my pictures of the Santa Fe painted F-units going to the Galveston Railroad Museum, and I have plenty […]

[Jimbaux should fight the good fight every moment, every minute, every day.] It’s Your Only Way Isn’t that song awesome? For those of you who have come here only for my Presidential election predictions, you can skip down until you find the appropriate subheadline. Getting Back To The NOGC, Finally Schedules of work, work, work […]