Gotta go on a trip I’d rather not go on.
Hopefully 3+ years of BULLSXXT will come to an end.
Don’t go getting into trouble while I’m gone…
TOC
Curmudgeon said:
Gotta go on a trip I'd rather not go on.Hopefully 3+ years of BULLSXXT will come to an end.
Don’t go getting into trouble while I’m gone…
TOC
Dave,
Good luck, hope it all works out.
Muahahaha…
I’m gonna go turn my power supply on … and power up the tracks! 
Seriously … fingers crossed. Hope it all works!
MB
Safe Trip Dave.
GodSpeed, Dave.
JimC.
aarrrrgggghhhhh
Curmudgeon said:That good?
aarrrrgggghhhhh
Well, it’s better than no noise at all. I suspect after a snort or two, and a cigar he’ll be formulating basic words…
Matthew (OV) said:Aaaaarrrggghhh IS a basic word. Us well-aged grouches utter it as we grab the jawbone of an ass to smite whatever idiot has just earned a good smiting.
Well, it's better than no noise at all. I suspect after a snort or two, and a cigar he'll be formulating basic words....
Chris Vernell said:Oooh...there's been a lot of smiting earned lately!Matthew (OV) said:Aaaaarrrggghhh IS a basic word. Us well-aged grouches utter it as we grab the jawbone of an ass to smite whatever idiot has just earned a good smiting.
Well, it's better than no noise at all. I suspect after a snort or two, and a cigar he'll be formulating basic words....
Could be that TOC got a pirate promotion?
Well, it’s been exactly 48 hours since I left on this “trip”.
One minute into the trip, an unexpected snowstorm hit…I can deal with that.
Literally blowing it in was an Arctic Air Mass (last night 13 degrees), and everything froze.
A 40-minute rush-hour trip to the airport took…3-1/2 hours.
MORONS! Had to be California Drivers, and folks who think “front-wheel drive” means you don’t need to know how to drive OR equip your vehicle for winter.
So, driving the 57-year-old pickup around and through the quagmire, I get to the airport.
Flight to Sacramento is long gone. Okay, since I’ve NEVER missed a flight before, I have to go into problem-solving mode.
Next flight out (actually last one of the night) is to Oakland.
Make the arrangements, call and change the car rental…and the flight is 2 hours late getting out of the wheel chocks.
Get into Oakland about 0145 (first time in Oakland since January of 1970), finally get to the car rental place (eleventy million miles from the airport), get set up, and drive to Sacramento. New car, 65 mph trying to figure out mirrors, seat, heat, steering…
Hell, I don’t remember a toll booth on a bridge between the two places…
Cross the City Limit sign into Sacramento at 0316.
Get to the motel, drop into bed at 0330.
Alarm clock and phone goes off at 0700.
All I can tell you is these MORONS called for this meeting and had NO INTENTION of doing anything.
Wasted, and I mean wasted, trip.
Finally, after 5-1/2 hours of listening, left, flight out at 2100.
Two inches of ice on all the roads off the freeways…and either 2MPH MORONS in front of you, or, doing EXACTLY the speed limit in two ruts and some FRUITCAKE decides 50 must be the speed and tries to climb into the bed of the truck.
Just kept the safety off.
So, spend a lot of time, a lot of money, in weather I should have been home in, and here I am.
Someday I will tell you about this, but for now, an insurance company for an outfit that causes serious injury and won’t even TALK to you for 3 years and makes a “nuisance” offer of $1K to settle in full (medical alone was over $11K) makes one wonder what is really going on…
Good thing I had a Ford to drive, and an old one at that.
Never missed a beat, went places others had slid right off the road in.
My 50 Passenger works the same, but I wasn’t going to park that in the parking garage overnight.
I’m back.
TOC
Sheesh, sounds like a real pain. Glad you made it home in one piece.
Curmudgeon said:
Well, it's been exactly 48 hours since I left on this "trip".One minute into the trip, an unexpected snowstorm hit…I can deal with that.
Literally blowing it in was an Arctic Air Mass (last night 13 degrees), and everything froze.…
I’m back.
TOC
Dave,
Glad you made it back in one piece! With the way some people drive that isn’t a given.
Sorry to hear the “clowns” had nothing constructive to offer.
BTW the weather up here is “CRISP!!”. More snow on the way!
Curmudgeon said:"meeting" in my experience is a synonym for "wasted effort". "insurance company": "we take your money, but don't expect us to give any back". (Actually, I have had some decent experiences with insurance companies, so I guess I shouldn't be quite so cynical.)
All I can tell you is these MORONS called for this meeting and had NO INTENTION of doing anything. Wasted, and I mean wasted, trip. ....an insurance company for an outfit that causes serious injury and won't even TALK to you for 3 years and makes a "nuisance" offer of $1K to settle in full (medical alone was over $11K) makes one wonder what is really going on......
I have also had decent experiences.
But this one is weird.
And getting weirder.
Bryan Johnson said:
Hey Dave , you should’ve had this with you ! http://1stclass.mylargescale.com/bryanj/bullets.tiff
Dave, I ran into that same toll booth on way from Berkeley to Sacramento when I was up there. Didnt you notice that nice shiny new bridge under construction right next to that bridge? Guess thats how they pay for it. I might take umbridge to the “California drivers” but they are all over the place here too and I can’t argue with it…Pick up & SUV drivers who think their 3ton behemoth makes them invunerable to all weather and the rules of physics. Now I’m a former pickup truck and jeep driver so I know just what “high center of gravity” and “increased stopping distance” means if ya know what I mean. We get heavy rains that you cant see 5 feet in front of your car and these knuckleheads are barreling down the freeway at 80mph. I hope these idiots have that “Jesus is my co-pilot” bumper sticker, cause their gonna meet him, sooner than they think. Yep morons is a correct terminology. Too bad it was such a fast trip, I would have recommended a “decompression” visit to Yoshi’s in Jack London Square for a nice meal and a good Jazz show before returning home. Hope things get better up there for ya.
Every time I have to go back to that state the drivers seem to have evolved into another phase of their evolution.
When attending Fullerton Jr. College, we drove to school on the freeway at 100MPH in the slow lane as there was NO TRAFFIC on the Riverside Freeway from Santa Ana river west, and anybody ON the freeway instantly moved to the “fast lane” and did 50.
It was interesting to drive on a 3-5 lane per side freeway all the way to Sacramento and have the freeway to yourself.
Now you get “lane hogs” in all lanes, nobody knows what to do.
I was going to the airport from Sacramento and some yay-who with a Blazer and the back full of luggage, doing 50 in the fast lane (of 2).
One guy went around him on the right, I go around and suddenly it’s 80+.
Morons.
Yeah, did JLS a long time ago.
To give you a point of reference, train related, when I was in Oakland last time, somewhere near JLS they had just put the first BART train on display for the public to see what their tax dollars were getting them.
They were sinking tunnel sections in the bay and working on ground and above ground sections all the way to Timbuktu.
welcome home dave
Reminiscences, or…an ol’ coot boring the young folks with tales from the past.
I’ve eaten at most of the restaurants in Jack London Square although not for many years now. The best food though I think was available in the produce area. I wonder if all those produce houses are even still there now? Lena’s Kitchen was my favorite. The owner would feed you until you were full regardless of what you ordered. Seems he immigrated from Yugoslavia after WWII where he had almost starved to death.
Merchants Cafe was a real goody also as was the Overland at 1st and Broadway. The Overland had a bar and served wonderful corned beef sandwiches on french rolls. Occasionally you’d even rub elbows with the rich & famous there such as Phil Harris or the double for Ernest Borgnine in McHale’s Navy who ran a diving school nearby. There were a couple of other establishments I can’t remember the names of too. They all served liquor and beer and the produce workers were mostly well juiced by afternoon.
The Western Pacific tracks ran right down third street through the heart of the produce area. In steam days the engineer would start blowing his whistle long and loud some blocks ahead to warn everybody to move the trucks that were sticking out everywhere being loaded, unloaded or cleaned out. The produce workers would often throw fruit at the locomotive as its whistle bellowed at the still unmoved trucks. It became a regular game as the fireman sometimes would come out on the engine running board and try to catch the oncoming edible missles while the throwers were trying to splatter both him and the engine.
Hope I didn’t bore you all too much but living in the past is a right of passage to all that survive long enough to indulge in it! hehe! 
Anyway its your own fault for mentioning Oakland’s Jack London Square.
P.S. The “Moron Family” was present then too.