“Sorry grandma, we wanted to come visit before you died, but we don’t have family here to leave the kid with and Amtrak doesn’t serve our town, and we really didn’t want to upset skeffles.”

I kept waiting for an explanation of who Melissa Francis is and why I or anyone else should consider her opinion relevant.

RIP. The last of the great Hometown Troll Sportswriters.

There are several “big” steam locomotives operating in the US (maybe a dozen?) so the skillset is still around. The guys who operate the Big Boy also operate another big locomotive (#844) so no one had to learn from the ground up. I’m sure they are still figuring out 4014's peculiarities, but that’s to be expected.

For train nerds, this is basically like Babe Ruth jogging back into right field for the Yankees. The Big Boys were #1 on the “too big to restore, too big to operate” list, nobody thought it would ever happen. So this is pretty much a dream come true for our little fandom.

It’s 6,300 horsepower continuously at 35mph. You can move a lot of train with that.

And then there are nerds like me who are all like “yeah but pound for pound the N&W A was better than either!”

By the late 30s is was pretty clear that diesels were going to take over eventually, but a lot of railroads weren’t quite ready to wholesale replace their fleets of modern steam engines with a technology that was still unproven. After WWII, when there was a ton of data about diesel capabilities, the jig was up.

I hate that what looks like some good old-fashioned Jim Carreying makes me sort of want to see this.

And you know what else sucks? Anytime Biggby (the new name) comes up there are always a few white folks who just don’t see what the problem was!!

I used to live in the community where Kickapoo is based (Viroqua, WI). Two comments:

Yes it is. I maintain that if any of the most famous and therefore hated Dems publicly said “I believe the Earth is a sphere that revolves around the Sun, and that plate tectonics exist” the shape of the Earth would immediately become one of the main themes of the 2020 election.

I live in a very snowy area. The number of people who drive without lights in heavy snow terrifies me. It’s bright enough that the car won’t turn on the lights itself, and the drivers are oblivious.

Some of the most anxiety-inducing hours of my life where those between clamping the CPU in with that earthy crunch and getting to the point I could try to boot the thing.

It’s the American Way! As long as the crabs keep dragging each other back into the bucket our betters are happy!

Bob Seger is just respectable George Thorogood.

At least the Brits add a layer of class to their oligarchy. Here in America, how do I know who my betters are if they don’t even have titles?!?

Stop.

If tell my daughter she can’t have a popsicle and she cries I feel like shit for an hour. I can’t imagine the pathology driving these people.

So basically this poor kid is getting all the neuroses of a child actor without any actual fame?