Monthly Train-Calendar Report for November 2017

BAM! Got it! (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

—“Hey man! Where we goin’?” I asked my brother.
“Main Street Bridge,” he answered.
“You are not!” I said. “Yer headed for Jackson Street.”
“Nope. Tunnel Inn on Main Street.”
“720 Jackson Street. You are WRONG, dude.”
The November 2017 entry in my own calendar is eastbound 18N, Norfolk Southern auto-racks approaching Jackson Street Bridge atop The Hill in Gallitzin (PA).
This picture goes back a couple years. My brother was still on crutches. He fell off a ladder and broke his leg.
This train was climbing the west slope of Allegheny Mountain, so we set out to beat it to Gallitzin.
It’s on Track Two: signaled both directions. Two and Three use the original Pennsy tunnel. One, nearby, uses New Portage Tunnel. One is eastbound, Three is westbound, and Two can be either way.
Often heavy eastbound coal-trains use Two to avoid One and its “Slide:” at 2.28% slightly steeper than the original Pennsy at 1.75-1.8% average. New Portage is slightly higher than Pennsy’s original tunnel, so incorporates a ramp down to the original Pennsy grade.
Usually come November Yrs Trly starts using snow pictures in my calendar. Like other landscape calendar producers, I began using snow pictures in Winter: December, January, and February, melting snow in March, and maybe a light dusting for November.
It often snows atop Allegheny Mountain in November — even October.
This picture is an exception. Fall foliage is about over — we came too late. But it’s still around somewhat.
I’ve wanted to use this picture for years. But for October it’s late.
We slammed into adjacent Gallitzin Tunnel-Park, and both leaped out. The train was coming around the curve.
My brother tossed his crutches, and hobbled across the street. BAM! Got it! Would it be okay?
Later that night we looked at what he photographed, and his crutchless potshot was excellent.




A “double.” (Photo by Tim Calvin.)

—The November 2017 entry in my Norfolk Southern Employees’ Photography-Contest calendar looks like something my brother and I might shoot.
Or rather what I might do, since my brother is more into “in-yer-face” three-quarter locomotive shots. Which is fine, since I use plenty of his photographs in my calendar.
I’m more into “artsy” stuff = scenic views.
What’s pictured is what my brother and I call a “double;” two trains in one picture. I got that terminology from Phil Faudi, my railfan friend in Altoona, PA. Doubles are infrequent, although near Altoona we’re more likely to see one.
The double pictured is in Kendallville, Indiana. Two trains in one picture is luck. Photographer Calvin happened to be in the right place at the right time.
Trains around Altoona are frequent enough my brother and I have snagged quite a few.
Phil Faudi conducted railfan “tours” as a business a few years ago. Many of my photo locations are Phil.
My first “tour” we stood on the overpass in Lilly, PA. A coal-extra was slowly hammering up the west slope of Allegheny Mountain on Track One. On his railroad-radio scanner Phil could hear a double-stack approaching on Track Two.
“We’re gonna get a double, Bob.”
BAM! Got it!
I was thrilled. Never before had I got two trains in one picture.


My first double! (Photo by BobbaLew.)

I ran that picture years ago in my first calendar.
My brother and I snagged many since, plus me alone. Train frequency around Altoona is like that.
The railroad is a main artery of trade between the northeast and the rest of the nation. It used to be the Pennsylvania Railroad, but is now Norfolk Southern. The other main artery is what used to be New York Central across NY state. That railroad is now CSX.
I searched Kendallville in my Google-Maps. It looks like the railroad pictured is Norfolk Southern’s line to Chicago, ex NYC, I think.




You better not have yer laundry out! (Photo by John Dziobko.)

—The November 2017 entries in my All-Pennsy color calendar and my Audio-Visual Designs black-and-white All-Pennsy Calendar are equally uninspiring.
My All-Pennsy color calendar is M-1 (4-8-2) #6967 leading eastbound freight past “Lewis” Tower in Lewistown, PA.
Looking at this picture I see how filthy railroading was back then.
“Dirty old steam-engines,” my mother used to say.
Soot covers everything, tracks, the locomotive, especially the tower building.
Lewistown is on Pennsy’s famous “Middle Division,” Harrisburg to Altoona. The Middle Division was a final stomping-ground for Pennsy steam, especially the M-1 Mountains.
It’s slightly upgrade, following the Juniata river, then the Little Juniata. Not difficult, a river grade.
The M-1s were perfect, although they had to be coaled halfway to Altoona. Denholm had a giant coaling facility.
Upgrade on the Middle Division an M-1 could maintain 40-50 mph, sometimes faster. Better to not scrap the M-1s in favor of diesels when the M-1s were so perfect.
The picture is 1956. Use of steam on Pennsy ended in late ’57. Pennsy, being a coal-road, favored coal-fired steam locomotion.
Pennsy used to think its M-1 Mountains were the best steamers they had. The M-1s are 1923 on, not a 4-8-4, and only 70 square feet grate-area.
But they had a long combustion-chamber that enhanced coal burning. The M-1 is the boiler and firebox of the I-1 Decapod (2-10-0), but with that added combustion-chamber.
The M-1 was not a high-stepper like Pennsy’s K-4 Pacific.
It’s drivers were only 72-inch diameter, not the 80-inchers of a K-4.
(Still, 72 inches is six feet.)
It’s an “all-purpose” engine, not a boomer-and-zoomer. It hauled freight at a pretty good clip.
But, yer laundry better not be trackside. Everything will load up with soot.
As far as I can deduce, Lewis Tower is no more. The railroad is dispatched from Pittsburgh.




BAM-BAM-BAM-BAM! (Photo by George E. Votova©.)

—The November 2017 entry of my Audio-Visual Designs black-and-white All-Pennsy Calendar is a K-4 Pacific (4-6-2) stomping out of Long Branch on New York & Long Branch Railroad with a commuter-train toward New York City.
NY&LB connected to Central of New Jersey, and eventually became owned by it.
NY&LB became a commuter feeder toward New York City, and Pennsy wanted in. They threatened to build a competing railroad. A competing PRR railroad would have ended CNJ’s NY&LB.
Interestingly, all of that became Jersey Transit. Commuter railroading became too expensive for private enterprise. Commuter railroading toward New York City was turned over to gumint.
The other interesting point is the smoke a steam-locomotive generates. That much smoke would no longer be tolerated. What’s seen here would dissipate, but all one had to do was visit Altoona (PA) in steam-days. It was socked in with smoke = chuffing steam-engines burning coal.
Same thing in China. Power-plants burn coal, and cities sock in. People have to wear masks.
Railfans like to see similar pillars of smoke belching from restored steam locomotives. Crews have to over-stoke, or sand flues. Years ago railroad management poo-pooed smoke. It indicated the fire wasn’t burning well; that the fireman be called on-the-carpet.
Note the heavyweight parlor-car ahead of the combine. Mega-rich separated from the worker-bees.
The picture is 1934. By then Pennsy more-or-less ruled NY&LB.
Ten years later this is the world I was born into. When I started seeing railroading in 1946-’47, Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines (PRSL) was still using steam-locomotives, although usually leased from its predecessors. What made me a railfan were Pennsy K-4s and Reading G-3s in regular revenue service. (Although I preferred Pennsy — that red keystone number-plate.)


Where it all began, EXACTLY. (Photo by Robert Long©.)

The above picture is 1956, about the end of steam on PRSL. Diesels were already in use.
“Where it all began” is another Pennsy K-4, in this case just leaving Haddonfield station, not far from where we lived. I was only age-2 or so when “it all began,” but have been a railfan since.

In pursuit of Fall Foliage

Not much foliage here. (Y91 climbs the Mighty Curve.) (Photo by BobbaLew.)

“Any day chasing trains beats any day at work,” my brother says.
He’s involved in managing electric-power generation in the Boston area.
“And the weather here has been slam-dunk,” I observed. “70+ degrees, not a cloud in the sky, strident blue stratosphere, and strong sunlight. My ISO is only 400, and I’m at 1/800th or a thousandth. Cloudy might be ISO 1,000, 1/500th if I can get away with it. Sometimes ISO 1,250, 1/250th.” (1/250th courts blurring of charging locomotives.)
“The only thing lacking is Fall Foliage,” I said. “It’s almost non-existent. Some color is around, but not much.”
“And it sounds like it won’t get any better,” my brother added. “A guy here noted leaves are browning, then falling off. It’s been too dry and hot.”
We were doing this visit as always. My brother drives to Altoona Wednesday — takes him nine hours. Then I drive there Thursday, and he chases trains alone until I arrive. It takes me five hours.

---

(Thursday, October 19th, my brother alone.)

He began at Bennington Curve atop Allegheny Mountain west of Altoona. “Benny” is just east of the summit tunnels.
We looked at his first “Benny” picture; train 12G: “That thing has a slug in the lashup!” I cried.


“This thing has a slug in it!” (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

A slug is a locomotive with its engine/generator and control-stand removed. It’s just traction-motors.
It’s wired to a full locomotive, a “mother.” Its traction-motors are powered by the mother unit. Instead of powering just four or six traction-motors, the mother is powering eight or twelve (or ten).
Never before have I seen a slug on mainline railroading. Usually they’re in yard-service, where ya need a lotta low-powered traction.
The slug (#874) is a converted EMD SD-40, shorn of its prime-mover, etc, and fuel-tank. Six traction-motors sucking power off the mother, in this case a GE Dash-9.
Often you’ll see a slug between two mothers = a full locomotive at each end. The slug is sucking off the two locomotives.

My brother got other trains near Benny.


Slightly west of Benny, 25Z claws toward Allegheny tunnel. The second unit is a Burlington-Northern Santa Fe run-through returning west, but NS is using it. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)


591, coal-empties uphill at Bennington Curve. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

My brother then went to what my Altoona railfan friend calls “High-bridge” — what we call “Five-tracks” — the Route 53 overpass east of Cresson over five tracks toward the summit.
Four tracks are originally the Pennsy main. The fifth is a storage siding.
Tracks Four and Three are on the original Pennsylvania Railroad alignment. Two and One, slightly higher, are on the old state New-Portage railroad alignment, aimed at New Portage tunnel, south of the original Pennsy tunnel.
New-Portage railroad, part of a state-sponsored combination canal and railroad to compete with NY’s Erie Canal, failed almost immediately, and became part of Pennsy. New Portage tunnel was slightly higher, so Pennsy had to ramp up to it = “The Slide.”
My brother is always attracted to “Five-tracks.” “Never seen five tracks on a railroad main.” (Actually only four tracks are main, but that’s two more than usual.)
The final ascent toward the summit is dramatic; slightly steeper eastbound to New Portage tunnel.
Westbounds usually get Track Four — they came up the east slope after Altoona on Three; which becomes Four past the summit.


38Q is eastbound on One, climbing toward the summit. Right-to-left are Four, Three, Two, One, and the siding. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

Track Three can be either way; it was Two at the summit.
My brother then went to Cresson, then Cassandra Railroad Overlook, even better than Horseshoe Curve because it’s shady.
Cassandra Railroad Overlook is at the east end of a long bypass Pennsy built in 1898.
That bypass circumvented torturous curves through Cassandra; it begins in Portage. It required a long fill, then a deep rock cut — what couldn’t be done when the railroad was first graded.
Part of the original railroad remains as a branch to Sonman coal loadout. Sonman was once a mine, but no longer is. It remains, loading long trains of coal trucked in.
Long ago the highway entered Cassandra over the rock. When that rock was cut for the bypass, an overpass had to be built. That highway since bypassed Cassandra, so its right-of-way was abandoned.
But the old overpass still exists, or was replaced. I’ve heard various stories: original highway bridge versus replacement pedestrian overpass.
I think it’s the original highway overpass; cast-iron or steel trusswork, and a concrete deck. A pedestrian overpass didn’t need to support a loaded Model-A truck — which this bridge could.
Although it’s only one lane: wide enough to clear a Model-A, but probably nothing wider.
Supposedly the bridge was kept so Cassandra residents could safely cross the railroad to coal-mining on the other side of the tracks.
Whatever, railfans began congregating on the old bridge to watch trains.
A Cassandra resident noticed, so started mowing, and put in old restaurant tables. Park benches were added.
Cassandra is the West Slope of the mountain. Not as steep as the East Slope, but trains still use helpers, and assault the heavens climbing.
Most importantly, my brother snagged the SD80MACs; only Norfolk Southern has ‘em.


Y90 with SD80MAC #7202 threads the rock cut toward Cassandra Railroad Overlook. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

The SD80MACs were originally Conrail, and at 5,000 horsepower each were intended to reduce locomotive usage on the old Pennsy Middle Division, Harrisburg to Altoona, from three per train to two.
The SD80MACs were alternating-current traction-motors. Most diesel-electric locomotives had been direct-current.
AC drags better at slow speed than DC, so the SD80MACs got redirected toward coal-drags.
13 of Conrail’s SD80MACs went to CSX after Conrail broke up and sold in 1999. But Norfolk Southern traded for ‘em. Now only NS has SD80MACs.
The MACs are based at Cresson’s helper facility, and get used to drag heavy coal-trains over the mountain to Altoona — coal that originates in the area.
They’re behemoths, and use EMD’s V-20 710G prime-mover.

My brother shot other pictures at Cassandra:


22W hammers upgrade on One, while empty coal cars descend on Three. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)


61N, an empty slab-train, passes under Cassandra Railroad Overlook. (There is a Union-Pacific run-through, or NS ex-UP rebuild candidate, in the lashup.) (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

A “slab-train” is all open gondola-cars. Westbound it carries steel slabs from manufacturer to rolling-mill — usually two slabs per car. The slabs are often rolled into automotive sheetmetal.
As such a “slabber” is heavy, requiring helpers up the East Slope. The helpers also hold back the train as it descends the West Slope.
The train pictured is eastbound, returning empty for more slabs.
My brother then drove to where Jamestown Road crosses the 1898 bypass on a bridge. The bypass is arrow-straight from Cassandra down to Portage, and the overpass is at about the halfway point.
My guess is Pennsy built the overpass, since the girders look like railroad practice. The bridge also has eastbound signals mounted, milepost 257.
Railroad-east looks up the long straight toward Cassandra. Railroad-west looks down the long straight from Portage.


Eastbound 66X, solid crude-oil, approaches Jamestown Road overpass on Track One. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)


21V, a stacker, cruises west down the bypass. —The helpers of 66X are visible far away on Track One. The track that switches into One is from Sonman. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

My brother then drove down to Portage, but our fabulous trailer-shot is being overgrown. A retired highway trailer is trackside where the 1898 bypass ends. We got westbounds at that trailer charging off the bypass.
Word had it the guy cutting back trackside weeds died — don’t know how true that is. (Locals are jumping through hoops for us railfans.)
I’d set up my tripod next to the trailer, and telephoto the curve off the bypass. Now weeds are in the way.


11J, solid auto-racks, exits the 1898 bypass. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

---

(By now I arrived, so together, Thursday, October 19th.)

I went to Cassandra, and my brother back to “Five Tracks.” He said foliage was a little better there, which is near the mountain-top.
Cassandra didn’t work for me. My location needed westbound on Two — everything westbound was on Three, which is partially obscured by trackside shrubbery. Two may have been closed.
I drove back toward Five-Tracks, but decided I’d check out a trackside cutout west of the overpass.


23Z passes the cutout toward MO. (High-Bridge is in the background.) (Photo by BobbaLew.)

(“MO” are old telegraph call-letters for a signal-tower that was once there. MO is now just an interlocking with crossovers = four tracks back to three.)
I then drove back to High-Bridge. My brother, sitting on an old bridge abutment, had already shot 23Z coming down from the summit.


23Z cruises down Four toward High-Bridge from the summit. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

By now we were losing our light.
Looking west at the Five-Tracks approach, railheads gleamed in the setting sun.


294 approaches “High-Bridge” in fading light. (Photo by BobbaLew.)

We drove to “Benny,” but by then anything looking west was destroyed by strong sunlight backlight.

---

(Together, all day Friday, October 20th.)

Our first stop was Horseshoe Curve.
“Every railfan, BY LAW should be required to visit The Mighty Curve” (Horseshoe Curve), BY FAR the BEST railfan pilgrimage spot I’ve ever been to.”
(That’s two different links readers. Second is the YouTube webcam.)


Y91 (empty coal-cars) continues up the western side of the Curve after passing the apex. (Photo by BobbaLew.)


Amtrak’s eastbound Pennsylvanian continues down the Curve towards Altoona. (Photo by BobbaLew.)

“How come they didn’t build a trestle between the two mountains?” a gentleman asked.
We were on the viewing overlook in the Curve’s apex.
“Because it would be too steep!” I exclaimed.
“Railroading isn’t trucking,” my brother added.
“In the early 1800s this mountain made trade between Philadelphia and the nation’s interior almost impossible,” I said. “Allegheny Mountain didn’t extend into NY state, making the Erie Canal possible.
Philadelphia capitalists were so worried over the success of the Erie Canal, they got PA to build a canal system. But Allegheny Mountain couldn’t be canaled. They had to portage it with a railroad, and grading at that time was so rudimentary the railroad had to use inclined planes = steep grades on which stationary steam-engines atop the grade winched up the cars.
The portage railroad also required transloading canal-packets onto railroad flatcars.
By the 1830s railroading was superseding canals. PA’s combined canal/portage system was so cumbersome and slow, Philadelphia capitalists founded their own private common-carrier railroad, the Pennsylvania Railroad, Harrisburg to Pittsburgh.
They still had to conquer Allegheny Mountain. They brought in John Edgar Thomson from GA, who had built railroads in the area. He noticed this valley, that horseshoeing it would ease the grade enough to operate through trains.
Helper locomotives would be needed, but you weren’t breaking up the train.
The grade up east slope of this mountain averages 1.75% — that’s 1.75 feet up for every 100 feet forward. Things start getting hairy after 2%. At 4% yer lucky if a locomotive call pull up 10 or more cars.
I think the maximum ruling grade on Interstates is 7% — a truck can do steeper. But it can’t move 250 or more trailer containers with a crew of only two or three — maybe two or four more over the mountain.
Nor can trucks carry 120 tons of coal, the capacity of a single railroad coal gondola. A lot more than 18 wheels are gonna be needed. —And that coal-train may have more than 100 120-ton cars.
Thomson’s grade over Allegheny Mountain, and his Horseshoe Curve, still exist. 1.75% is fairly steep for a train, but ya haven’t gotta break it up.”
“What an idiot,” my brother said later.
I disagreed. “It’s the old rubber-tire jones,” I said. “Most people don’t understand railroading.” For most people, railroading, like canals, is done. “I never realized so many trains were still running.”
My brother and I both had our railroad-radio scanners. So we got to hear the hours-long radio jabbering about the troubles of train 27N. The “Trip-Optimizer” on one of its two locomotives was shutting down the locomotive.
“Trip-Optimizer” is an auto-pilot of sorts, computerized I’m sure, that operates the train while its engineer stands by to override if necessary. “Trip-Optimizer” monitors train handing and weight to enhance fuel economy. 10% fuel-saving is claimed.
What a capital idea; trash “seat-of-the-pants,” which is different for every human.
WHOA! Garbage-in-garbage-out! I know all-too-well how ‘pyooter trickery can lead astray. “What prompted that?” I ask my iPhone. Mysteries wrapped in conundrums.
If they killed Trip-Optimizer, the locomotive ran fine.
It was the old waazoo. The driver reports hairballs to higher-ups, and thereafter gets blamed. We got this at Transit. A bus would shut down stranding all-and-sundry out in the boonies. 10 degrees out. Shiver two hours awaiting a replacement bus.
Angry passengers badmouth the driver, and Transit management, in its infinite wisdom, blames the driver for the failed bus. “He shoulda refused the bus,” management bellows. At yer peril! Refuse a bus and you got called on the carpet.
The engineer, knowing he’d get called in if he didn’t report the hairball, mentioned it to every higher-up along the line = Harrisburg to Altoona.
And of course every higher-up had to have a full description of the hairball. That’s 10-15 minutes per description. Higher-up after higher-up = referred ever higher.
“If I shut the Optimizer off, no bells, no alarms; the engine loads properly.”
“So run without it.”
HELLO, is this not the same wisdom delivered 100 miles earlier, and perhaps four more times as the train proceeded west? Four times 10 is 40 minutes.
Finally 27N was released from Altoona — “Run without it.”


27N, minus Optimizer, climbs The Mighty Curve. (It’s solid auto-racks.) (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

Employees spend more time figgerin’ how to cover their butts.

We decided to revisit Bennington Curve. It would be morning light, and foliage was slightly better atop the mountain.


590 (loaded coal) rounds Benny. (Photo by BobbaLew.)


25V (stacker on Three) climbs past pushers on the back of 590 descending. (Photo by BobbaLew.)

Trains passed, then I suggested a new photo-location near Bennington = an overlook slightly above the tracks.
I’ve noticed my brother seems hesitant to try new railfan-locations I suggest. This includes new photo-locations. Various things I might not have considered are at play, particularly lighting.
Years ago, back when my brother had only been to Horseshoe Curve, I suggested going to Brickyard Crossing in Altoona. Brickyard is where the railroad crosses little-used Porta Road at grade. It’s the only grade-crossing in Altoona.
A brickyard used to be adjacent, but now it’s gone. Railroad employees and railfans still call it “Brickyard.” It’s milepost 238.8; it has a signal-bridge and defect-detector.
Put-downs, snide remarks, but other family were present; so we went.
The railroad being what it is, after 10 minutes a heavy coal-train came down Track One. Within minutes a stacker was passing uphill on Three.
“Bobby, this place is really cool!”
HELLO; multiple trains are right in-yer-face.
Almost immediately my brother and my railfan nephew were up on a trackside embankment taking photos.
Months later I suggested my brother, etc, visit Cassandra Railroad Overlook. Weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. Cassandra is maybe 12-15 miles west of Horseshoe — but we went.
A few weeks later my railfan nephew showed me photos he and my brother took at — guess — Cassandra Railroad Overlook. After all that badmouthing, my brother took my nephew to Cassandra.
Complaints and bellyaching regarding the new overlook.
“At least it’s worth checking out,” I said.
“Bobby, this place is really great!”
“Tried to tell ya!” I snapped.
My brother snagged the picture I wanted to get.


11J (all auto-racks) passes the new overlook. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

“Not worth coming here if you don’t show,” my brother tells me.
That works both ways, of course. I’m railfan enough to come here alone, and have. But I’d rather it be both of us. We have a good time, and I let him drive. He’s 13 years younger than me.
And despite his management jones, I’m gonna stick to my guns.
“Tell ya what. I’ll go to Fostoria alone if I hafta. I need that shot. You can go where you want.”
Next we drove to Summerhill, railroad-west of Portage, almost to South Fork. An old Pennsy signal-bridge is there, milepost 263, with eastbound signals elevated to be visible above a highway-bridge.
It was a shot I wanted to try = get the signal-bridge silhouetted by sky.
“Get outta my picture!” my brother bellowed. He was behind me on an embankment.
“This shot only works where I am. I ain’t cavin’.”
Ties were piled next to the railroad. Compromise time. I could hunker behind the ties and not be in his picture. Low was where I wanted to be anyway.
The vaunted UPS-train came through, 21E, but I didn’t have my camera on, or whatever. I get various inputs regarding the UPS-train, 21E versus 21J. My railfriend in Altoona says it’s 21E — my brother says 21J is also UPS.
I don’t care that much. I once heard the engineer on a stacker tell the dispatcher no problem holding for “the hotshot” to clear. That was 21E.


21J comes through Summerhill. (The red-and-black wiring probably has something to do with “Positive-Train-Control.”) (Photo by BobbaLew.)

21J I successfully photographed. The UPS-train is cross-country, more-or-less guaranteed on-time. It gets three diesels insteada two. It goes Norfolk Southern to near Chicago, where it gets handed over to Burlington-Northern Santa Fe.
21J also had three diesels. It was pretty much all UPS trailers-on-flatcar, although now Fed-Ex and others are using the “UPS train.”
I also got #6920, Norfolk Southern’s Veterans Unit, an SD60E, rebuilt from an EMD SD-60. It has Norfolk Southern’s new “Crescent cab,” and is painted mainly navy-blue instead of black.


NS’s Veterans-unit is leading. (Photo by BobbaLew.)

6920 was heading I4Z, an advance section of 24Z due to too many cars. The train also had two BNSF run-through units.
So, could we beat it down to Altoona’s Amtrak station, so we could shoot it there? That’s Summerhill to Altoona, perhaps 15-18 miles.


I4Z, led by NS’s Veterans-unit, approaches Altoona station. (Photo by BobbaLew.)

Altoona’s Amtrak station was our next stop, but it was getting dark. In October you only get maybe nine hours of usable light. By 6 p.m. it’s marginal.
The station has two pedestrian overpasses to a railroad museum on the other side of the tracks. Altoona was once Mighty Pennsy’s shop-town.
One bridge is covered, but the second isn’t. Vagrants call the covered bridge “the elevator bridge,” because it has elevators.
The uncovered overpass is just stairs.
“Ya mean I gotta climb them stairs?” I asked. Probably at least 25 feet up; four stair runs.
Two shots, one being Amtrak’s westbound Pennsylvanian, which stops in Altoona.


Amtrak’s westbound Pennsylvanian approaches Altoona‘s Amtrak station. (Photo by BobbaLew.)

My last shot is after 6 p.m. In October ya don’t get many locations.


24W passes Altoona station. (Photo by BobbaLew.)

---

(Saturday, October 21st, alone, before driving home.)

One more shot; tiny Fostoria, hardly anything, but the railroad goes smack through it.
A signal-bridge (227) crosses most of the entire right-of-way; once four tracks, but now three. And one of those tracks is a signal-controlled siding. Six old Pennsy targets are on the signal-bridge — all tracks are signaled either way.
The siding can accommodate extra traffic when Track Two or One are closed. The siding is Track Three — disregard the old signal-signage, which labels it Track One.
I’m trying to silhouette the signal-bridge against sky = a wide-angle shot. Has to be morning-light. Afternoon doesn’t work; only the locomotive-front is lit. I need the train lit too.


25V splits Fostoria. (Photo by BobbaLew.)

• “The Mighty Curve” goes back long ago to the “Mighty Mezz,” the Daily Messenger newspaper in Canandaigua, where I worked after my stroke October 26th, 1993. I recovered well enough to return to work. One time a fellow worker, a graphic designer, asked where I was going on vacation. “Horseshoe Curve,” I said. “The Mighty Curve, eh? How come yer always going there? That’s where you went last time.” “Trains, man.”
• “Transit” equals Regional Transit Service (RTS), the public transit-bus operator in Rochester, NY, where I drove transit-bus for 16&1/2 years (1977-1993). My stroke ended that. I retired from there on medical-disability. I recovered well enough to return to work at the Daily Messenger newspaper in Canandaigua; I retired from that almost 12 years ago.
• “Bobby” is of course me, “Bob Hughes,” aka “BobbaLew.”

Steering-Wheels

My most recent issue of Classic Car magazine, December 2017, prompted an interesting thought.
A columnist noted the steering-wheel was invented. Indeed it was. Steering-wheels became so common I took ‘em for granted.
Driving = “behind the wheel.”
Go back to the earliest days, and cars were steered by tillers. Until one day in 1900 James and William Packard were out exercising one of their creations, they hit a pothole, and the tiller smacked William in the knee.
They asked an engineer back at their factory to come up with something better — less injurious — and VIOLA, the steering-wheel.
Everything I’ve driven, cars anyway, had a steering-wheel. I’m 1944, not 19th century.
Even my first riding lawnmower, a John Deere, had a steering-wheel. Not my current zero-turn.
The steering-wheel put distance between the driver and potholes. Hit a pothole and the wheel might kick you. But not like a tiller.
Since 1900 steering advanced by leaps-and-bounds.
The first leap might be power-steering.
I avoided power-steering at first; it was vague or dead.
My first vehicle with power-steering was our E250 Ford van. It was used; it came that way.
It probably needed it. It had a gigantic heavy 460 under its hood. Still vague, but not bad.


Somewhere in SD. (Photo by BobbaLew.)

Now everything has power-steering. When I first started driving buses, they didn’t. But about 1979 we started getting power-steered buses.
If you didn’t get one, and had a route with many sharp turns, no power-steering wore you out.
Our first car with power-steering was probably our 2003 Honda CR-V.
There were a couple cars after the E250, but none with power-steering.
By 2003 power-steering was hardly noticeable. Vagueness was gone, as was arduous cranking.
My current car has power-steering. If it’s off the effort is tremendous. Same with power-brakes.
I climb in and confront the steering-wheel: leather-wrapped with airbag incorporated.
A friend had a ’49 Ford hotrod. It’s steering-wheel was on a long steel rod waiting to impale your chest. I know, because we took it apart.
Scared me to death! NO WAY could I ever crack 100 behind that steel rod. (And seat-belts = ARE YOU KIDDING?)
Now that shaft incorporates a collapsable section — not so scary.
And who woulda known that steering-wheel was invented to save knees!

• My riding-mower is a 48-inch “zero-turn:’ “zero-turn” because it’s a special design with separate drives to each drive-wheel, so can be spun on a dime. “Zero-turns” are becoming the norm, because they cut mowing time compared to a lawn-tractor, which has to be set up for each mowing-pass.
• For 16&1/2 years (1977-1993) I drove transit bus for Regional Transit Service (RTS) in Rochester, NY, a public employer, the transit-bus operator in Rochester and environs. My stroke October 26th, 1993 ended that. I retired on medical-disability. I recovered well enough to return to work at a newspaper; I retired from that 11 years ago.

Pumpkin Patch Trains

R&GV #54 climbs the hill. (iPhone photo by BobbaLew.)

How do I say anything at all about Rochester & Genesee Valley Railroad Museum that will be perceived positively?
I been slingin’ words almost 40 years. I’ve noticed the written word is usually perceived negatively.
The exact same wording conveyed face-to-face usually is perceived positively.
Back in the early ‘70s I reported a local car-rally. My report was published in a small weekly newspaper.
The rallyists went ballistic; as if I divulged their secret little world.
Not long ago I posted a comment on Facebook reflecting my parents’ negative opinion regarding an uncle. His kids went ballistic, and started badmouthing me personally.
At the newspaper where I worked following my stroke, we called this “shooting the Messenger.” It refers to killing the bearer of bad news, e.g. a general kills the one who came bearing bad news regarding a war campaign.
Our newspaper was the Canandaigua Daily Messenger.
My brother Bill, from northern DE, and his wife Sue, came to visit.
Rochester & Genesee Valley Railroad Museum stages annual Fall-Foliage excursions on an adjacent shortline railroad. They have old railroad coaches they use for the excursions.
It was the weekend prior to my brother’s visit, so we had to skip it. R&GV also runs “Pumpkin Patch” trains on other Fall weekends. But they’re not full-boat Fall-Foliage excursions.
R&GV has its own railroad. It can’t accommodate boomin’-and-zoomin’ with big-time equipment, but it IS a railroad.
The Pumpkin Patch trains would just be a small open-air car and a caboose. A small R&GV locomotive would pull.
I got tickets for a Pumpkin Patch train-ride.
The museum has been extant 80 years, first as an early chapter of the National Railway Historical Society. Not too long ago they cut ties because NRHS wouldn’t help them fund restoration projects.
I visited long ago with that same brother, plus his railfan son who at that time was 4 or 5. Back then R&GV was still an NRHS chapter, and didn’t have a railroad.
Years earlier they got an old rural depot along Erie Railroad’s Rochester branch. That branch is now Livonia, Avon & Lakeville, who helps run the museum’s Fall-Foliage excursions. South of Livonia the Erie branch is abandoned — in fact, even north of Livonia is partially abandoned.


R&GV’s ex-Erie depot. (iPhone photo by BobbaLew.)

LA&L ran steam-powered passenger excursions at first. I did it, of course; that’s about 1970.
LA&L became a smashing success, mainly because it went after lineside customers. Now it operates far more than originally, but only freight. The passenger excursions ended, and the steam-engine was sold.
LA&L isn’t big-time railroading, but it does go right past the museum’s depot building.
When I visited in the ‘70s, the chapter had a few equipment pieces. They’ve since acquired quite a bit more, plus built an enclosed restoration shop on a hill above the depot.
Their railroad has to climb that hill, and used to connect to N.Y. Museum of Transportation nearby. The two organizations ran small joint railroad operations, but had a falling out. It was over railroad safety; N.Y. Museum of Transportation was accused of being lax.


Outside the restoration shop. (iPhone photo by BobbaLew.)

The Pumpkin Patch trains are mainly aimed at kids. It isn’t big-time railroading, but it’s railroading. (And thank goodness it isn’t “Thomas the Tank-Engine.”)
Trainmen are dressed in railroad-garb: conductor uniforms, etc.
First we exchanged our computer printouts for actual tickets. Then we strode through the ancient depot. 1920s! Telegraph in one corner, and I noticed dusty wooden row-seats for waiting passengers. —A world that no longer is.
Outside we got in line for the open-air car, a new addition of open-air seating under roof atop an old flatcar.
The open-air car was constructed by volunteers; R&GV is volunteer.
The caboose was ex-Erie C254, steel and restored.
Our tiny two-car train pulled in and stopped amid screeching and clattering brakes. Our train was pulled by the museum’s only locomotive, R&GV #54, the only locomotive designated R&GV. There are others: Livonia, Avon & Lakeville #20, Eastman Kodak #9, ex Rochester Gas & Electric, and #1843 (ex-Army).
Their prize, “Old HammerHead,” ex-Lehigh Valley #211, was inside their restoration shop. It’s an Alco RS-3, re-engined long ago by Conrail with an EMD prime-mover.


Nickel Plate #79 (at right). (iPhone photo by BobbaLew.)

There also is another prize, Nickel Plate #79, stored inactive. (Big-time railroading, though only a yard-switcher.)
We rode up the hill, then backed toward the restoration shop. We could hang around and look around, and from the Pumpkin Patch watch our tiny train again climb the hill with another load of happy passengers.

• A “car-rally” is not a race, so I was told. Rally-organizers lay out a route, usually of little-used country roads, and note the time required to safely and lawfully navigate the route. The goal is for a driver/car to zero time-points set up along the route. Route instructions are handed out before the rally, with the time required to navigate each section noted. Route instructions are often cryptic, intended to put off the driver/navigator of each car. Cars usually have a driver and also a navigator, sometimes the driver’s wife — although I was told that was a good way to destroy a marriage. My rally was organized by the local Corvair-Owners club, but I rode along in a 1969 440 Barracuda. Often we went off-route, then it was PEDAL-TO-THE-METAL to get back on-route. I probably saw over 100 mph many times. Then the driver/navigator team might see a rally checkpoint ahead, and pull over to show on time. The team that won was the one closest to being on time. —What I witnessed was sheer madness: angry accusations and entrants threatening fisticuffs.
• I had a stroke October 26th, 1993, from which I pretty much recovered. Just tiny detriments; I can pass for never having had a stroke. It slightly compromised my speech. (Difficulty finding and putting words together.)

Paradigm shift

“We’re goin’ home, Big Meat-head,” I said to my dog. I call her “Meat-head” because like “pot-heads” want marijuana, my dog wants meat.
“Goin’ home to our strange little life I’m told isn’t strange.”
I suppose I’ve made what over-educated hoity-toities call a “paradigm shift.”
Ever since my wife died five years ago I felt I was living “a strange little life.” Unable to travel or do much, living in a house full of junk.
I happened to mention this to my counselor last visit.
“What’s strange about it?” she asked. Part of my counselor’s duty is to help me become my own judge.
She had a point.
Our “strange little life” has become “our strange little life that’s supposedly not strange.”
RE: “house full of junk.....”
I daycare my dog with a friend I call “Paster Bill.” We used to work at the Messenger newspaper in Canandaigua. He and his wife (also ex-Messenger) established a pet-grooming business in Canandaigua, and they daycare my dog when I’m in town — like at the YMCA.
We remain good friends because we’re both bleeding-heart liberals. “Paster Bill” is also studying to become a paster.
Occasionally I bother him.
“Believe me,” he says; “your house is not full of junk. I’ve seen worse.”
Okay, a lot is put away. But opening my closets spills tons of junk. Components of my old hi-fi, bicycles, a leaky computer-printer, many of my wife’s accoutrements. A spare room still has bedding used years ago by my wife’s mother — who died about a year ago.
The other day my neighbor noticed my old cross-country skis. “You oughta put that stuff on Craig’s List,” he said. As if I’d wanna.
I used to sell stuff in the “Swap-Sheet,” which was before Craig’s List.
I’m not interested in parrying geeks at all hours, looking for something-for-nothing.
“How come your car’s so rusty?”
“What did you expect for $500?”
I’m not interested in fielding such gibberish, particularly slobbering phonecalls at 3 a.m.
“I wouldn’t wanna do it either,” my counselor says.
Dust-bunnies accumulate for lack of someone to clean ‘em up.
“Oh well,” I think; “despite the dust I’m still here.”
So my counselor had a point, and I guess I accommodated.
“What difference does it make?” she says. “When yer gone, ya can’t be guilty.
Plus there are estate-sales.”

• My current dog is “Scarlett” (two “Ts,” as in Scarlett O’Hara), a rescue Irish-Setter. She’s thirteen, and is my sixth Irish-Setter, a high-energy dog. (A “rescue Irish Setter” is an Irish Setter rescued from a bad home; e.g. abusive or a puppy-mill. [Scarlett was from a failed backyard breeder.] By getting a rescue-dog, we avoid puppydom, but the dog is often messed up. —Scarlett isn't bad. She’s my fourth rescue.)
• RE: “Meat-head.....” —Every dog we (I) ever owned I’ve nicknamed “Meat-head.” With me Scarlett knows of herself as “Meat-head.” (A previous dog, who was rather small, I called “Little Meat-head.”)

“Feeble” versus “not feeble”

“Here I am again,” I say to lifeguards at the Canandaigua YMCA pool.
“Another feeble attempt to stave off aging.
I know I’m not supposed to say ‘feeble,’ but as long as I stagger in that pool, I feel my attempts are ‘feeble.’”
For perhaps the past six months I have been doing aquatic therapy in the Canandaigua YMCA pool, attempting to improve my balance, which is dreadful.
I had a stroke 24 years ago, and have been unable to balance on one foot since. I also can’t do the closed-eye model-walk with hands out front.
Don’t know as the stroke is why, since I got back to running, bicycle and motorcycle.
I was told bicycle and motorcycle are miraculous, but they both have giant spinning gyroscopes called wheels. Get above 5 mph and they balance themselves.
But things seem to have deteriorated recently. I fell hard on ice a couple years ago, and more-or-less never recovered.
We X-rayed my knees, and determined my left knee was bone-on-bone. I was advised knee-replacement.
At least a year of hobbling passed waiting to replace my knee.
That was finally done two years ago, but balance problems persisted, or even worsened. Occasionally I fell.
Now, perhaps because of aquacise, I no longer fall as much. But I feel that’s paying maximum attention to where I step — avoiding roots, rocks, and pavement edges that could trip me.
I still lose my balance = start toppling over. I can usually catch it. I also usually catch stumbles.
People tell me I walk much better. Maybe so, but I still start toppling, and can’t balance on one foot.
I have been diagnosed with “neuropathy,” wasting away of nerves to my feet. I still feel pain if I stand on something painful. But supposedly neuropathy is why my balance is bad.
Yet I keep hammering at it. Don’t know as I’ll ever be able to model-walk, or stand on one foot.
All I know is I feel fairly confident walking on dreadful footing, e.g. walking my dog at the park, or chasing trains — where rock-ballast awaits.
I can avoid falling, but feel that’s paying attention to footing.

Can I back out?

For the past couple years, Yr Fthfl Srvnt has been driving a Smartphone.
I started with a Motorola Droid-X, but quickly tired of its many foibles, like calls to strangers in the middle of the night.
And complete removal of the battery to reboot the phone. which I had to do often.
The Motorola Droid-X was “Android,” Google’s Smartphone platform at that time.
My brother in northern DE suggested an Apple iPhone, like he and his wife.
This despite my siblings telling me Apple was the Devil incarnate, that I’m “rebellious” to use an Apple computer.
“Jesus uses a Windows PC,” I was told.
I started with a -5, then I upgraded to the iPhone-6 I now have. Each came with a contract renewal, so didn’t cost much. My cellphone service is Verizon.
Every couple months Apple debuts a new operating-system for iPhone. I dutifully installed each upgrade as it came.
The other night they wanted to upgrade to iOS11, so I eventually let ‘em.
As always, things are different, but in my humble opinion worse.
Where, pray tell, are the scroll functions for voice-recognition text and e-mail?
I also use VR to do my grocery lists.
Ya know, there are people out there, me for example, who like to fix the errors voice-recognition makes. VR is pretty good, but unlike many I like to make my texts and e-mails readable (gasp) instead of challenging.
For example, if I say “too,” VR will put “2.” The average dork can figger that out, but sometimes VR is so off-the-mark what I meant is lost.
With no scroll-buttons I can’t just scroll to the fix. I gotta hope my finger locates the curser nearby, then delete everything after the error. Do that, and I’m doubling my time to fix things.
Plus iOS11 wants my thumbprint just to log-in. It gives me the option of password log-in, but to go to that is an added step = five seconds.
Five seconds; La-dee-dah! Except that’s five seconds 10.6 didn’t require. 11 thereby slowed phone operation five seconds.
So goes instant gratification!
So “do the thumbprint log-in, dude.”
I did, a few months ago. It was so erratic I switched back to password log-in.
Maybe it’s better now, but I have better things to do than spend an hour setting that up.
What upsets me most is loss of the scroll function.
Can I go back? Uninstall 11 and go back to 10.6?
iOS upgrades need a “command-Z.”

• “Command-Z” is a computer key stroke that reverses what you just did = a mistake, for example. My word-processor has multiple “command-Zs.” —Upgrading to iOS11 was a mistake.

The boat didn’t sink

We approach the State Street bridge in Pittsford. (The captain is at left in the red tee-shirt.) (iPhone photo by BobbaLew.)

On Wednesday, October 4th, the “Alumni” held a cruise on the Erie Canal.
The “Alumni” are retired union employees of Regional Transit Service (RTS) in Rochester, NY, a public employer, the transit-bus operator in Rochester and environs.
Most of us are retired bus-drivers. My career ended in late 1993 with my stroke. 16 & 1/2 years. The job was okay at first — it paid for my house. But I was tiring of it, especially our clientele.
We bus-drivers had an unwritten rule = DON’T GET SHOT! We were supposed to enforce many rules, and often got called in.
Paramount was not getting killed — like over a 15¢ fare discrepancy.
I used to say there were three givens to avoid getting fired: -a) show up, -b) don’t hit anything, and -c) keep yer hands outta the farebox.
Who knows what all I got blown in for, but I never was taken “outta service,” probably because I followed those three rules.
I was an hour late starting out — would I miss the boat? We bus-drivers had terminology for failing to show on time for assignment. We “slipped.” You were likely sent home to lose the entire day, or be held for piecework. You might only work a couple hours instead of eight.
Our boat would start loading before noon. I also had to drop off my dog for doggy daycare = about 5-10 minutes.
I made it. Our boat was the Colonial Belle, a fairly large double-decker.
We had at least 50, maybe more. But as always I’m sorta out-of-it. I’m a bleeding-heart liberal, not the kind of person that makes a bus-driver.
But bus-driving made me more sociable and assertive.
“Siddown and shaddup!” I once told some unruly teenagers. “As long as I’m drivin’ the bus, I’m captain of the ship!”
Before bus-driving I couldna done that. Bus-driving brought that out.
My beloved wife, who died five years ago, commented bus-driving was an excellent fit for me. To successfully parry our clientele you had to be ornery. I already was.
Most stayed downstairs inside the boat. A few of us went topside out in the open.
The boat’s captain was also topside in an open cubical with wheel and controls. He provided running commentary of our cruise.
I kept my mouth shut. He didn’t make any grievous errors, but failed to say Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York City, in the early 1800s, were competing to become this nation’s premier ocean port.
Philadelphia and Baltimore both had the Appalachians problem, particularly Allegheny Mountain.
New York didn’t. No Appalachians up toward Lake Ontario. A canal in NY didn’t have the mountain challenges of PA and MD.
And so the Erie Canal, funded more-or-less by the state, which made NY the Empire-State. —It made New York City our nation’s premier ocean port.
He also failed to note canals were quickly outmoded by railroads. Railroads had numerous advantages, but mainly they didn’t freeze in Winter.
Digging the Erie with early 1800s technology, mainly pick-and-shovel, was an immense engineering success. From Buffalo to the Hudson at Albany the canal descended 566 feet. This required a slew of locks, but there was no Allegheny Mountain.
For a while the Erie Canal was an astounding commercial success. It opened this nation’s interior to trade. The boom lasted maybe 30-50 years. Canals were a good idea, but quickly superseded by railroading.
The canal was improved over-the-years. At first it was only four feet deep, but in 1836 it was deepened to seven feet and widened. The number of locks was reduced.
It was improved again in 1918, and renamed the “State Barge Canal,” deep enough to accommodate tugboats with barges. It has since been renamed back to the “Erie Canal.”
There were numerous challenges. Perhaps most difficult were -A) getting up out of the Hudson River valley, and -B) up the Niagara Escarpment toward Buffalo.
There were numerous rivers to cross, which was often done with aqueducts, canal-carrying bridges.
We were traveling an aqueduct of sorts. One challenge was getting across Irondequoit defile. The earthen canal-sides were built up enough to raise the canal above the defile. Our boat was at roof and treetop level of things down in the defile.
Most sat downstairs, but a few of us went topside. I started with an old friend and his wife. They had never done the canal-cruise; I did last time, which I think was two years ago, the first time the Alumni did it.
Our cruise was supposedly “Fall foliage,” but fall-foliage had hardly begun. My perception was it was a get-together for Transit retirees, that just happened to be an Erie Canal cruise.
Speed-limit on the canal is 10 mph; we weren’t doing that. Bicyclists passed on the old towpath, converted to a canal-side trail.
Canal-side condos drifted lazily by, along with canal-side residences. They probably cost a fortune.
The canal is no longer the commercial success it once was. It sees little commercial traffic; mostly recreational boating. Part of it gets drained in Winter.
Driving bus we said there were two seasons: canal-full and canal-empty.
I felt like those downstairs were missing out. Socializing instead of taking it all in, which is fine.
I ended up off by myself, a feeble attempt to take better topside photographs with my iPhone, plus silently critique the captain.
Eventually we turned around to return to Fairport where we started. I requested coworkers move so I could get a better picture.
“So how’s yer wife doing?” one asked.
“My wife died over five years ago,” I said.
Our cruise ended with coworkers bellowing the merits of the Trump administration.
“He’s doing a wonderful job,” one yelled; “yet them hoity-toity over-educated liberals (gasp) badmouth everything he says or does.”
I normally duck out of political or religious discussions, wanting to not lose friends. BUT  “And so it was under Obama. Limbaugh and his lackeys supplied the vitriol for CONSERVATIVES. They blamed him for everything.”
“Execute Hillary!” they screamed.
They even claimed Obama was an Islamic terrorist Hell-bent on destroying America. They even questioned his citizenship. “Named after Saddam Hussein, I tell ya!”
Grist for haters.
Some of my coworkers badmouthed unions. “HEX-KYOOZE me, but why yer wages were half-decent is because of unions.”
We ambled slowly off the boat. I noticed a proliferation of canes among attendees. My friend also had difficulty going down stairs. So do I. “Watch yer step, Bob,” someone said.
We’re getting old, but “No cane fer this kid yet. I shouldn’t need no cane. My balance is dreadful, but I do okay without a cane.” —And will continue to do so.
My final stop was to reclaim my dog from doggy daycare. The owner appeared with my dog.
“As you can see,” I said; “the boat didn’t sink.
The lady laughed. “No charge,” she said.
“Wait a minute,” I said. “Yer running a business here. Are you sure?”
“She was only here a couple hours. Anyway, we like you as well as your dog.”
There it is again, dear readers. Make ‘em laugh = collect freebie.

“The Keed” versus Firefox

Constant-readers, and apparently there are a few, know about two weeks ago I upgraded the operating-system on this ancient Apple MacBook Pro laptop from the OS-X “Snow-Leopard” (10.6) that came on it to OS-X “El Capitan” (10.11). Supposedly to better protect it from viruses; it was claimed “El Cappy” would be safer.
What do I know? All I know is my ‘pyooter got a virus — probably planted by a website, since I never click anything.
My Internet-browser is Firefox, as it’s been for years. Before Firefox was Internet-Explorer for MACs, and even Netscape. All were eons ago — although Netscape 4.73 is probably still in this machine. (Does Netscape still exist?)
Firefox stopped automatically upgrading. Snow Leopard was incompatible with more recent Firefoxes.
So my Firefox was still my older version despite El Cappy.
The other day I noticed a small message denoting slow Firefox startup, beside a button to fix it.
Knowing all-to-well what happens when I click a fixer button — namely it explodes in my face — I clicked it, hoping I could back away if necessary.
ZOOM! Off into unfathomable-of-unfathomables. I ain’t a ‘pyooter engineer.
Firefox presented me with something that took over my entire screen.
It wanted me to “set-up-account.”
Yeah, sure; I can’t even buy groceries without them tracking my purchases.
“How old are you?” it asked. I considered the 969 years of Methuselah, but was kind enough to be honest. (I’m 73.)
I probably don’t have this right: it wanted me to log-in by password.
“What password?” I yelled; “unless it’s the one I just created.”
Stabbing around, only one Internet-tab was on my Firefox = their log-in screen. All my previous tabs were gone.
So it appeared my Firefox was upgraded, but in so doing all my tabs got vaporized, plus I could no longer access my bookmarks.
Where my old Firefox was I have no idea; although it probably still existed on my backup external.
Another long trip to Mac-Shack was developing. Drive poor Andrew, my ‘pyooter-guru, bonkers.
Firefox was also blasting me about “syncing” my iPhone with a newly-installed “Firefox-for-iPhone” app.
A day or two passed, enough time to “think-about-it.” (DREAD!)
I know, years ago at the Messenger Newspaper I was told “That there thinkin’ jazz is dangerous.”
I bet Firefox has a “view” menu that can fire up my 89 bazilyun bookmarks. Or maybe the “bookmarks” menu itself.
Supposedly all my bookmarks had transferred = they’re in here somewhere.
“Bookmarks toolbar;” VIOLA! There they are!
Then I created all the tabs I normally use, then “bookmark tabs.”
Viola, again! Saved as “tabs” in my “Bookmarks toolbar.”
So, when my most recent Firefox opens only one tab, I add tabs, and use bookmarks to make the tab be what I use.
Previously I had maybe 20+ tabs running. Andrew said they used memory, but this MacBook Pro has four gigs, so I never got the “not-enough-memory” shuffle.
Andrew suggested I bookmark my tabs, so only three or four are running instead of 20. —My stabbing around did that.
My iPhone is still not “synced;” whatever that means.
Let ‘er rip = into mumbo-jumbo land.
I installed Firefox-for-iPhone from Apple’s app store, but now Firefox wants a confirmation-number, supposedly sent by e-mail.
Nothing yet; not even in my spam-folder. Maybe they’re out on donut-break.
Not that I care. My iPhone is another day.
At least the Firefox on this rig is drivable.
I won’t be bothering Andrew.