“Cache” not “Cash”

—“What, pray tell, is this?” (Above.)
I asked that to ******, my contact at Railstream. I’ve never met ******. Perhaps she’s the wife of Railstream’s owner, or just their resident ‘pyooter-guru.
When I bless them with ‘pyooter questions, it’s usually ****** that answers.
Railstream streams live railroad video over the Internet. They have 26 video-cameras at 21 locations. Some are railfan accommodations, and other locations are interesting to railfans.
The one I always watch is the Cresson webcam. it’s on Station-Inn, a railfan bed-and-breakfast in Cresson PA.
Station-Inn is right next to the old Pennsy (Pennsylvania Railroad) mainline up the west slope of Allegheny Mountain.
The railroad is now Norfolk Southern, and is still very busy. That railroad was, and still is, a main trade conduit with this nation’s northeastern megalopolis.
I have that Cresson webcam on constantly. I use it as background.
I’ve been to the area many times — “Altoona” I always say. Cresson is west of Altoona; other side of the mountain. Altoona used to be Pennsy’s main railroad town = shops and maintenance facilities. Pennsy built locomotives in Altoona years ago.
And Norfolk Southern still has quite a bit. A giant locomotive maintenance facility is just north of Altoona.
Altoona is where Pennsy took on Allegheny Mountain; long ago a barrier to trade with the midwest.
Pennsy added helper locomotives to conquer the mountain. Norfolk Southern still does.
And the railroad is very busy. “Wait 15-25 minutes and you’ll see a train,” I always say. Track-maintenance may lengthen wait-times, but it can’t throttle train-flow.
Often we’ll see two trains at a time; one westbound passing one eastbound. There are three tracks, and my first “double” (two trains at once) was two eastbounds.

My first “double” in years, in Lilly PA. (Faudi called ‘em “doubles.”) (Photo by BobbaLew with Phil Faudi.)

Three trains on four tracks, at the Mighty Curve, Labor Day 1970. (Penn-Central back then.) (Photo by BobbaLew.)

I’ve even seen three at once on four tracks. Now it’s three tracks. I bet they cut back to two tracks in not too long.
The railroad is also the location of world-famous Horseshoe Curve (the Mighty Curve), a trick to railroad over Allegheny Mountain without steep grades.
“Addicted to the Cresson webcam,” I say.
“Sounds like 04T.” It’s about 9:10 A.M., and 04T is Amtrak’s eastbound Pennsylvanian.
Around 6 P.M., rumba-rumba-rumba. “Sounds like 07T,” Amtrak’s westbound Pennsylvanian. 04T and 07T are the only passenger-trains left on this storied cross-state railroad. There used to be hundreds.
Many freight-trains remain: mixed freight, unit coal, unit crude-oil, or unit autos. And plenty of stackers: unit-trains of double-stacked freight containers.
40 feet are containers for overseas shipping, and up to 53 feet are domestic intermodal: thousands of containers destined for trucking. —Imagine all those containers as trucks clogging an Interstate.
But my Cresson webcam has been acting wonky. I don’t know how things work, but perhaps the actual video is stored in my computer for playback maybe 10-15 seconds after what was recorded.
If I’m actually at Station Inn a train may be passing out front, but it’s not on Railstream yet.
No matter when I’m not at Station Inn, but it’s nice to not hafta continuously refresh Railstream when its “feed” locks.
“Clear your cache,” ****** suggested.
What, pray tell, is cache?” I’d ask. I’m not a techie. Google defines “computer cache” as bits and pieces of a website you visited before so that website can avoid displaying from scratch. (Displaying from cache is faster than from scratch.)
Apparently cache increases in size as more is cached. So now my cache is so big it constricts website performance.
LA-DEE-DAH! How do I “clear cache?” ****** suggested that some time ago, but I didn’t because Railstream continued working.
But now I’m getting the “quota” message — with Railstream hung.
“Definitely clear your cache,” ****** stated.
I fired up YouTube. Thank goodness a friend turned me on to YouTube years ago. “Clear cache from Firefox,” I queried.
Many answers, but my first was barely audible, and by some techie in Indonesia mumbling broken English. (Microsoft help-desk, mayhap?)
My second hit was American, but his suggestions weren’t what was on MY Firefox. Seems they never are. I always hafta apply guile-and-cunning.
I ended up using Firefox’s help-screen. Yada-yada-yada-yada. Verbiage overload for a stroke-survivor. How can I digest all that when I can barely concentrate?
“Well,” I say. “Others my age (76) give up in despair.” The one who buys groceries, does laundry, makes the bed, etc is ME. So the one who drives this ‘pyooter is me alone.
Engage what gray-matter remains. Dodge the unfathomables: “history,” “cookies,” “sites visited,” etc. “Clear cache and something else;” (“cookies,” I think). I untoggled “something else,” thereby only clearing cache, I guess.
I clicked the “clear cache,” and nothing happened — or so it seemed.
No crunching or sounds of any kind. Welcome to computer-tech where shutter-trip sound gets added to your Smartphone’s operating-system to know you took a picture.
After two tries I guess my cache is cleared. Railstream isn’t hanging any more.
So thank you ******. And add one more fillip to the old geezer’s computer knowledge, most of which was gleaned on-my-own.

• “KRESS-in.”
• I had a stroke October 26th, 1993 from an undiagnosed heart-defect since repaired. I pretty much recovered. Just tiny detriments; I can pass for never having had a stroke.