Saturday, June 10, 2006

I'm Back!!!

Thank you all for the nice emails... I miss you all! I've been working 60 to 70 hours a week and haven't gotten the time to get to the library. By the time I get home everything was closed in town. So here's the skinny in a nutshell...
I got here all right and settled in, and after a week I was talking to the owner and president of the railroad and he was telling me of all the track work that needed to be done on the 123 milw main line that the operate the New Tygard Flyer passenger train and local freight trains. The contractor who was doing the work I was told had the ballast tamper there but they were looking for a regulator operator... This is where I step in. I regulated ballast before when I was a crewman on a the ballast cleaner two years ago. He made the suggestion that I take the job temporarily until that work gets done.
So I worked for the Durbin & Greenbrier Rail Road a total of one week. I'm now working for AmTrack maintenance of way (not to be confused with Amtrak) operating a ballast regulator. (Pictures soon!) and the funny thing about it is I'm making a really obscene amount of money doing it... I'll put it this way, I make more an hour now that I did in a day at my job in Athens, and my weekly paychecks still have commas in the amount after taxes. Too bad it'll only last until the summer is over...
I also found a really nice apartment here in town and I'll be moving in tomorrow. I expect to head down to Athens next weekend to get my stuff and I should have phone and internet at my place in a few weeks. There's no cable internet available so I'll have to go with DSL for now. I'll miss my really fast cable modem!
Thanks again for all the nice emails, I promise I'll get to answering all soon! I miss you all too!

13 comments:

cmk said...

Glad to hear you are still among us, RT! I look forward to reading you again! Take care.

Kev said...

Welcome back and congratulations!

So ... it's been 149 days. What happened?

DivineMsN said...

Congrats, we look forward to hearing from you.

Lisa said...

Welcome back!

berly02 said...

You sound so happy. Glad your back!

Crazy Me said...

Glad you are back!! I want to make an "obscene" amount of $$!! Sign me up!

The Ramblin Hillbilly said...

Welcome back RT, Glad to see you up and running again. Just gimme a call when your ready to pick the stuff up.

Becky said...

Hey there Tom -- I missed the original announcement, but congrats and well done! Take care and follow your dreams.

Becky

Mrs. S. said...

YEA!! I clicked just for giggles.. I had to take a double take when I saw "I'm Back!"

I'm so glad everything is going good!!

Looking forward to reading more!

tsduff said...

Tom, glad to hear SOMEONE is making it... $$ wise anyway ;-)

I'm so happy for you at your great job. It sounds so incredible, considering the way things were at the old job. Thanks for the update - you have been missed.

bevy said...

Glad you're ok and that nothing happened to you on 06.06.06.

Courtney O. said...

Congrats to you on everything!! Sounds like you're enjoying your new job :) You deserve it!

phlegmfatale said...

so lovely to know you have landed in such a lovely spot!