Long Weekend Audio: Caboom!Cast

The urge struck us to do some more audio, so here we are. We had a lot of fun doing this one.

It started with me not saying go at the right moment. Woops. Welcome to me not being a good record button-pusher. Then we just rambled about the awesome weather, the Blue Jays winning again, and the coolness that is our balcony.

I don't know if you can hear what happened next, but somebody's car alarm similar to the one I described in this old post started going off, so Steve started imitating it...at which point, Trix brought us back to the reason we decided to do this audio in the first place.

Unfortunately you can't hear it, but Trix started circling us, puffing furiously. We put the mic in her face, but she did not puff hello. I described some new behaviour Trix does when there are fireworks or thunder storms, or our new term, thunderworks! The fear has been with her all along, but it has changed recently. Oh yeah? and I meant 1 a.m. not p.m. woops.

And as we finished up our thunderworks discussion, we came up with another term. Nicky Nicky Blind door: the act of a blind person knocking on the wrong door, realizing it's the wrong house, and getting the hell out of dodge, leading the person who lives in the wrong house to believe they've been a victim of Nicky Nicky 9 Door. And here's the link to the story of that blind guy getting shot in the face when he entered the wrong house. Oh yeah, and here's the story of the drunk unintentional houseguest we had one night. Before we move on, here's that car alarm bit I was talking about, a super detailed account of Shoe's surprise 40th birthday party, and a picture of the yes please burger. Holy crap, how many things did we have to mention in that short stint?

Moving on, we talked some more about the hot weather, and the plants a friend and I are planting in the Enabling Garden. Hey, anybody know where the reference "fuck this cat, and fuck this door!" came from? Go ahead and take a guess. At this point, we came up with our third invented word, Friedo (pronounced "fried o"): dog left in a hot car. We also made up some new lyrics to what would be the Frido song. And you know what? We should have stuck to that song...because I proceeded to ruin the next song we attempted. Even these people did a better job.

This led to an awesome story of how, in his CFRU days, Steve unintentionally insulted electronica. R2D2, a television and a vacuum having a threesome, you say? What a description.

Wow. This thing goes everywhere. We went from how you can't please everybody on the radio and on websites to me apologizing for not realizing that the Jonathan Sory story was more tragic than it seemed on the surface.

...which somehow led in a long and winding way to things taking on a totally different meaning if you're just listening to them, which then led to talking about screen reader users who just go by the way words sound and don't check the spelling, which can lead to some rather creative typos. Man, if you're bored, I understand.

Before we signed off, I made fun of Steve's loud phone text message noises, and Trix reappeared, looking all scared all over again.

And that about does it for another one. I think coining 3 new terms is pretty good. We enjoyed putting it together, hope you enjoy listening. Go get it in all its 1 hour and 7 minute glory.

You Stupid, Stupid Kids!

Ug. Just...seriously. Say these kids are young all you want, but that's no excuse. Us smart ones had this train shit nailed down at the exact moment mom and dad taught us about looking both ways for cars. The thought process went a little something like this: Oh damn, those things move fast. Ok, I'll be sure not to fuck with them.

The video was taken on a stretch of CN rail line near 16th Avenue Public School in Richmond Hill, north of Toronto.

The CBC viewer captured two pieces of video, taken moments apart. They show two children, who appear to be no older than 12, playing a dangerous game with passing CN freight trains.

In the first video, one youngster "plays chicken" with an approaching train, stepping off the tracks seconds before it passes at high speed.

In the second piece of video, two children — including one from the first video — touch a slow-moving train as it passes in the opposite direction on an adjacent track.

If you click the link not only can you see the videos, but you can read all sorts of other mind boggling stupidity about how yes this shortcut is unsafe but I save 15 minutes by using it and yeah, let's keep hacking open the fence the train people keep fixing. surely there's no reason why they don't want us there.

If it weren't for the knowledge that some poor sap will have to clean your guts off the tracks and that it would slow down the days of innocent people when the trains have to stop, I'd wish death upon you all.

Retards.

Maybe He Really Is Invincible.

Holy crap. Exactly how drunk do you have to be to get hit by a train and not know it? Leonard Nickelray says he had been drinking and was walking home groovin' to his apparently way too loud iPod when the train came up behind him and wompled him. He flew through the air, but witnesses said he just got up and kept walking.

When police tracked him down, he had no idea what had happened, but noticed now that all kinds of parts of his body hurt. They took him to the hospital, and they found no broken bones.

What the? How the? It's a train. Most of us would be dead or pretty severely injured. But not this guy. He just gets up like nothing happened.

I wonder if this would have been the way our buddy Anton would have reacted if he had been hit by a train while drunk. Reading this story reminds me of a certain New Years party. Anton was pretty gone, and started bouncing off walls and screaming "I am invincible!" When we told him about it the next day, he said "I was wondering why my hips hurt today." That'd be why, bud.

I think Leonard Nickelray should run out and buy a lottery ticket. He's a very lucky man.

He Didn't Catch The Train, But The Train Caught Him

Since we have talked so much about people crossing the tracks and not hearing or seeing the oncoming train and then getting smucked by it, I thought this video had a place here. Apparently this guy was moving rather slowly. I don't know, because the audio in the video doesn't mention how fast he was going, although it says he was rushing to catch the train. It does say he didn't see it. Um, how?

All Aboard The Obliviot Train

People are really losing respect for trains. A man in Missoula, Montana was in his car, drivin' along groovin' to music. He was so oblivious that he drove through an intersection onto some railroad tracks, seemingly while a train was coming. He had the music set so loud that he didn't notice the slow-moving train until it hit his car. Luckily for him, his car was pooched but he was fine.

In New Mexico, however, 18-year-old Amanda Byrne wasn't so lucky. She was jog jog joggin' along, listening to music in a headset, and also wearing a headband, and jog jog jogged right into the path of a train. It honked frantically and tried to put the brakes on as it came up behind her, but she somehow didn't feel the vibrations either, and...ker smacko! Amanda Byrne is no longer with us.

People, please, watch out while walking on train tracks. They're primarily meant for trains!

Somebody Needs To Tell This Kid That There's No Such Thing As An Extra Life

I respect the hell out of Alessandro Micalizzi. Don't feel bad, I didn't know that name until just now either.

To a lot of people, the off-duty Italian police officer is a hero. With just seconds to spare, he managed to jump off of a subway platform and rescue a 10-year-old boy who had fallen onto the tracks as a train was about to pull in.

Yeah...hero.

I'm not sure I could do what Micalizzi did. Not only because it's pretty goddamn dangerous and who knows if I'd have the guts, but also because in the few seconds I would have to act I would probably be in conflict with myself over whether or not I really wanted to rescue somebody who is in this position becausehe was playing his PlayStation Portable and not watching where he was going.

Yes, I know the kid is only 10. I remember being 10. It's pretty easy to get distracted by things when you're 10. But that's what parents are for, and according to this he was walking with his mother and sister at the time. There's no way in hell my mother would let me be so careless, unless of course she decided she didn't want me anymore. She would do what a parent is supposed to do, make me shut off the damn game until we're in a safe place. If she didn't think she could trust me to do that she'd take it away from me, probably for a few days until I figured it out.

Honestly, what's wrong with people?

There's a video at the link, but it's a silent film. Sorry, blind people.

Palm Is Home

Here's an interview with Iris Thompson about the whole Palm incident. Wow. There is an emergency strip on the trains, but she couldn't find it, and nobody would help her! One man even told her it was ok. Oh no it isn't. I bet he feels about 6 different kinds of dumb right about now.

Wow, nobody at Skytrain has bothered to call her. Not cool, not cool!

This just gets more depressing by the day.

What Happened To Palm Has Happened Before

Well, just when you thought the story of Palm couldn't get any sicker, it does. This type of thing has happened before, only in that case, folks were able to pry open the doors in time. Apparently that time, Translink did nothing about it. I hope to hell this time, they will sit up and take notice, and make some changes to make it safer for everyone.

Dragged Guide Dog Update

Here's an update to the guide dog getting dragged by the train story.

It looks like The dog's name is Palm, and she's recovering. Look at that list of injuries. Ow ow ow ow oo oo oo oo eee eeee eeee! And look at that vet bill. But it does say the hospital is taking donations. Funny, it doesn't name the hospital. But if you're in the Vancouver area and want to help, I'm sure you could find it. Iris Thompson would thank you I'm sure.

I feel for her and her dog. Who knows if that poor thing will ever work again. And if I were her, I'd have a lot of sleepless nights ahead.

The Guide Dogs Tag Meets The Trains Tag

I saw the headline guide dog dragged by speeding train" and screamed. I can't, I just can't imagine.

Somehow, the leash got caught by the sliding door and then the dog ended up out on the platform where it was dragged, got caught on something else, and fell to the guideway below. It appears to be alive, but needed one hell of a lot of surgery.

She has filed a claim for thousands of dollars in vet bills. If it was a freak accident, why is she asking the train people to pay for it? Did she ask the train to stop and they didn't? How could they not? There once was a woman and a dog on board, and now there's just a woman. I need more info.

Oh god oh god oh god. Keep a tight grip on that leash when getting onto a train. I can't even imagine what the woman is going through, being inside the train while the dog was being dragged outside.

Well, He Found Some Ghosts...

Christopher Kaiser was with some other ghost hunters doing what ghost hunters do, duh, hunting for ghosts. They were on the hunt for a specific ghost train known to haunt some tracks at the place where it crashed back on August 27, 1891. Well, Kaiser may have found the ghosts, but not in the way he planned.He was united with them by a real train! Yes, while the 12 people searched for evidence of haunting, a real train was coming. It blew its whistle, it tried to stop, most everyone else got out of the way...except Kaiser, and a woman who survived, but had to be airllifted to hospital.

Now, I wonder if Kaiser's ghost will haunt the tracks, and instead of searching for the legendary ghost train, future ghost hunters will search for the legendary ghost hunting dumbass who got smoked by another train. Hmmm...I see potential for a domino effect happening.

Canoe Believe This?

Good god, does Matthew Johnson's family hang out withthe family of Brian Hopkins? They must! Two families couldn't independently come up with such similarly stupid lawsuits...or could they?

The story goes that Matthew Johnson and 3 nitwit friends went and rented a canoe. They decided to jump off a railroad trestle into Mad River. A train was coming. Three of them made it into the river, Johnson...not so much. Now, his family is suing the railroad, and the people who rented the canoe! Yes, somehow the people who rented the canoe should have told Carol Johnson's stupid son not to jump off the railroad trestle into the water, because they should have known that people might do that.

I have a different ending to the story. People who reach the age of 21 should know better than to stand on railroad trestles, especially when trains are coming. There is no way he couldn't have seen the train, so it's his own damn stupid fault he died.

I'm getting too angry. I have to stop looking at stupidity for a minute.

I'll Hit You Tonight, With A Downtown Train

Why do we still have people wearing headphones while crossing train tracks? I know in one case, they're not sure if he was wearing headphones, but in another that just happened not too long before these last two train deaths, the guy was definitely wearing headphones.

I feel sorry for the folks driving the Maple Leaf train that Friday and Saturday. They hit one woman in Buffalo, and then smoke another dude in Toronto. And we thought the same man getting hit twice by the same train was weird.

Someone Needs More Training...No, Not That Kind.

I know that when police and firefighters are responding to an accident, they have to think quickly. But why would anyone think train tracks would be a good place to park a giant fire engine? Of course, the train came while they were dealing with things, and the fire engine was turned into a crumpled wreck.

Hellooo. Train tracks are for trains, not for parking fire trucks.

The Chew Chew Train

There's something wrong with this guy. Twice in the past two weeks, he's been hit by the same train. The first time he was hit by the train, it severed one of his hands at the wrist. This time, he had injuries to the now handless arm and his other hand. And they're also thinking he needs his head examined.

Something is weird. His family says it's not suicide, but one has to wonder. I mean, after a train rips your hand off, you'd think you'd be extra careful about not falling onto the tracks. And, it was the same train? Super weird. I can't chalk it up to him having the worst luck ever. I just can't.

So Much For The Who Done It Part

a trainload of people attending a murder mystery dinner show near North Fort Myers, florida, got a little closer to the murder and mystery than they bargained for Monday when the train they were traveling onstruck and killed an unidentified man who was lying on the tracks for reasons still unknown.

The dinner train was heading south on the Seminole Gulf Railway toward Fort Myers, Schall said. "There was a male laying on the tracks for whatever reason, and he was run over," he said.

A deputy on the scene said it appeared the man was alive and perhaps fell asleep on the tracks about a half mile north of Slater Road. "It's quite a ways to walk off the beaten path," Schall said.

He said it's too early to speculate why the man was on the tracks.

Mushroom-Clouded Thinking

Most people who find themselves in the trains category either don't notice the train, or are distracted by things like cellphones and scratch tickets. They are not like James Lampiriswho

• got all hopped up on mushrooms,
• and wandered around the neighbourhood naked and yelling at himself,
• only to stop yelling long enough to ask a woman if she was ok.
• When she said she was ok, but wondered about him, he then started cursing at her,
• and then ran off towards some train tracks,
• and straight for a slow-moving train.
• It hit him, but he survived it,
• and ran into some woods
• where he was caught and taken into custody by four police officers.
• It sounded like quite a fight.

Stay away from the mushrooms there James. They're not good for you.

Grand Theft Fail Auto

I think Gary E. Ensor should take a lesson from Jason Durant and Claude King and learn that just like them, he's not meant for a life of crime.

For some reason, his truck got stuck on some tracks and a train was coming. So he got out of his truck and left it to be ker smashed by the train. But he decided he needed to get another set of wheels, so he tried, and failed, to steal four different cars. He's fast, he attempted all the thefts within the space of a few minutes of each other. He got arrested, thus ending his short crime spree. Now, everyone wonders why he did it, including his wife.

When I Hear That Lonesome Whistle, I Hang My Pants And Die

If you've been paying attention to the things you read here, you should have long ago learned that walking down train tracks and being distracted do not a good mix make.

Today it's time to learn something new.

that something new comes courtesy of an un-named 22-year-old German fellow who, after being thrown off of a train for riding without having a ticket, decided to get his revenge via a goodmooning.

Unfortunately for our hero, his pants got caught in one of the doors and he wound up being dragged about 200 bare-assed metres down the line before the emergency brake was pulled and he could be freed.

Amazingly he was unharmed other than the obvious cuts and bruises, which means he will live to see his day in court. At that time he will face charges of dangerous interference with rail transport and insulting the train staff. He could also be on the hook financially if he's sued for the delays he caused.

A Penny Flattened Is A Woman In A Train Accident

And now it's time for another healthy living public service message from your friends at Vomit Comet.

When trying to flatten pennies on a railroad track, always do your best toget out of the way *before* the train gets to the coin.

The report says that the unidentified woman in this case suffered a head injury and was walking around when emergency crews arrived, but no word on whether it was a pre-existing condition.