Is it always somebody’s fault?
My buddy “Titanic” was inbound with a dive charter when he heard an SOS. A 90-foot sightseeing boat was burning off the entrance of the…
Time to get out of Dodge
A Dodge City deputy sheriff had stopped me late one night. Setting the parking brake, I met him at the door, and he explained that…
Wrong about Bobb
It felt like my bosses would kill me (firing being too gentle).
We were meeting with a big customer who asked what I thought of…
I’ve got a bridge to sell you, but the clearance is low
My new boss Jim and I were on a sales trip in western Pennsylvania. Jim only lasted a few months, and I don’t remember his…
Bureaucrats know nothing about effective regulation
“I know NOTHING!”
You may think I’m talking about myself, but actually it’s a quote from a character in “Hogan’s Heroes,” an iconic 1960’s sitcom.…
Private-sector involvement could help public transit
A young driver was highballing across Chicago’s west side at the wheel of a semi when his trailer clobbered a low overpass. He was nearly…
Never allow a loose nut behind the wheel of a coach
If there was a competition for “bus slalom,” my buddy’s weary old 4106 could have contended for the gold.
He’d checked everything: tie rods, bearings,…
Want to empty a bus? Squish a skunk through its vent
We were a “traveling time warp” (description stolen from my pal Warren).
The company I worked for had bought the entire fleet of a transit…
Be careful making left turns; you might need an exorcism
Left turns make me nervous. You may think it’s because I’m a fairly conservative guy, but the real reasons are far more rooted in physics.
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