#conductorposting

[ironhorsegirl]

Update as we're stopped for passengers in Harrisburg: Today's "thing to keep talking about over the train crew radio" has been the Harry von Zell "Hoobert Heever" flub with obvious intentions and results

[hughierogers]

Hot chocolate?

YO, WE GOT IT

[ironhorsegirl]

What's something that makes your coworkers smile to talk about, every time?

Ah, this is the sweetest thing anyone could have asked! Okay, I'll go through all of them...

This is Fireman, my partner in crime up in the locomotive cab. She and I have a lot of funny conversations up there when we're on the rails. She's a meme and YTP encyclopedia and she'll quote the old classics for ages. But I really love listening to her talk about some of her favorite topics, like chemistry or world religions, or hearing her delightedly pull something out of nowhere from an old hyperfixation (mountaineering). Then her passion comes out and it's great.

Assistant Conductor is one of the coolest people I have ever met, and she's such a good writer. A lot of people expect her to be really serious because she's really tall and masks the best out of all of us, but she LOVES cute stuff and gets so excited over it. She likes coming up with aesthetic Pokemon teams for her friends and absolutely glows with joy when she shows you all the stuff she's done on her Animal Crossing island.

Brakeman is like a decade younger than the rest of us so we all indulge him like a little sibling. He's always going on excitedly about whatever action movie he most recently watched or the fighting games he's currently playing, and if you ask him to tell you about his dream to fight on top of a moving train he gets ecstatic. (You can also give him dessert. He loves dessert.)

Conductor is almost never not smiling, to be fair, and it's one of the things I love most about him. He's a big goofball. He's passionate about so many things - playing trombone, drawing rubberhose cartoons, cooking, playing video games, railroad history...he just loves life and loves the world and loves existing and learning more and I just think that's so goddamned wonderful. He is an absolute breath of fresh air, and he's so silly and joyful that he helps me be silly again too.

(The others have also said he smiles like that when he talks about me, but...y'know...)

Anyway, there we go! Sorry that took me a while, we were all out to dinner after getting back from our last run of the week!

[ironhorsegirl]

I hated this holiday for most of my life because I grew up being told I was ugly and unlovable by my classmates and now I just hate it because it commercializes a basic emotion and pushes this idea that if you aren't in a romantic relationship any love you feel is lesser.

Luckily for me I have a partner who agrees with me on that latter point and doesn't understand why there has to be a designated day to tell people you care about them when you should just be doing that anyway.

Anyway, we're currently staying in and playing video games which is what we usually do when it's cold out so today is just a day.

[ironhorsegirl]

I am admittedly not a traditionally pretty woman in any sense and a lot of the time I have a hard time with it because people were shitty to me growing up but I have been reminded just now by Conductor that when I am covered in grease and all sweaty and gross that he wants to [REDACTED] and I am still not used to being desirable so this is fucking weird

[ironhorsegirl]

I swear we learn something new about a crew member every maintenance Wednesday.

Conductor just flawlessly banged out the keyboard part of Take On Me because someone brought in a keyboard and put it in the break lounge.

[ironhorsegirl]

Fireman and AC have been looking at my design notes and apparently according to them the way I doodle Conductor versus the way I doodle myself is very telling and I don't think I should elaborate on this

[ironhorsegirl]

WAIT A FUCKING SECOND IS THAT WHY HE CAN'T FUCKING LOOK AT ME WHEN I'M DOING MAINTENANCE WORK AND I'M ALL GREASY -