I have received a number of phone calls from well meaning fellow steam lover friends alarmed by a rumor making the rounds on the underground foamer intel network ( second only to the CIA ) that the initials RJD of the 614's new owner stand for " Ross Just Died".

I am grateful and pleased to post that reports of my demise are not true AND that I have been blessed with very good health despite years of not taking proper care of my body.

Please accept my very early wishes for a wonderful Thanksgiving and a blessed Christmas.

All the best, Ross Rowland......not the R in RJD

Thank you for this bit of good news!!

I think it's appropriate to add something about the news and other stuff we can get via social media.

As we know, there is a saying that "If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is."

I think we need a corollary, along the lines of "If something sounds too crazy (or outrageous, or nutty) to be true, it probably is."

How do we filter out the bad stuff?

I think the first thing to do is to take note if you see something--a headline, an internet meme, even advertisements--and it gives you a strong reaction. You get mad, you laugh because it seems so stupid, you feel really good because you're not that stupid or whatever.

If that happens, take the time to cool off a bit. Then, say in the case of those memes, do a little research. Look up, let's say, an image in a meme emphasizing how mining for lithium is so horrible for the environment we should ban electric cars or something.

I actually ran into this particular example. The image with the meme featured a huge bucket wheel excavator, supposedly chewing up the landscape in Bolivia or somewhere in South America.

I took a look at the photo, and I thought, "I've seen this somewhere before."

You can do image searches to find (or attempt to find) the origin of an image. Tineye is one such application, Google Lens is another.

I did the search (Google Lens here), and yep, I'd seen photos of this machine before. Seems it was a coal mine excavator in Germany. I even found where a model kit had been made of it!! Someone else made their own model out of Lego pieces!!

Now, I imagine the debate between electric cars and gas cars might be important for some people here. I'm not going to take either side here.

What I am trying to say is someone lied about this, and tried to get people stirred up.

That's not good.

I've had to be in court, and one thing that's really apparent in court is how you have to have a solid case. You need evidence and/or reliable testimony. You don't want to lie.

If you have to lie, you undermine your case and can even get it thrown out entirely--and maybe you get thrown in jail for perjury.

If you have a good case, you don't have to lie.

I mentioned I don't do much with memes on Facebook. There are some exceptions, actually mostly just shared pictures of old cars from the 1950s and back, steam trains (what else would you expect from a member here?), and cute and beautiful cats.

Hey!! Sometimes you wind up with pictures of trains and cats, or trains and old cars!

Now that stuff is nice!!

I'm glad you're well Ross.

The rumor might have been started by poor reading comprehension. In the C&0 #614 Official Return to Steam Announcement thread Jason posted:

Someone may have read the "It is the initials of someone special that has passed on that is being honored" part and jumped to the conclusion that the someone special was you (Ross) before they got to the "R is not for Ross" part.

I can confirm through experience, even with paying clients, that people just don't bother to read. If it's more than a three sentence paragraph, I guess it's considered TL;DR. I always had to follow up with a call to get the correct answers I needed.

And on a side note, Facebook is by far the absolute best place to post faulty or incomplete reasoning for the ill-informed to pick up on and have that BS take off like a rocket.

My father always said: "Use your head. That's what it's there for.".

It could be worse; Alfred Nobel's obituary was published in the newspaper much to his chagrin.

Ironically, Friday, I got a message about an "emergency meeting". Before I could enter multiple passwords and wait for my phone to request MFA, I got a text from a coworker "RIP Name".

Since it had just been announced that there was going to be an RTO mandate next June; but the senior execs hadn't figured out what they were going to do about parking-as they stopped leasing lots three years ago. I though the RIP meant one of our senior IT people had decided to voice her displeasure by retiring ahead of her planned departure in 2025-and the emergency was how were we going to replace somebody who was that rare fusion of conviviality and competence. I had "Good for her" typed in when a second text indicated that she had passed away suddenly and RIP didn't mean Retired in Protest.

Lesson learned: when people are discussing death or using metaphors related to death; be damn sure of what you are talking about and assuming nothing.

Older readers will remember/know of the Beatles' "Paul is dead" fiasco and the SNL skit with John Belushi in a cemetery lamenting all his deceased castmates-he was the first to go.

Why not just say who the "RJD" is right from the beginning?

As soon as I saw the announcement I asked, "who's RJD" and I was trying to run through names of relevant individuals in my head... I went to their website to see if it clarified this, and it didn't mention it at all...

The irony here is that those are MY initials (just a different order) so that also piques my curiosity...

Who else played their white albums backwards to hear
"cranberry sauce", and "miss him miss him"?

.. and to find out if revolution #9 makes more sense in reverse?

The reason that the principals of RJD LLC have set it up so that the very capable Jason Johnson is the public face of the organization is that they want the focus to be on the 614 and its return to service not on personalities. They certainly are entitled to that.

Be glad that the engine has found a new well funded home and that she'll be getting her thorough rebuild in America's Gold Standard steam shop.

Onward & Upward. Ross Rowland

I should set record straight, the person claiming to be Ross is indeed Ross and i can verify he is doing very well. We have have had one form of contact or another with him daily for the past several months and he is still firing on all cylinders.

Jason

Firing on all cylinders? No, no, NO, that's all wrong!! That's a DIESEL!!

THE proper way to say it for Ross is that he's got a boiler that's steaming well, a good clean fire, the glasses are full, as is the tank, the needle is on the pin, and he has a feather at the pops!!

Highball!!

Would that include having LD Porta updates functional? (in case of pace maker, or similar cybernetic device)

I Know For Many...RJD LLC Doesn't Sound Very Catchy For The NEW C&O 614 Group...

Maybe Some Renaming Ideas:

- Friends Of C&O 614
- Class J3A Greenbrier Trust
- Iron Horse Railroaders Society
- Steam Preservation Of America
- Aces Railway Club

The Last 3 Here Are A Nod To Mr. Rowland...

Sure Mr. Johnson Will Come With Better...

Enjoy! ^_^

He's welcome to call it whatever he wants, what he accomplishes matters and the name is inconsequential. Find something real to worry about, people...... this is nothing but good news.

I keep inverting letters, and thinking that IRON MAN (and many others) actor Robert Downey Jr is involved.

Those are some good names if our only focus was just #614, we are thinking much bigger and #614 is just a piece. The reality in the bigger picture is no one really cares what the name is. Is it running and pulling happy passengers. That is what matters most.