The Cellar - Almost Train:100, Passengers:0

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Almost Train:100, Passengers:0

Quote:

Passengers in Near-Miss with Train on Track
Mon Sep 22, 9:57 AM ET

PARIS (Reuters) - French state rail operator SNCF said Monday it was launching an investigation into how passengers walking on a railway track after their train broke down narrowly missed being run over by another train.

The near-miss occurred near the town of Villeneuve-Saint-Georges, south-east of Paris, Saturday evening after a train carrying an estimated 100 passengers broke down a short distance from a station.

Travelers were told to disembark on the left-hand side of the train and return to the station by foot, said Philippe Baudelocque, who filmed the scene with a video camera.

Finding the doors locked, they exited on the opposite side and began walking along the track, he said. The images show the crowd scattering into a ditch as a train passes among them at a solid speed, missing some onlookers by only a few feet.

"I started to walk, then I saw the train coming straight ahead," Baudelocque told LCI television.

SNCF President Louis Gallois said in a statement he was shocked and worried by the incident and had asked for an in-depth internal investigation.

Why do they call it a near-miss? It missed them. Shouldn't it be called a near-hit?

Aren't you suppose to be working?:D

I'm at home now, actually. :P

I think they call it "near miss" because of how close it was, how it "almost" hit. Think of it as if you were throwing a baseball at a barn. If you missed by 30 feet, that wouldn't be anywhere close, so it would be a "miss" or a "big miss" or "huge miss" or whatever it is kids are using these days. But if it was within inches, you might call it a "near miss", because it was so close without hitting.

It really all depends on how you interpret the word "near".

Quote:

SNCF said Monday it was launching an investigation into how passengers walking on a railway track after their train broke down narrowly missed being run over by another train.

By jumping aside, that's how!

Re: Almost Train:100, Passengers:0

Quote:

Originally posted by OnyxCougar

Why do they call it a near-miss? It missed them. Shouldn't it be called a near-hit?

George Carlin fan?

I was before all his material became the same. I saw him in Laughlin many years ago, was a dinner show and I was resting my arm on the stage. The material I've seen him do recently is exactly the same as it was then. I love him, but it's like that old cassette of Bill Cosby - Himself. You can only hear it so much before it starts to lose the humor bouquet.

I thought G.C. was funnier before he got so bitter.

Quote:

Originally posted by xoxoxoBruce
I thought G.C. was funnier before he got so bitter.

He is almost mean these days... as someone (i forget who) on the cellar said...less comic, more philosopher.

even so, i always think of philosophers as dealing in the gentle what-ifs....and he is in the mean what-nows.

      Hey maybe I still like him because life is making me bitter ... Oh wait, nope, I'm still smiling.
      I think he's tired of doing the stand-up thing. I'd imagine going on tour and tell the same jokes over and over must get old, fast. Ah well.

The solution to that is...get new material. If you're genuinely a funny person, with relevant anecdotes about society, then you can have new, fresh material that is still funny. That way, you don't get burnt out as quickly.

Most music groups cut an album, then take that material on tour, then cut another album, then take that material and add it to the tour, etc until people stop coming. But they keep making new stuff, so people keep coming.

Even Neil Diamond, whose latest effort was Three Chord Opera several years ago... his concerts aren't the same. I've been to five of them since 1996...and he sings the standards, but he also rotates the old songs... (He did Shilo last year, but not the year before, for example.) I'll go every time.

G.C. is not as funny anymore because it's the same old thing. If he injected new material that was less scathing and bitter and more intellectual and relevant, he'd return to his status (at least in my opinion) as one of the funniest comedians around.