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On Sunday, Erik and I visited the giant steam locomotive Big Boy 4014 in West Chicago where it was parked for a few days. Then, on Tuesday, we chased it from the bridge it crossed over the Fox River at Elgin to the bridge over the Rock River near Dixon. Seeing it close-up and operational instead of the one I saw in Green Bay on static display was a whole different world. I'm not going to post more pictures of it until I can process them through Photoshop; less than the best I can do with them would be a disservice to the subject. But here's a quick and dirty edit of just one of them.

Many of the large bolt-heads had these star shapes that it looks like some kind of retaining clips fit into. They're so pretty! I wish I knew enough about engineering to understand them. The circular shape in the background is one of the driving wheels.

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As well as being awestruck by the steam engine, shooting yesterday reminded me of how much I enjoy the aesthetics of working infrastructure.