At four in the morning the Union Pacific Northwest line hasn't run yet, and the only sound in Palatine is a plow blade finding pavement. ASR Inc. is a snow removal outfit that works those hours, the ones before the village stirs and before the first commuters walk from their cars toward the platform along Northwest Highway. Plowing drives and lots, clearing walkways down to the concrete, spreading salt where a thaw-and-freeze would otherwise leave glass underfoot: unglamorous work with a very visible result. A cleared lot at sunrise, dark and steaming a little in the cold, means nobody's day began with a shovel. That is the point of the whole enterprise.