Ace-Garageguy

Looks real good. Funny...I used to think that was one of the ugliest cars anybody ever put on wheels. I bought a decent one with some big 2bbl V8 lump for $65 way back in about '1977, traded it even for a clean '67 VW Westphalia camper. Sure would like to have it now...

^^^ (OP)

Ignore the man behind the curtain.

Your frustration is understandable, and I used to get kinda bothered by this stuff too. But in the final analysis, if it's not something I need for business, waiting a few days won't really affect anything. And if it IS something I need for business, I can almost always find plenty to do while I wait for whatever thingamajig is running late. Fifteen bucks is fifteen bucks, after all. EDIT: Don't get me wrong. It DOES chap my backside when I message some clown with "You know, you've had my money for two weeks and I see my package hasn't made it to your shipper of choice yet" and all I get is crickets for 3 more days and then it pops up on the USPS tracking app. But I don't even bother with negative feedback. Why? Because someday the same guy just might have the only chrome plated 1st gen grangefluriffigur in the known universe, and he's got a $10 BIN price on it when the cheapest one I've seen anywhere else is half a mil. I can wait a few extra days.

Them possums keeps on a gittin inta tha cat's food, an I'm a fixin ta have me sum possum stew it they keeps it up.

Probably overpaid for this little guy, but I couldn't leave without him. Only $8. It's an old lower-end Model Power HO scale Central of Georgia PS-1 boxcar in the "football" livery...purple and silver, which I don't know for sure was real...in perfect condition, and somebody's upgraded the wheels to metal and mounted a horn-hook coupler on one truck to act as an adaptor car between Kadee-equipped and horn-hook cars (yes, I know; the photo is from the web and has Kadees on both ends, so sue me). Definitely a 'train set' toy-quality piece, but it's another roadname I didn't have, and with a little detail work and weathering, it'll look fine in among a bunch of other boxcars in a yard.

Excellent idea. I do most of my real-world design work in CAD (cardboard aided design), so why not model trains too?

Bought a couple of Train Miniatures "NOS" freight car kits, only to get them home and find they'd been cherry-picked for parts. Not little stuff, but the main car underframes. OK, they were cheap. Really cheap. I can scratch-build frames easily enough, and I enjoy doing that kind of benchwork. And they were CHEAP. SO...I stop by Hobby Town on the way home to get some Plastruct or Evergreen. Not a single thing I can use, stock not replenished recently. Pretty sad state of affairs when one old geek-geezer modeler has a VASTLY better stock of styrene than a major "hobby retailer".

It really depends on whether you have a mind of your own, or need someone else's opinion to tell you what to think. Allen himself supposedly remarked occasionally that he regretted the Gorre and Daphetid name. I always liked the Stegosaurus "organic switch engine" Emma, and most of the rest of the little surprises he hid everywhere. But there's a phrase in model railroading that probably sums up his position perfectly: "my railroad, my rules". There's no shortage of people trying to tell other people in the hobby (any hobby) that they're doing it wrong. I personally think that people arguing about the name of his railroad might do well to take a little more time appreciating his craftsmanship and vision.

Frames that look like this often get filled with cardboard and Bondo and covered with shiny paint just before the auction.

...Batman.

"Night moves" for geezers often involve prescriptions and dentures.

I kinda think anyone I'd consider "good" in the hobby would be strongly influenced by John Allen, even if their styles were different. If I'm remembering correctly, Bill McClanahan developed scenery techniques and wrote a few books, one of which I'm pretty sure I have. I've been out of the hobby since I was about 15 or 16, not by desire (though I seriously doubt girls at that age would have understood), and it's only the past few years I've been collecting stuff to build a layout, but I've been collecting and reading old model railroad mags since around 2013. Still, there are huge gaps in my knowledge. The space I was counting on to finally build a sizable layout will most likely not ever be available, so I'm looking at what some guys have done with small layouts, "shelf" layouts, and modular construction. Steve Grantham ("Earl Marischal" on the board here) has a very fine smaller layout himself, and has been something of an inspiration to use what space I have wisely, and not get caught up in what could have been.

"In the year 2525" is the title of this song.

Thanks. I could look at that for hours. More inspiration...