In my last post I mentioned that I was becoming more fond of the social aspects of the hobby.\u00a0 Well, tonight I thought I’d expand on that a bit.<\/p>\n
I’m a regular reader of Trevor Marshall’s blog (Port Rowan in 1:64<\/a>) and he often writes about the social aspects he enjoys as part of his hobby.\u00a0 It isn’t uncommon for him to host an operating session, then retire to a local eatery afterwards for a nice meal and a pint or two.\u00a0 He recently wrote of hosting a couple visitors at his home during which they actually devoured two meals in the one day (lunch, then later, supper).<\/p>\n For a good number of years I was a regular operator at the late Lou Schultz’s C&O layout.\u00a0 One of the things I really enjoyed there was the social camaraderie that took place in the crew lounge both during the session, and afterwards.\u00a0 I’ve just this year started eating breakfast out on Saturday mornings with a group of model railroaders (I recently referred to this as the ROMEO* breakfast).<\/p>\n Thinking back on it, the very first group of model railroaders that I fraternized with was the original Crescent City Model Railroad Club in New Orleans.\u00a0 This came about when I was in my mid teens.\u00a0 After the operating session, we usually drove to a pizza place on Veterans Highway in “new” Metairie.\u00a0 Back in the mid 60s, pizza wasn’t a common thing in the deep south.\u00a0 Indeed, the first slice of pizza I ever consumed was during that late hour “snack”.<\/p>\n The point of all this is that as I’ve aged, the social aspects and the camaraderie of being with others of the same ilk has become more and more desirable to me.\u00a0 I hope to one day have a small group of folks over for regular operating sessions, and to maybe head out somewhere afterwards to share a meal.\u00a0 Just tonight I was visited by two local modelers, Rod Fredericks and Gary McMills. Gary had been here once before, perhaps a year or so ago.\u00a0 But much has been done on the layout construction since his last visit, so he had plenty to look at.\u00a0 This was Rod’s first visit, so he received the nickel tour.\u00a0 After the walk-through we just plunked down in some chairs and had a good old fashioned bull session.\u00a0 What an enjoyable evening!\u00a0 I had even thought of us perhaps heading around the corner to enjoy a cold brew, but tomorrow is Thanksgiving day and everyone needed to get on home for an early start in the morning.<\/p>\n I have to thank Trevor for reminding me of how much fun these social interactions are.\u00a0 It’s really easy to hunker down in the layout room day after day and to simply forget that there’s so much more out there to enjoy about the hobby.\u00a0 Reading of Trevor’s enjoyment has prompted me to stick my head up out of the benchwork occasionally to spend time with friends.<\/p>\n -Jack<\/em><\/p>\n *R<\/strong>etired O<\/strong>ld M<\/strong>odelers E<\/strong>ating O<\/strong>ut<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In my last post I mentioned that I was becoming more fond of the social aspects of the hobby.\u00a0 Well, tonight I thought I’d expand on that a bit. I’m a regular reader of Trevor Marshall’s blog (Port Rowan in … Continue reading