You might be a train freak if….

If you hear a train coming toward a crossing ahead and slow down (so you can watch the train) rather than speed-up to get across before it gets there.

Know the name of 50 RR's that no longer exist.

Spend 3 Days on AMTRAK going from NY to San Diego rather than flying (did it this spring).

If you think standing by a track waiting for a train to come is a hobby.

You take a break from running trains or tinkering with trains . . . only to spend time online talking about trains or editing and posting train videos!

I've got 2500 photos on my phone, 500 family and 2000 trains.

Dick

You have a PRR cookbook from the Strasburg gift shop. it’s worn out. You use the Project Gutenberg copy.

You still have the crocheted stuffed diesels and a steam engine or two from son’s childhood. They’re in the old laundry room upstairs. The bathroom doesn’t have train stuff because the humidity would damage it. You also have an afghan with crocheted railroad heralds, some of which were a real bear to graph by hand. Note that the old SP herald had way too much detail for a 40x40-stitch square.….and guilty as charged about getting stuck at a crossing, too.

Two things come to mind when someone says Jeep/Geep.

If you eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on Pennsylvania Railroad china……

You might be a train freak.

...if your up at 3am posting on the OGR Forum.

...if you have more steam locomotives than the current, local railroad has diesels.

Tom

@Hump Yard Mike posted:

I was thinking of this today how others outside of this hobby might perceive folks into it as I realized how this passion of trains comes out in so many ways from art work, to railroadiana items, antiques, careers in railroading and the trains (multiple scales- Z, N, HO, O, G and Standard Gauge) themselves.  I am a train freak.

This got me to thinking of Jeff Foxworthy.  Maybe others can add to the statement below which applies:

You might be a train freak if….      

you have train/railroad items in every room of your house except your bathroom and laundry rooms.

You might be a train freak if you make sure you have train/railroad items in your bathroom and laundry room as well as every other room.

......my bathroom.

If you find any excuse to head into town when you hear a train horn echoing across the valley.

Rich

You dream up 5 or more new Forum topics in 1 day;

You compose a model train song;

You tunnel through a wall in your house, devaluing it, so your trains can leave the room and then return to add dramatic effect and make it seem like your trains are really going to different places;

You disassemble and remove your workbench so you can have the space to build a Popsicle Stick Yankee Stadium;

And to top it off, you build a Popsicle Stick Polo Grounds on the other side of your laundry room across from the Popsicle Stick Yankee Stadium, in order to recreate the real former Sedgewick Avenue Station area along The Put.

Arnold

When you take an old shelf down in your in-law's house and think about putting it in your house to display trains.....

You might be a train freak.....

@RSJB18 posted:

When you take an old shelf down in your in-law's house and think about putting it in your house to display trains.....

You might be a train freak.....

Guilty as charged 🥺

I turned my Mother in law’s curio cabinet into a display case for my prewar.

If you pull up to a RR crossing in sub-zero degree weather with a 30mph wind and roll down the car window so you can hear the train better...you might be a train freak.

If your first born's initials are EMD...you might be a train freak  (True story)

Tom

If your trains inventory (purchased price) totals more than the current resale value of your house,...

...And, ergo, your purchase of yet another BTO item is less 'painful' than the mortgage payment.

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You look forward to your next Covid quarantine in order to have more time for working on the railroad.

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Your Congressional representative phones you asking for more information regarding your formal request for an emergency subsidy for your railroad.

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Scott Mann emails you to clarify your last 3rd Rail/GGD order entry stating only 'One of each, please.'

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Your custom class A RV features a Nathan 5-chime...and 'Warbonnet' paint.

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etc.

- if you catch up on your household honey-do list, and then your wife tells you, "yes, you can go play choo-choos now."

...if you cover over your basement fireplace to expand your layout.

...if you make your basement bar the upper level of your layout.

@CBQer posted:

I've got 2500 photos on my phone, 500 family and 2000 trains.

Dick

You have family photos???????

When you moved from NY to Tenn. you had two Pods for household stuff and one for your trains.

Your farm is bordered on 3 sides by former railroads CNJ (who you worked for long ago) and LV and are still active lines operated by NS and you really like the trains going by.

...and the CNJ still does!

You found this property for sale after a New Year's Day motor car/speeder run when you went past it, saw for sale sign and then made a successful offer to buy 2 days later because of where it was!

Your railroad friends, who are still working freight trains, blow the horn whenever they pass by no matter what time it is...grandkids (and grandpa) love it !

As I write this a westbound NS stack train just went by as shown on a local area railcam a few miles away.

Thanks.

Walter

@RSJB18 posted:

You have family photos???????

Whaaa...?  You still have a family????

Grandma tells everyone at Thanksgiving dinner you sit in front of the television watching RailStream webcams, and the grandkids each independently learning of a planned excursion train ride on their family vacation immediately exclaim, "Grandpa would like that!"

@Walter Matuch posted:

Your farm is bordered on 3 sides by former railroads CNJ (who you worked for long ago) and LV and are still active lines operated by NS and you really like the trains going by.

...and the CNJ still does!

You found this property for sale after a New Year's Day motor car/speeder run when you went past it, saw for sale sign and then made a successful offer to buy 2 days later because of where it was!

Your railroad friends, who are still working freight trains, blow the horn whenever they pass by no matter what time it is...grandkids (and grandpa) love it !

As I write this a westbound NS stack train just went by as shown on a local area railcam a few miles away.

Thanks.

Walter

This post makes you green with envy!  LOL

You might be a train freak if you have driven about 25 miles out of town so many times and for so many years in order to visit the Mescal control point on UP's Sunset Route that all the engineers recognize your car and give you a quick blast on the air horn. This CP is where the old El Paso & Southwestern track was realigned to join the SP's Sunset Route when it was still single track; now that the Sunset Route is double track, the single diverging switch has been replaced by a control point with #24 switches. Sometimes Amtrak's Sunset Limited changes tracks at this point, and it's fun to watch it slither quickly through the high-number switches, again with an air-horn acknowledgement from the engineer.

When your waiting at a LIRR grade crossing for the usual M-5,7,9 commuter to blow by and a New York and Atlantic freight sneaks past and you regret not having your camera at the ready....

You might be a train freak if you take the plastic plate from one of you meals on the Southwest Chief from Chicago to LA and make a thermometer out of it.

you have multiple train shirts.

you read train books more than your school books in college and somehow graduated

you have a train blanket on your bed that you are afraid to wash for fear that it might get damaged

you come up with the name Frisco Daylight for your future son and if you ever have a daughter naming her Chessie

you beg your godparents to put a train horn on the family car

you are always looking for another train for your collection

you dream about trains in your sleep

This has a been a lot of fun looking at the replies.

Paigetrain, I have been thinking of the railroad horn on the car for while.  Someday…

A couple more to add….

if you have a stand alone building to house your train collection

if you use vacation time to make it to York

if you have spare pilots for most of your o scale steam engines in case of an unforeseen wreck on the layout.

if you have spare ps2/ps3  kits on hand in case one of your engines goes belly up.

if you notice that the real crossing  gates don’t arrive down at the same as they should or the light flash out of sync on them.

@Hump Yard Mike posted:

I was thinking of this today how others outside of this hobby might perceive folks into it as I realized how this passion of trains comes out in so many ways from art work, to railroadiana items, antiques, careers in railroading and the trains (multiple scales- Z, N, HO, O, G and Standard Gauge) themselves.  I am a train freak.

This got me to thinking of Jeff Foxworthy.  Maybe others can add to the statement below which applies:

You might be a train freak if….      

you have train/railroad items in every room of your house except your bathroom and laundry rooms.

I have OGR magazines in the master bathroom.   The laundry room is clean. Does that make me a super train freak?

@paigetrain posted:

you have multiple train shirts.

you read train books more than your school books in college and somehow graduated

you have a train blanket on your bed that you are afraid to wash for fear that it might get damaged

you come up with the name Frisco Daylight for your future son and if you ever have a daughter naming her Chessie

you beg your godparents to put a train horn on the family car

you are always looking for another train for your collection

you dream about trains in your sleep

Love this!

This may be my favorite Forum topic and thread of all time. Way to go, Hump Yard Mike!

Arnold

@Hump Yard Mike posted:

You might be a train freak if….      

you have train/railroad items in every room of your house except your bathroom and laundry rooms.

What do you mean by making an exception for the laundry room?

Hump Yard Mike, haven't you heard of my famous George Washingmachine Bridge?

LOL, Arnold

When traveling you seek out trackside motels and ask the desk clerk to reserve a room facing the same side of the tracks.

Some of your wedding pictures have a train somewhere in the background.

Your create passwords with the word Lionel and engine numbers in them.

You love the smell of burning coal.

You get excited approaching a railroad crossing when the gates and flashers begin to activate.

Even as a newbie, I might be a train freak when on my recent move from NJ to WNC, the realtor's main job was a house with a spacious, preferably finished, lower level with walkout, and separate workshop space and storage space. 

Months before moving in, having a friend drive down a 16' rental truck filled with RR supplies while we drove my large SUV also filled, and trying to explain to the two Nigerian workers from Angies List what all of this stuff was, labeled

"train room" (best 300 bucks I ever spent, on the two workers NOT the rental ugh).

I might be a train freak, spending more on the train room lighting than the rest of the house combined. Lastly, wishing that I had more space!

Loved reading this topic,

Mikki

Arnold,

Maybe we need to have a rating system for different train freak commitment levels once one has met the basic threshold, where the Laundry room could be counted as bonus points.

Your door bell is a train horn

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you refer to your car as a 0-4-0

—————-

you know the words to every Amtrak jingle

...when traveling on business, your after-hours entertainment is railfanning, visiting local hobby shops, and scoping out any local steel mills.

.

@Hump Yard Mike posted:

Arnold,

Maybe we need to have a rating system for different train freak commitment levels once one has met the basic threshold, where the Laundry room could be counted as bonus points.

Hilarious, love this idea. You, Hump Yard Mike, IMO, have a great sense of humor and imagination. Would love to meet you some day, maybe at York. Arnold

...you see a house for sale and wonder if it would have a room big enough to be "YOUR" train room!