>From The FWIW Dept: Was organizing/condensing some book shelf artifacts and tossing some old and unwanted printed matter. Ran across some old (1998 or so) "S/Sn3 Modeling Guide" magazines. (I was in my last years of trying to do Sn3 in the late 1990's.)
Thumbed through a couple of them to see what was therein... fell upon a Des Plains Hobbies ad on the back page. Wow... therein were pictures of simple American Models engines that had be detailed with DPH details and custom painted. Two really stood out: A UP GP9 that was really nice... and a Erie-Lackawanna RS3 that was also super nice. Was amazed at the nice proportions and overall quality of the basic models themselves. The excellent details and nice paint/decal jobs were frosting on the cake. The above to say this: I'm not ready to give up on model railroading just yet. In fact, I suspect that once I'm retired (in a bit over 5 years) things are gonna' change in more ways than one. It could very well be that once I have more time (and no longer having to contend with 1:1 railroading and the side effects thereof), my desire to workbench model may return. That so... perhaps while our finances are in pretty good shape, now is the time to acquire desired pieces in advance of that time? Doubt I'll want to drop the serious bucks for multiple engine purchases once out on retirement and on a fixed income. Hmmmm. Interesting thought. Andre Ming
