model railroad layout for filming 4/19/06

Hello, We're looking for a model train layout about 4'x8' with a town setting including a school and bus of reasonably good detail for a TV spot to be filmed on friday the 21st of April 2006. It may need to be transportable to a location and we could help with that and provide a rental fee and lunch. We'll have a snorkel cam which will give very nice shots moving through the layout.

If anyone is interested or has any ideas or leads please contact Ben Rothenberg at 202-352-3552 or email snipped-for-privacy@earthlink.net (pictures would be great)

Thanks, Ben

Oops forgot to say the shoot is in the Washington DC area. Thanks

How far are you willing to transport the layout? What country are you in, this is the world wide web you know. {;^)

"Brian Smith"

Not if you're an American. Nothing exists outside their borders. :-)

Just joking guys. Don't get hot under the collar but the guy does have a point, you really shouldn't assume that people know what country you are referring to.

-- Cheers

Roger T.

Home of the Great Eastern Railway

Or even what city.

Ben did realize his omission and posted a reply saying he was in Washington, DC.

The point ("Not if you're an American. Nothing exists outside their borders") is still valid, Ken - That would be "Washington, DC" ... where?

Fortunately, the rest of the world has learnt to compensate for what seems to many of us, to be extreme arrogance.

Regards, Ron Australia

The phone number 202-352-3552 should have pinpointed it enough to make your question uncessary.

That would be a US phone number, would it??? It certainly is not an Australian one. Once again with the arrogant assumptions...

Ron Australia

If it's certainly not an Australian number, and you know it's not, why worry about it? For me the number narrowed it down to the DC, USA area.

Yes, I agree that too many people in the USA don't realize there is a world outside our country. This seems especially true of people in high levels of our government these days.

Heck, in DC they don't even realize there's a world outside the Beltway :-).

However, we don't win any prizes for parochialism. I've seen a lot of it in other countries as well. We're just so big and powerful that ours is more annoying :-).

If I said that Washington, DC, was in the United States, would you be satistfied? Or would you still be upset because there have been many counties that have used "United States" over the years?

United States of Belgium, a confederation that existed during the year 1790.

United Mexican States, the official name of Mexico.

United States of Colombia, name held by the Colombia between 1863 and 1886.

United States of Central America, a defunct 19th century federation of the nations of Central America.

United States of Venezuela from 1864 to April 15, 1953;

Republic of the United States of Brazil, the name of Brazil between 1889 and

United States of Indonesia, name of the country from 1949 to 1950.

Or are you just upset that you are not able to offer your layout for use in Ben's video?

"Ken Rice"

As these two are the ones currently in use, the other examples you mentioned are all defunct names.

As the only one that uses "United States" as two consecutive words, is "United States of America", then yes, one could correctly assume that you are referring to the United States of America. Besides, I don't think that there's a Washington, DC in Mexico. The rest of the world is sufficiently well informed to know that Washington, DC is the capital of the U.S.A..

-- Cheers

Roger T.

Home of the Great Eastern Railway

Ron , not all of us in the USA are arrogant. Many of us get just as pissed at some of our countrymens arrogance as you do. However , many people in this country and other countries tend to think of of those they exchange messages with as being in the same country. It's easy to think that way until it really sinks in that this is indeed the WorldWideWeb. I think it's amazing , and wonderful , that we can all talk to one another all around the globe. Helps us to realize that people are pretty much the same all over. Can you imagine what our ancestors of a century ago would do if they were suddenly brought back to life now ?

Ken Day

I agree with you on all points. Unfortunately, Ron from Australia does not seem to be among the sufficiently informed. .

Ken Rice spake thus:

Is it possible that Australians are even more insular than USAns? If so, that would be amazing.

Nah, he has been spending too much time with Terry...

fl@liner

~snip~

I think we (yes I'm an American) are very aware of things outside our border. A great deal of our money and blood is spent out there, trying to help others to a better life. We don't always get it right, but at least we try, and succeed or fail, we receive criticism anyway (unfortunately not only from abroad but in this era, from many of our own citizens and political leaders).

This is not to say we aren't arrogant at times, but I don't think it's intentional nor really any more so than similar attitudes of the populace of any other country. If you want to see arrogance you should get a close up look at illegal aliens from Mexico here in the U.S. who after taking advantage of billions of dollars (per year) of undeserved free services, wave the flag of a foreign nation on our soil and demand even more, and then make hostile threats against us if they don't get exactly what they want. No, I don't think America has any corner on the market of arrogance.

As for assumptions on discussions boards and such, yeah, I can see that. Aside from the U.K., most of Canada and Australia, we're really not that informed on what percentage of people in other countries speak much English (thus we don't expect, offhand, a poster to be from another nation on a U.S. board, especially if they make no mention of being from a different country). I've seen some discussion boards with letters in their titles indicating its a foreign based board (but am not sure if it's aways an identifier of where they're located -I assume this is a U.S. board). The lack of accent in text discussions plays a trick with the mind too. Aside from the different spelling of some words (which gives away U.K. posters mostly), I think it's natural to assume a poster is American, at least at first. -Unless of course they place their location by their name as you do.

It's easy when thought about to understand why that could be seen as arrogance, but it's not done on purpose, and as people get more experience I believe there's more of a tendency not to assume. For example when I came here I caught myself wondering where everyone was from because of years of experiences on other discussion boards. There's a Halloween board I go to at times and if anyplace there would be a board to assume everyone was American (because Halloween isn't hardly observed in most other countries, including the U.K.), this would be it.

-But there are about the same percentage of posters from other countries (in this case, U.K., and Canada) as there are on this board. You just never know.

In closing (on another off-topic), there's no hard feelings to those who have the idea Americans are arrogant (at least by me). Even our own news media doesn't represent us accurately, and movies and TV certainly doesn't reflect (on average) the core of who we are or what we believe. And on top of that, there are a lot of embarrassing things that go on here. All in all, it's easy (even for many Americans), to get the wrong picture.

-But really; how many Washington D.C.s are there? Peace, Ron, and a salute to Australia (and the U.K.) for their assistance in the Iraq war. May all our soldiers finish their mission and come home safe and soon.

"You can't do this to me! I'm an American!" :)

"Ken Rice"

Good one Ken.

-- Cheers

Roger T.

Home of the Great Eastern Railway