Re: Vesties....was..... Are most US model railroaders actually not

You said a lot just then. This is sort of a change of thread, but one of the reasons why I quit railroading as a profession was that I saw those old men work until they were seventy or seventy-five; not because they had to, but because the had no other life. When you work on the railroad as an engineer or other train crew, the company owns you completely. These old guys would finally retire and have no friends or activities to occupy their time. They would go home and sit down in the easy-chair, turn on the TV and, six months later, die.>>>

King Vestie never worked for any railroad, if I remember correctly Froggy, he was a Wannabe. I know he took a lot of pics and spent quite alot of time in Port Jervis, Otisville, Goshen, all along the Erie (Lackawanna) Way. I know he bummed alot of rides on Erie and EL locomotives. I think he would have been much more palatable, had he changed his clothes once in awhile, took a shower between full moons, and had a half decent personality. I do know that he was the reason alot of other people left the club, and I believe that he was thrown out of another club, before he helped form the one I belonged to. Unfortunately, he was the President of the club, and not a very good one at that. There were other guys that I was very friendly with there, that were extremely knowledgeable about trains, both 1:1 and scale, as well as the area, history, etc... and none of them came off like King Vestie. The guy would use his mortgage money to buy trains with, and not be able to make his mortgage payment at the end of the month, then cry about not having enough cash.... something was definitely wrong with this person. His life was sad and miserable, because he made it that way, it wasn't thrust upon him, from what I saw, anyway. Jeff

I go to work because I choose to. I could retire at any time. My boss just gave me a big project with about a decade in the future. I said "how do you know I won't retire" "You wont" he was right.....Damn.....Too much fun.

I get to meet many people every day I feel so lucky and would never change places, even with the young. I only hope their future will have all of the interesting activities I have had....

My Da died on the job. He was really just learning to live when he left us. I was 32 then. Over 30 years ago.

Jim Stewart

We all know them, Jeff, would you trade places, I think never. Just pray that they get a life....

Jim Stewart

I didn't know how boring being an engineer was until I got and used MS train sim since it is a 'realtime' game. I found long stretches that were dull and tedious to get through.

On Tue, 1 Jul 2003 13:15:49 UTC, "Frank A. Rosenbaum" wrote: 2000

Hours of boredom punctuated by moments of sheer terror!