It happens in a variety of ways in everyday life. You're driving down the road and spy this sharp looking convertible in a used car lot that makes you pull in, and once you get behind the wheel, you're hooked, and you're driving home in a car you never imagined owning. Or you happen by a local animal shelter for whatever reason, and there's this adorable puppy sitting behind bars looking at you hopefully, it melts your heart...and before you know it you're a dog owner. ("A dog? I didn't want a pet!")
I imagine something similar happens to a lot of us at train meets and shows. You pass a table and see an engine sitting there that you never gave a second thought to previously...if you even knew it existed. But something about it seeing it at that moment in time on that particular day makes you stop. You look it over, admire the paint scheme, the design, the road name...something. And before you can say "FM Trainmaster" you're home running, say, a Spokane Portland & Seattle around your layout when you swore you'd never own a road name west of the Mississippi.
I had an experience like this several weeks ago at York, when I spied this MTH Premier EMD. The engine was sitting there next to other engines..Santa Fe, CP, a couple of others I can't quite remember. And something about the crisp-looking blue and white paint scheme really stood out against those more familiar colors and configurations that I had seen a million times before. It made me stop and take notice. In the past, I was probably vaguely aware of seeing EMD's in catalogs or online from time to time. Never gave one a second thought. Never had any intention of buying one. But even after walking away and wandering other halls, I kept thinking about the beautiful shade of blue and the crisp white contrast (funny isn't it that you can make these major purchases based on something as simple and childlike as "I like the colors!") and the descriptive lettering on the side. A couple of hours later I was crawling northbound through heavy traffic on I-83 heading back to The Garden State with an EMD SD60 sitting on the floor of the back seat.
So has this ever happened to you? Let's see something you had no intention of ever owning or running on your layout. Until that one day when you were at......
So now I have the same exact number of stinky diesels as sweet sounding steam engines. Of course there is one more steamer I hunting!
, I guess it could be considered "Interesting Looking" though!
