Good idea

But your link puts the viewer at the beginning of the thread. It posting you want to point to is on the 4th page. Or the 3rd page if the first page is the 0th page Try:

https://forum.mrhmag.com/post/weekly-photo-fun-862017-through-8122017-12207482

It will get interested people closer.

I would be surprised if most of us (who have any kind of layout) don't have items that we see as funny or cute on the layout. I know that there are items on my layout that are like that. Of course, I don't expect anyone else to get the "joke." Many items have non humorous meaning to me. Like trying to represent some particular piece of rolling stock or locomotive I had seen and photographed. (UP GP30 868, MP GP15-1's 1555 and 1575 and someday I'll finish RI SW1 538)

TARDIS

I have a TARDIS hiding behind the saloon...

 

@kfglover

To be more accurate:

https://forum.mrhmag.com/post/weekly-photo-fun-862017-through-8122017-12207482

Like this stuff!

I love a bit of wimsey, and I mentally divide it into a couple of categories.

1.  Something like car number NCC 1701.  It's only whimsical if you know the story--in this case, Star Trek.  A railroad car labled "Dunwich Fish Processing" or "Miskatonic Railroad" likewise is unremarkable; there were so many differnt little railroads that no one would think twice about them unless they know the story.

2.  More blatant wimsey:  A Tardis is out of place even if you've never heard of the Doctor.  It's easy to remove to make things look completely prototypical.  A Delorean parked behind the garage in 1920.

These two are easily and quickly made non-wimsical.

3.  Everything else.  Things that are not easily and quickly removed from the layout.

I'll be sticking with 1 and 2, though I've seen some wondrful layouts that don't.

(Incidently, Thomas and friends is at the point where it is prototypical in some cases!)

Delorean...

There is actually one behind the restaurant... but unfortunately you can't see it unless you're on a stool. Once I have a livery stable, it'll be inside there. (I bought a Plasticville Livery stable, it was factory sealed, from the 80s, and missing half the parts. I still can't find any replacement parts. Bachmann can't help, and nobody responded in the Bachmann forums, so eBay is my best bet)

Whimsy-imparied?

The funny thing is I've been a published cartoonist and a standup comedian. I have a massive sense of whimsy in my normal life. My wife is used to me answering questions in a Doctor Suess-ryhme manner or with the voice of Grover from Sesame Street. Stuff like that.

I have a scale TARDIS as well as a scale APC from the movie, "Aliens" that would fit perfectly on my layout. The latter, i took some photos for a sci-fi site on my layout just to show how it'd look other than just on a shelf. But do these items ever stay? Nope. The TARDIS was a keychain that I removed the chain from, and it's almost perfect for O scale. But it's never sat on the layout.

Frankly, I find whimsy highly overrated on layouts, just as I'm annoyed by the massively oversized signs that many people put on their structures (and usually with the Helvetica typeface, regardless the timeframe for the layout. Can someone explain why people are so enamored with that typeface?). I know a few modelers who have funny sounding business names, and a local guy with a large On30 layout that has a Bigfoot figure hidden in the trees and a "house of ill fame" with a couple in the midst of, well, you know, if you turn the lights on in the top floor.

That stuff just isn't for me.

I find enough whimsy in my layout alone. The idea that the real-life ET&WNC had a branch line into the valley in which my parents grew up is whimsical enough as it never happened in real life. Most of my figures have names and I can tell you the story of many of them if you asked. Some are even based on real people. 

Here's the one whimsical thing you'll find, taken back before the scenery was in place:

"Oleander Barrel Staves" is the name of a structure I had on my old HO layout when I was about 13, as it just sounded really funny to me for some reason. The 'Amalgamated barrel staves' reference below that is from an old Bullwinkle cartoon where he's looking to invest in stocks. I never forgot that and always thought it was funny. It's the only whimsical anything you'll find on my layout, but it's something I just couldn't resist.

Off Topic, Bill how did you do that???

Hi Bill, I get the page = 3 part but how did you know the comment was 295015, Inquiry minds want to know??? This is one of the most frustrating things for me, sometimes I'd like to reference a specific post like you've done above.

Thanks,

Rich

If you hover over the blue post title for any post, it shows a link in the bottom left corner.  You can also right click it and copy link and paste it somewhere else and it will have the post number at the end.

Thomas and Friends

Hi IrishRover, I follow a couple of video blogs posted by guys from the UK. You are correct, All the Thomas and Friends locomotives are based on British Steam and Diesel locomotives. Just remove the faces and you'd have half decent models of British locomotives. 

Plus, if you're modeling the Strasburg Railroad or one of the other tourist railroads, Thomas shows up from time to time to pull a train. So now is it art copying life, or life copying art? 

At one time it was accepted to add some whimsy into a model railroad, including the name, but for some reason we've moved away from that line of thinking. I think John Allen had the perfect mix of whimsy along with scale model railroading, even the name of his layout was tongue-in-cheek. 

@Dave

Dave, Thank You. Let me give this a try. 

https://forum.mrhmag.com/post/layout-suprises-and-humour-12207519

mysterious whimsy

I have a small lake on my layout to which I added the Woodland Scenics canoers, but I didn't glue them down. One day I noticed they were missing, and then later discovered them in a rather incongruous location. My guess is that occasionally when I'm not around my son wanders by and makes a few whimsical changes.

At one time it was accepted

Really? I see it every day in magazines and online, not to mention discussions with other modelers.

Actually, before he passed, Allen admitted that if he'd had to do it over, he wouldn't have used that name and voiced regrets over it to a couple of people I've known who did op sessions with him.

So, where has he placed them?

I dunno about surprises but...

Hi all,

I dunno about surprises but when you build a minimum gauge warehouse layout that has some significance in the punny name of "Randim Stackum & Wrackem Inc" that has the motto "You pack it - We stack it" does it fit under here? It was built in 2008/2009 and still survives almost 8 years on.

This photo shows the full extent of the Randim Stackum & Wrackem Gn15 warehouse layout. This was built for a competition where the dimensions of the layout were fixed. For an additional challenge I went for large scale in the restricted space. The layout uses 1/24 scale figures, 1/20 scale forklift trucks and 1/16 scale pallets and pallet loads.

The photo shows computer speakers embedded under the operating floor just visible at rear for ambient and custom-built event sounds, the dedicated train and door controller on left, radio controls for the forklift in the centre and the "Randim Load Selektor" (a modified electronic dice kit). On the railway side of operations, the warehouse doors as well as the self-propelled palletmover are driven from the dedicated controller.

If you want more detail, you can read all about the build and the great forkie hunt on the Gn15 Gnatterbox forum at  http://gn15.info/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=3963&hilit=Randim+Stackum  As I have said previously on here - just because it is a small sized layout, does not mean that there has not been considerable thought and effort applied when every inch counts. 

Whymsical enough for here??  I dunno, but it was a fun ride 

Whimsey

Lee, We must not be reading the same magazines. As for John Allen's Gorre & Daphetid, I can only go by what I've read in the various magazines and the video interviews I've seen with Andy Sperandeo. Like the one interview that mentioned the Timesaver was actually a game.

Anyone seen

Anyone seen this?

http://www.ottgalleries.com/MRR.html

Some fine modeling wrapped in whimsy... 

whimsy

I like the whimsy, but subdued. Even the over used and trite, a bunch of police cars in front of a donut shop, I find to still be funny. Most of my visitors have never seen a model railroad, and some seem to not take me serious. After spending countless hours over a model or scene, I don't wish for somebody to just walk around nodding their head. I have hidden scenes, take off of movies and tv shows, even x-rated. Once a few are pointed out, people start pausing, studying each scene, especially the skeptics, looking for these "Easter eggs". The sad thing is that many just don't get it. For example, I put Billy Bob loves Charlene on a water tower, this is from an old country song, John Deere Green. Sadly, the song is so old, I seem to be the only one that gets it. Another thing that people miss are businesses named from the Andy Griffith Show. It has gotten to the point that visitors to our home now request to go down to the train room. The whole point of me doing my railroad is for me to have fun, and I enjoy a little whimsy and imagination, especially if it appears prototypical and believable, and appreciate the ones that can get it. I am looking for a way to fit in a Waldo.

Whimsical names...

Though my layout doesn't have a name (yet... it's a studio that uses mostly "Southern" engines... I like green on my steam! Even if I do have three black Southern steam engines) the town that is center stage of my layout DOES have a name, and In think it's quite whimsical. It is called the town of Hekawi. As in... "Where the Hekawi?"

It's named for the "Indian" tribe from "F-Troop". A dear friend was in that show, and suggested it when I first started on the layout.

I like whimsy... and I understand what people mean when they say that whimsy has fallen out of style a bit... not here, but on another board, I got a bit of negative feedback on the idea of a western town with that name, and got some negativity at the idea of lighting the town in a less than prototypical manner, as well as some negativity on what engines I planned to use... my engines are perfect for a TV or silver screen western, but are engines that span from the late 1800s, to the late 1920s. I've mentioned some of my plans that pay tribute to TV and movie westerns, and have had feedback (again, never here... and never at my local shop) but it has happened. So I do understand where that's coming from. It wasn't the sort of feedback I used to get back in the 80s, when I first planned a completely fantastical layout (my plan back then, was a three part layout, with "time tunnels". Part would have been late 1800s, Old west, part would have been 1950s, and the final part would have been complete Science Fiction futuristic... I had a Tyco "Turbo Train" that was just itching to run the rails of the entire layout!) The closest I got to flack on that idea in the 80s, was a few shops (there were a lot more shops back then) suggested kitbashing something, and losing the Turbo Train, which required steel track (the Turbo Train went VERY fast, and stuck to the track using magnets) The 1950s portion was going to model a town from a comic strip. No... no... not the Okefenokee swamp, though Walt Kelly would have been proud... and no, not Dogpatch (though I did have a Sadie Hawkins figure) but rather, it would have been based on Bloom County. I had already modeled an "Oral Bill" billboard... an Opus figure... the boarding house, with a small UFO on the roof, with an alien holding a "we are holding Elvis' brain hostage" sign, as Oliver Wendell Jones' back was turned, peering through his telescope... I even started on Cutter John's wheelchair, before having to pack it all up. When I would talk about the layout, and what I wanted to do, the model rail folks I knew back then LOVED the idea! Nobody told me I HAD to build a prototype. Nobody criticized me for wanting works of fiction tossed in. It was my layout, I could build it how I wanted. (and if folks did criticize, I didn't hear it)

On another board, one of the guys stated that either you model a prototype, or you are NOT a real model railroader, you are just playing with toy trains.

Well, I have seen far too many "toy trains" that were MODELS. I have seen too many builders that are model railroaders, that are far from prototype. I have seen some FINE detail, and EXCITING layouts that have kept my interest that would be considered "toy trains" to the hard core rivet counter... confusing toy trains. I have also worked in Hollywood, with some fine modelers that MODEL absolute works of fiction. They are still fine scale modelers. Nobody in their line of work, or hobby would tell them otherwise. Model railroading is no different.

Whether you make the Jurassic Park Railway, or a Steampunk Utopia, or whether you are building Westeros with Harry Potter trains... if you build a scale railroad, you are a model railroader.

And lets face it... whimsy keeps interest. There is a certain joy to be had, seeing those little gems hidden along the back roads, or in the towns, or on the main line, that makes this hobby fun!

Remember, it's only a history project if you are building a history project. It's your railroad... make it fun for YOU! Don't worry about what anyone else will think, because chances are, even those who say "oh no... don't do that!" will still think it's way cool!

(sorry for posting my take on a Reverse Running here... I didn't mean to be that long winded)

Fun

Fun is the whole idea.  I'd like to see more ideas of oddities, from the subtle to the wild.  I'd call my NCC 1701 car as easter egg as much as anything; if yu don't know the story, it's just another railrad car.  The Innsmouth Short Line car I'm planning on building, with appropriate Innsmouth residents--THAT is more wimsey, though still wimsey that can  go, just by being parked elsewhere.

Balance and Generational Change

A bit of whimsy is good, but just keep it subtle and don't have it everywhere. The other thing to keep in mind is that references to TV shows or movies are very generational. I can recall making a comment "Book it Danno" at some meeting at work and having everyone look at me strangely since they had never seen the show Hawaii 5-0. So you might get it, but anyone under 50 might not have a clue.

I have been trying to come up with things that would attract people and kids at train shows, but run into this generational problem. I had Wily Coyote and the Roadrunner on a diorama thinking that would attract the kids. After watching them I realized that they had never seen those cartoons! Spongebob squarepants might have been a better choice. Its hard to keep on top of those changes!

Whimsey

Lee's whimsey about the Oleander Barrel Staves can go in more than one direction.  He chose the name because it sounded cute, but the oleander plant is poisonous.  Most folks would be scratching their heads on the prospect of making barrels out of toxic oleander.  Let alone the question of finding an oleander large enough to make a barrel stave in the first place!

Generational Whimsy

Brent, I agree most whimsy is probably generational, like your "Book'em Danno" reference. I have a reference on my layout that most people probably will not get, "Achenback Tunnel"

Achenback Tunnel

Not if they are into particle physics.

Jupiter Mining

My little piece of the N&W services the Red Dwarf #1 mine owned by the Jupiter Mining Co. It is also somewhat obscure and generational. Any guesses?

Don

whimsy II

I agree, some whimsy is generational, as mentioned. But could it not also be a way for us to communicate to others our likes and a little education on things of our past interests. I mention this, because on a camping trip last year, the RV next to ours had a vanity plate that said "Tardis". Being that I have never seen Dr. Who, I had no idea, but my wife, a lifelong fan, did and explained it to me. When I saw it mentioned above, I knew what it was and did not have to google. Does the name Archer and Spade ring a bell? How about The Mystic Knights of the Seas? These are things from the past that have found a place on my layout, and just maybe somebody from today's generation  may have enough interest to investigate. Of course as cool as I found the name the people gave their RV, I still haven't watched the Doctor, just not my thing.