Club v Stand alone

QUOTE You don't need the words model rail club to imply anorak in this game. Just mention to someone that you are into railway modelling and the implications are a cross between Dwayne Dibley and Roy Cropper.

I get the exact same, and I get it from my wife, her family and my work mates. I don't see why we get the "anorak" stigma when it's ok to be interested in cars or trucks or golf or whatever. Theres one guy at work I sit next to who is in the Aussie equivalent of the Territorial army when he occasionally brings up the anorak thing, I say to him "hey, your in your thirties and still playing in the mud at soldiers, I'm in my forties and my hobby involves woodwork, electronics, art, computer technology who's the big kid?"

I don't really see why we get it but it's pretty universal. I even seen a dig at model railways on Red Dwarf on TV. The worst thing is I don't see how we could change this.

All I willsay is look around you next time you go to an exhibition and you will see that possibly there are those who look the part so maybe the stick is partly deserved. As for train spotting I only take photo's if i'm at a station to catch a train anywayso wouldn't confess to travelling the length and breadth of Britain to "cop" a particular loco. Perhaps we should start having a pop at those sad gits who have fun sitting by a river for 8 hours trying to land a minnow. You think this is an expensive hobby, a clooeague spent £50 on lures and came out with around 10. He even confessed the other day that the last time he went he kept falling asleep and waking up as the rod made a plunge for the river. At least as a trainspotter you are more or less guaranteed to cop summat unless you are sat nest to a line that has been closed for repairs!!

I too am sick of the stereotypes and as I still attend a school the piss taking is more widespread especially when we are working on the railway and we have something running if I got a penny for everytime i heard "Make it Crash" and "make it go faster" or "ha its come off its rubbish" we have even given up placing scenery on at school as kids start mucking around with the cars and some particulary sad people find it funny to pose cows in sexual positions
As towards us being sad there are sports which involve Sitting by a river for several hours pulling a fish out of the water and throwing it back and even dafter a game designed by a bunch of ginger scots (sorry for the stereotype) who decided they were fed up of being oppressed by the english and decided then to hit a ball into a hole with a stick fish it back out again and hit it into another hole and we are sad because we enjoy creating a little slice of paradise and running trains on it in my opinion anyone who calls someone "sad" is by all rights "sad" themselves
Sorry for any offence created in this post if any
Also I am a great advocate of the club although some clubs could do better to persuade members Spongebob mention Shipley model railway club I contacted them last year and they totally blanked me wheras Bradford Club a lesser known and smaller club replied is their a moral to this?