Helene

There should be a like button.

I've been to the exhibition today, met some of you in the flesh and had great fun talking trains to strange people, suddenly realising that I know a little bit more now than I did when I posted here for the first time - thanks to all of you. I also have to tell the admins here that the new look on the forum's just up my alley. The same green I have on my business cards and stationery. H

From the article: "Model train building is a nostalgia thing," a spokesman for the company said. "Dads and grandads alike are introducing their kids to it because it’s what they themselves grew up with – they either collected Hornby as a kid or they were around for genuine old steam trains." Thanks so much for posting, Patrick. Story is on the right track.

Good morning, everyone, me again. As I predicted, there are some follow-up questions after I've gone through all the material that you guys provided. Especially for the guys who told me to send on PMs. I am really dependent on the info that will follow on the previous conversations before I can carry on with other stuff, and as things go in my world, I'm usually tied to deadlines. I would really appreciate it if we could tie things up because I'm kind of hanging in limbo at the moment. Thank you ever so much for your patience. Helene

This is just a quick message to thank everybody who so kindly responded to my request on the thread as well as via the PMs. I have lots of work to do now, and I am sure more questions will pop up as I go along. I'll be back for those. If anybody can think of anything else that I may not know about historically, please let me know. As Old Blarney said on the old thread: Some more ideas? Lots of them but it is your book. Your character, David, could have gone on to work for Dr James Drumm, but this is yet another Railway Story. The thing is... I can't write stuff that I'm not even aware of. James Patterson says do your research down to the bee sting. The wealth of information that I got from all of you is like the stretched-out spring flowers in Namaqualand, South Africa. https://www.google.ie/search?q=namaqualand+flowers+2015&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ved=0CCYQsARqFQoTCJuCt8jnkcgCFTFa2wod490LzQ&biw=1366&bih=658 Lots of bees to find. Thanks again for everything so far. Helene

Hahaha, I know about the lease, and I know Guinness will never run out of business. Therefore the laughing smiley...

If you guys carry on like this, Guinness will be out of business in no time.

Thank you so much, Leslie. I'll definitely get in touch. County Down... Haven't been there yet. Sounds like a nice excuse for a trip.

Mmm, I have to admit that I haven't thought of the mum buying them kits for Christmas yet. She's a very emotional, manipulative woman The prodigy prefers playing with clay and paint in his mum's art studio, and he will become a huge point of conflict in their marriage. There are two sides to the father-son playroom. The other side is the Sony Playstation II (which was available in 2002) with the biggest TV screen that they could find back then. If he wasn't fiddling around with the art stuff, he was on the play station, but no matter what the dad did - even introducing Thomas the Tank Engine (which I was told could run together with the other trains on the normal tracks?) - little prodigy never took to the train dream of his dad. At a later stage, he will either destroy Thomas, or set the whole set on fire or something horrible like that. But he is also a sly little bugger. He always seems to get away with horrible things while someone else gets the blame. (How I am going to pull this off, scene by scene and chapter by chapter, heaven knows, but I'm going to try.) Please don't put away the glue. It's only through questions and comments like the ones I get on the forum that I'll eventually be able to figure the character out - completely and realistically, ie kill the darlings. That is why I am here.

Leslie, what's CIE? I was just thinking... he might have noticed trains somewhat earlier if his father was a train driver, eg. If his dad took him with on shorter trips since he was about four or five (1968/69), he might have got his love for trains from there? Would he still have seen a steam loco or two at that time, or not at all? If not, then I'll have to go for diesel... Practicalities: Would being a train driver be plausible in the context of my story? How much would a train driver have earned, eg? Was it a very technically skilled job back then? If not, what other job could he have done on the railway that would need high technical skill, and if such a job existed, would it not have paid too much? Useless information: They were poor, but they were a happy family in spite of. His father's motto was look on the bright side and do the right thing; the rest will take care of itself, which we all know is not always how it happens. David (the dad) tries his best to carry this motto forward, and thought that if he had enough money, he might be able to fix what was broken in his own childhood. He never realised how many other things would slip through the cracks if he didn't pay attention and spend enough time with his wife and son - the two people he loved most in this world. Some more ideas?

Thanks Wrenneire, I'll have a look.

Thanks, Richie, for your detailed answer. I am honoured to have my first answer from a Super Guru on this site. I assume that the SDMRC is the South Dublin Club where I spent some time with Paul Daly and co. the other evening. I have to thank them for a very informative few hours. I even learnt about Thomas the Tank Engine! Not sure they have an inner-city Dublin layout though. If the MRSI is the Model Railway Society of Ireland, my first e-mail via their website must have been lying in their inbox for close to two months by now. Or there's a glitch in the web-form system or something. I tried contacting them first. I waited about two weeks and then contacted the Midlands Club (the only club with a contact number on the Associates' page). Got Paul Daly's contact number from Ronnie Gaunt. Via Paul Daly, I eventually got in contact with Fran Burke, because for the life of me, I didn't know murphy models - al lower case - to be the code for cracking the question to get onto this site. But now I'm here! It would be grand to have contact with MRSI as well. Grand, I'm glad to hear that. Not so grand. I would have loved him to build these things as well, but you can probably not have Santa's whole toy shop for Christmas... In the context of this info of yours, see also my question on Blaine's reply re the dad's modelling experience and time constraints in the normal swing of things. When exactly did the first diesel engines come onto the Irish railway? I still have to figure out the logistics of where they lived in relation to the station and how easy it would have been to gain access to the station. They might have lived in one of the tenement buildings that collapsed in 1963 - or close to there - because it might have had a significant influence on the dad's (David's) family. The research is still a bit scanty. If you or anybody else reading this know anything or have any ideas on that front? David was born in 1964 so he might have had an interest since he was little. I think his dad might have had some technical/mechanical job as well. Brains and technical skill running in the family and all that. The only difference was opportunity because of economic circumstances. He must have had a job that paid only a pittance. Perhaps something with trains? Any ideas? I would think he'd like steam, but perhaps that's just me female Ana Karenina-kind of psyche at play here. If you guys were him... what would you have liked and why? And then, if we decide on steam or diesel or a combination of both... which models? Why those particular ones? Yea, I'm still going to drive you all bonkers. *Female Devil Smiley with horns, tail, a wink and a toothy grin* Why? Detail is important, as you will know from the great writers who shaped the literature of this country. If I want to have just a miniature little spot here, I need to do me homework. It would be disrespectful not to. On that note, I should probably say that I'm in the Afrikaans word business, so my English is by no means flawless. I also don't have time to check these posts for consistency and grammatical or other bugs, so if you see Afrikaans cracks in my language here, please forgive them. And as for the man thing... thank you for indulging me in your inner circle. It is much appreciated.

A humble thank you. That gives me hope. Okay, so no help from the trams. Thanks He isn't building these in the 1960s. He starts working on this specific layout when they start renovating the house in January 2002. They will move into the house in July, and there will be a fancy dinner at the house for the new colleagues at the end of August, before the commencement of the new academic year. I'm not sure whether he would have had more time for modelling earlier in his career though. He was too driven to make enough money to create a comfortable life for his family. It may be though that it was always an interest that he finally felt he could make time for. Another logistics question here: If he took time off to oversee the seven or eight months of renovations (not working on it himself, but just making sure that the contractors are doing their jobs) and kept himself busy on this project to surprise his son with, how much of it would he be able to finish, etc. He would still be commuting to London occasionally for a day or two to make sure that the London practice's wheels didin't come off, but other than that, and general checking up on the progress of the house and preparations for his new job, he would have had a lot of spare time then. He thought it important to have this huge surprise ready (or very far along) when they move in. Would it practically be plausible if he had half a room to cover? See the attached floor plan. The size would be approx correct, but this is not an exact floor plan of the house. It is just the shape of this one room that I liked when browsing hundreds of floor plans on the internet. I thought of putting the train set more towards the window half of the room where the bay window could possibly be utilised nicely for the landscape? Although Mum's a grand artist, I'm not quite sure that she will partake in this venture. There would be a large TV and Sony Playstation in the other half of the room. Any ideas? [ATTACH=CONFIG]20133[/ATTACH]

Thank you very much, burnthebox. Nothing against Wicklow. I promise. I love Wicklow, and was there last week to go and show it off to a friend from South Africa. The reason I chose Wicklow had to do with simple logistics. "Garden of Ireland" kind of weather where you have more bird species than just magpies, crows and gulls. Proximity and access to Dublin. I looked at thousands of pictures of Big Houses all over the country for days and days on end, then suddenly came across one in Wicklow and the lights went on. It was perfect. Another reason is the equestrian activities. Those are, in short, the most important reasons.

PS I do learn fast though.