Island layouts

[nachoman]

Wayne makes a good point about what is true in life, and not just model railroading.

I have a coworker who has no car, and no television (shocking). He earns plenty, and has no big expenses. Yet, he frequently mentions about how he is looking to buy a television and a car. I have worked with him for a year and a half, and he still talks about "when he finds one he likes". I finally concluded that he never will buy a car or a television; he is just indecisive. Other coworkers tell me he has been talking about getting a car and a television for ten years or more, but never has. That is dithering - constantly talking about what one wants to do without ever making progress towards that goal. Perhaps under psychoanalysis someone may conclude that he really doesn't want a car or a television and is just saying that to explain his eccentricity, and that he is happy living without - and that would not be dithering.

[doctorwayne]

I think "dithering" is an integral part of the hobby...

For some people it is the hobby. However, ballasting is not dithering, nor is re-arranging things to get the "look" you want. You were actively advancing the state of your layout as you ballasted, even though doing so was merely a means of putting off the problem of the structure arrangement. If you had been truly dithering, you would have accomplished absolutely nothing, except perhaps, to convince yourself that you were incapable of doing whatever it was that was holding you back in the first place. Instead, by doing "something", not only did that "something" get done, but the problem more-or-less solved itself. (Well, it didn't really - you solved it!)

Wayne

[MountainMan]

I think "dithering" is an integral part of the hobby...

For some people it is the hobby. However, ballasting is not dithering, nor is re-arranging things to get the "look" you want. You were actively advancing the state of your layout as you ballasted, even though doing so was merely a means of putting off the problem of the structure arrangement. If you had been truly dithering, you would have accomplished absolutely nothing, except perhaps, to convince yourself that you were incapable of doing whatever it was that was holding you back in the first place. Instead, by doing "something", not only did that "something" get done, but the problem more-or-less solved itself. (Well, it didn't really - you solved it!)

Wayne

My wife calls it "putzing" when she does it.

[Steamtrains]

Just a note...The coal silos in the back do not belong to the scene....They're in "storage" for the time being. They'll find a place to live in the as yet to be built peninsula.....