you see a guy with “body art” completely covering three appendages, and you think to yourself, “Man, think how much train stuff he could have bought with all of that ink!”
Or, mulling over how much time it would take to install a Miller’s Engineering module in one. Oh, I can see it now - a burly dude with a small battery pack attached to his arm and a tatoo that offers 42 different flash patterns for “Mom”…
Tom
… when you set your alarm clock at 3.30am to be up on time for the early morning local [swg]
When you are out in your trailer while it is parked in the driveway, having the wife thinking you are getting it ready for camping season, when in reality you are lying there wondering if you can rig an around the ceiling layout in it somehow. This would prevent serious withdrawal symptoms from occurring while in the Rockies. Although train watching does help with this to some extent.
Or when you avoid taking the shortest, direct route to a town 15 miles away, to your favorite “big box” lumber/building center, and take every conceivable back road you know of that will keep you close to,or in sight of, the CN main line, in hopes of getting lucky and catching anything that may be on the track.
No intervention needed… I admit it…
Mike.
When you’re sitting in your apartment near the B&M tracks in the late 1970s, you hear a whistle and say, “That’s a steam whistle!”
And after the train passes, you pick up the phone, call the B&M and ask to speak to the dispatcher.
When you find out the schedule for the return trip, you take the day off from work.
when you’re plotting what you’re buying next, MTL BN fallen flag 4 car set anybody?
Okay, now that would be really cool. [8D]
You know you are hooked …when you have a knuckle coupler for a trailer hitch!
You know you are hooked …when your bumper sticker says “my OTHER car is a Heavyweight {or streamlined} Passenger car”
You know you are hooked when you make coffee for the wife and ask “will that be steam or diesel?” instead of “cream or sugar”!
[8-|]
When you’re standing on the platform at the depot and scanning the track to make sure there aren’t any loose fastenings (except for those attached to the top of your neck" !! ).
Dennis
When you step into a wide-open 100’x40’ basement at a neighbor’s house, and can’t stop imagining what a helluva layout would fit in there.
Omigoodness this is just awesome! Your’s is too CSX!!! I laughed lol.
When you realize just how you want to paint your fictional roads units, while your working on a model aircraft.
Imagine this 8-40BW painted in aluminum with green stripes on the nose, and a green lighting bolt down the side. with the roadname letters being green and switching to aluminum while hitting the lightning bolt.
Testors aluminum paint, is pure amazing. 
You know you are hooked when you call your pusher, I mean the LHS and they have caller ID so they answer the phone “Derek! How are you?” plus you get e-mails all the time asking if he should pre-order this or that for you. Most of the time you say yes.
Hopelessly hooked in CT, Derek
hahaha yep, I agree UP those LHS guys recognize me before I’m even in the door! [(-D]
You know you’re hooked when you go to the train club at 4:00 pm on Friday and leave at 8:00 am on Saturday morning.(been there ,done that several times)
You know you’re hooked when you go to the train club to take inventory and realize that the 400+ cars on the layout are not enough.
You know when you are hook when you dream about winning the Lottery and building a free standing train room that looks like a 1:1 round house!
I know I’m hooked when I’m sitting here at 1:30 a.m. reading about other guys posting their reason for being hooked, and I agree with everyone.
-Bob
PS: I’m going to read this tomorrow and see if I remember why I wrote this?
You know you are hooked when your desktop’s default screen is set to the latest MR Magazine cover.
You know you are hooked when you bought the worst house in town…just because it was next to the RR tracks and you could FEEL the locals as well as see them go by!
you know you are hooked when your bumper sticker says “Proud parent of a HO RR”!
You know you are hooked when you mentally convert everything in 1:1 to your model scale.…
You know you are hooked when EVERY VACATION centers around trains…and you OH likes them too!!! {true story for me and MOH- we like to go visiting to steam train tourist RRs {and a few classic historic diesels too!}
[8-|]
…you hit the road at 4:30am to drive five hours to go to an eight-hour-long operating session.
Then drive five hours back the same day.
…when you time your commuting schedule to side-by-side with your favourite passenger train. Toot toot!