I was recently asked, “where do you get your inspiration for By the Yard”? The interviewer was rather disappointed when I replied, “ripped from the headlines of my life”. I don’t have some kind of clever writing process. Instead, almost all the By the Yard® comics are based on real life occurrences. This particular comic is pretty much word for word based on a real event. Train Guy and I had gone to a train show where the organizers were indeed boasting about how many acres of model trains were on display and that the event consisted of five gigantic expo-sized buildings. I dutifully trudged to and from all five buildings, enduring the New England January snow and ice. We had a nice time. We even saw the actual steam train from a village in Maine where my parents live. Train Guy visited every booth, some of them two or three times. He acquired some steam engines he had his eye on, literally dozens of train trucks (for the uninitiated those are the little wheely things that go under train cars) and a bunch of other widgets that served some unknown purpose.
After this auspicious day, a quick Google search revealed there was a quilt shop nearby. Being more than two hours from the house, of course we had to stop in. After all, when would be the next time we’d be out this way? As if we were in some kind of 80’s sitcom, the very second that we stepped into the quilt shop an exasperated patron burst through the doors and shouted out at the top of her voice, “And THIS is for the train show!!”. Train Guy and I gave each other a knowing glance and had to struggle to control our guffaws. He proceeded to putter around the shop while I checked out the goods at my leisure. He then tried to convince me to buy four yards of a fabric instead of the one yard that I thought was all I needed. That would be the inspiration for another comic for another day.
Since then, we discovered there are a lot of quilt-loving/train-loving couples, maybe some more so than others. My advice to couples who must endure their other half’s obsessive hobbies – whether they be trains, tractors, trucks, fishing rods or whatever – just be gracious. Sure, I can’t tell the difference between HO scale or ON30 and Train Guy still thinks a jelly roll is some kind of wonderful dessert, but by going to these events together, we learn more about each other’s’ interests and most important of all, we spend time together doing things that we love.