Saturday, September 22, 2012

Crash and Burn

Wonderful. The computer crashed before I had a chance to save the post I was working on for today. Awesome. All that lovely nuance and carefully crafted wordsmithing is now just a pile of unrecoverable bits floating somewhere on the hard drive.

I did make good on my promise to sleep most of my day off away. Aside from the manic work schedule, I think a contracted a bit of whatever unpleasantness was floating around at work. Nothing particularly nasty, it just made me even more tired than I should have had any right to be.

My car was also sick this week, and that was something a little extra sleep couldn’t cure. It’s definitely an incentive to generate a little extra revenue; as long as ol’ Sherman can last another 4 to 6 months, that should be enough time to cultivate a decently-sized down payment - after I’ve finished paying off the bill to keep him running in the first place.

All these model horse commitments I’ve made aren’t going to help, either: aside from Harlequin, there’s also a Lionheart and a Gus on the way, not to mention any Web Specials or other nonsense coming at us over the next few months. (Outside of the Pinto Fury/Prancer, nothing on this year's Discontinue List is begging to be brought home. Thank goodness.)

Like the Mid-States Specials, for instance: a Bay Roan Roxy named "Constellation", and a cute dun Classic Warmblood Mare named "Fawn". Fortunately, there are no Mid-States stores nearby to tempt me. I’m too cheap, and a bit too lazy, to order them online.

(No, seriously. Don’t even think about offering a pick-up or a trade. No room. No money. Not happening.)

There was a bit of a stink on Blab about the fact that a couple of pieces from this year’s Breyerfest auction were rather obviously tests of these two gals. My first reaction was a bit of pride: my intuition about the auction pieces being more "actual test pieces" rather than "factory customs" was right.

My second reaction was Do you people not know what the term "test color" means? It means that they’re testing a color, which also means that they are considering it for production. You shouldn’t be surprised if it does turn up a few months (or years) from now. That is their actual and original function. The fact that they can use them to generate money for charity is just a nice bonus. 

I’d think that finding out your auction piece was a Test Run for an actual production piece would be a huge plus: instead of being some fancy, but ultimately meaningless factory custom, you’d actually have a piece of Breyer History. Like this fella:


Yeah, he’s beat up, dinged up, and on an unfashionable mold, but I wouldn’t trade him for something newer or fancier. He’s quite obviously the test color for the #819 Dan Patch, on the Pacer mold. Why would I?

3 comments:

bubbasmom said...

Whoa! Unfashionable? My favorite mold? I think not;^) Wanna trade/sell him?

Anonymous said...

The fact anyone in the hobby is so clueless about the whole term "TEST RUN" is amazing to me. Add that to the limited color scheme of real horses and the hobby gets a big ol' *FACEPALM* from me today.

(Oh god they've used a roan color that I've seen on a very high priced test run HOW UNETHICAL!)

Anonymous said...

That test run kerfuffle was rather amusing and aggravating at the same time. Did Breyer sign a contract saying they'll never use that color again in either case? No? Oh, well! They're called TEST pieces for a reason!

Your Dan Patch QHG is a handsome fellow, by the way.