Wailua, and Other Business

Today is going to be a bit disconnected, since I’m still recovering from a bit of who-knows-what from last week. (There have been a lot of unexpectedly extended naps over the past few days!)

First up is Wailua - Second release in the America the Beautiful Series, all designed by Sommer Prosser:

Ooh, a Gloss Legionario! It is true that Gloss Finishes are a rare feature on Legionario releases; other than Tests and Samples, the only ones I can think of are Decorators like the 1991 Gold Florentine Raffle piece, and the Silver Filigree Grane of Gotterdammerung.

My only (tiny) quibble with him is that it’s yet another flavor of Gray. It is in keeping with the theme of the series – his mane is like a waterfall, and the dapples like water bubbles – but darn it, it’s still left me pining for a nice Dark Dappled Bay or Pinto!

On the plus side, the appearance of a relatively low-quantity piece run does suggest that more Legionarios may be in our future. The last widely available Legionario release (excluding the Exclusive Event Excalibur in 2014) was 2009’s Spanish Flamenco Set.

If there’s a Legionario SR at BreyerFest – Surprise or not – I am all in. I’ve entered every day for Wailua, too, but I haven’t been picked for a Web SR since Astru, so I am not hopeful.

Second, another previously unknown In-Between Mare has appeared on eBay. Needless to say, I won’t be participating in that exercise of financial futility.

It appears to have surfaced in the Chicago area, which is in keeping with the history we think we know about it: that a small test batch was made, whatever was made was mostly destroyed/reground when they did not pass muster, with a handful of survivors circulating locally.

The slow drip-drip of IBMs into the marketplace is just more fuel for the fire that that understanding of its history is wrong, or incomplete. (I still favor the notion that whatever was made was not destroyed, but simply mixed into the earliest distributed batches of the “new” Family Arabian Mare.)

Third, there’s the news that this year’s NAN has been cancelled.

In this house, whenever things get real quiet, it usually means that Vita has been up to some serious no-good – stripping the guest bedroom bed, eating an umbrella, or picking your coat pocket for cough drops and candy wrappers.

Just a couple of weeks ago I was thinking the same thing about NAN and NAMHSA.

I can’t say that I necessarily saw it coming, but it is also not a surprise, given the lack of meaningful communication and what recent changes and announcements have been made (like the switch to a one-judge system, and keeping the event in Kentucky for multiple successive years).

I don’t know if I’ll attend the event that they have planned for the Thursday before BreyerFest, since Thursday is already the busiest day of that week for me. I might just to attend the Open Meeting, but like the last time there was a serious controversy, I think by then it will be too late, with opinions too calcified for any progress to be made.

Ephemeral

I’m afraid I’m not going to be terribly talkative today. The "texture" issue I had over the weekend turned into an allergic reaction so severe that I ended up at the local urgent care clinic early Monday morning. I’m feeling (and looking!) somewhat better today, but the Benadryl is definitely messing with my head.

I used the unexpected day off to sort through some very old hobby ephemera I received during BreyerFest, from the archive of a long-time hobbyist. There’s not a lot of Breyer-specific information in it, but some of the materials contained within are absolutely mindblowing from a Hobby History standpoint. Including this seemingly crude newsletter:

It’s the first page/front page of the January 1969 issue of The Model Horse Shower’s Journal.

Think about that a minute: January 1969. That’s over 45 years ago! I’m astounded that something this ephemeral lasted this long. It’s continuing existence a testimony to the staying power of the hobby, and the profound impact it had on its participants.

The level of sophistication that existed in the hobby then came as something of a revelation to me. Live shows were exceedingly rare then, but the photo show scene was thriving, pedigree assignment/breeding was huge, and dozens of clubs abounded to cater to every whim and interest.

And most astounding of all, on the second page of the January 1969 issue, someone was already trying to collect photographs to write a history book. (Oh, how much simpler it would have been, back then…)

There was even a NAMSA: The North American Model Showers’ Association! I have an undated 8-page flier that defines all the positions within the Board of Directors, Voting Rights, the Point System, Approved Shows, and a Championship Show. (There’s mention of 6-cent stamps? That would date it to ca. 1968-1971.)

I have even earlier evidence of hobby activity, but nothing that suggested this level of complexity.

I didn’t become an active participant in the hobby until 1978, though I was aware of it before then through the ads for Just About Horses in the Breyer Collector’s Manuals. And through the enthusiastic recruiting efforts of a couple of hobbyists a grade ahead of me who rode the same school bus.

When I received my first issue of The Model Horse Shower’s Journal in September 1978, it was like I had opened the door into another world, full of people like me. Hundreds, if not thousands, of them.

Whenever I speak to younger hobbyists - and even some older hobbyists who discovered the hobby later in life - many of them get the impression that it’s a relatively new phenomenon, wholly created by Breyer itself.

Although it is true that Breyer started to have a more visible and active presence in the hobby by the late 1960s, they were only adding bricks to the foundation that we had started years before.

Easter Eggs

Spent the Easter weekend cleaning up the yard, and the office. When either endeavor began to frustrate, I had another one of my "Why isn’t this one done yet?" quilt projects to distract me.

Once all three projects are completed, I’ll move on to BreyerFest stuff.

I made good progress on all three because I’ve been trying to limit the computer time. Just too many aggravating hobby personalities and situations I don’t want to deal with, even in the most passive ways.

Except for one. While I don’t have a vested interest in any of the locations for next year’s NAN, as it is unlikely that I’d be able to attend regardless, I am extremely curious to see how the current NAMHSA crisis du jour turns out.

I have had my issues with NAMHSA - I think they spend too much time focusing on an end result (the "Big Show") and not enough time focusing on foundational issues (like the reason and purpose of The Show in the first place). Some of the individuals in charge have occasionally fallen into my personal "don’t want to deal with" group.

Yet curiously, and unlike a lot of hobbyists, I think everything will be fine in the end. The existence of dysfunction is not the problem: stuff happens, no matter how much or how well you plan. How the dysfunction is dealt with is the truer measure of judging an organization's viability.

Maybe I’m a little inured to some of the drama because I’ve been in the hobby long enough to have seen most of it before. I’ve also dealt with similar issues in other interests of mine and know it is not unique to us. (Google "SFWA Controversies" if you want to see some real hair-raising stuff. And today, apparently, the 2014 Hugo nominations. Yikes!)

You made it this far with my pontificating, so here are a couple of pictures from Marney’s Album, as conciliatory Easter Eggs. Notice anything odd about them?

No socks! There are a number of photos of Woodgrains in the album, all taken around the same time frame (1970-1971). While some of the pieces are undoubtedly true Production Runs, these two pictures - and a few others - make me wonder if these were Test Colors, or something, on Marney’s part.

Woodgrains had been largely discontinued at that point - only the Fighter remained in production by 1970 - but we know that Special Run Woodgrains were being made in the late 1960s and into the early 1970s for the Dunning Industries Ranchcraft line.

It’s hard to identify those later Special Run Woodgrains, absent their presence on lamps, because there’s no way of distinguishing them from earlier releases. We only know that Non-Fighting Stallion Woodgrains were manufactured (and not simply pulled from warehouse backstock) after 1966/7 because Running Mare and Foal lamps can be found with USA marks, as well as Woodgrains of molds that simply didn’t exist prior, such as the Polled Hereford Bull.

All of the other Woodgrains in the album are on molds that had been released as Woodgrains before, so they could all be items from her collection that she had picked up elsewhere.

Yet there are other photos in the album of pieces that are clearly attempts at reproducing vintage molds in vintage colors, like the Old Mold Mares I’ve mentioned here before.

There will never be any definitive proof unless one of those album pieces does show up - and only if it has a USA mark. I haven't seen or heard of any so far, but I’ve seen a lot of unlikely things, especially lately.

The Other Gray Saddlebred

Oh, good heavens, there’s more hyperventilating on NAMHSA-Discussion, this time over last year’s streaming NAN video feed, which reminded me of a bass fishing video. (Some events are better left to being there. See also: golfing, bowling and competitive eating.)

Look, I’m not a huge fan of getting my picture taken either, but you know what? Once you’re gone, the pictures are all people are going to have to know your face by. Most of the pictures taken of me in the past several years involved me in some rather silly and/or moderately awkward situations at BreyerFest or other hobbyist-related events, and I’m totally okay with that.

I can clean up pretty good when I need to, but most of the time I don't find myself in that kind of situation. The me that I am in those mildly embarrassing pictures is closer to the real me than any formally posed picture could ever be. That’s the person I want people to remember.

I have absolutely no desire to be invisible. In fact, I can think of nothing more horrifying than to vanish completely.

But I also don’t make it a habit of smoking, drinking or doing anything more illegal than jaywalking in public, so there’s that. (I’m not a teetotaler: where I live and what I do just make drinking anything stronger than a Mountain Dew wildly impractical most of the time.)

Commander still sits on my workbench, unopened. Silly Vita ate something she shouldn’t have (again!) and most of the day was spent warding off a potential hazmat situation. She’s back to her old self today, but it's as if that little bugger planned it all along, you know?

Interesting. The same week that the Vintage Club Commanders are shipping, Reeves announce another Gray Saddlebred Special Run - a BreyerFest Special in Gloss Dappled Gray Sabino on the Clock Saddlebred, named Ryman.

They also put up a picture of a second Bfest Special: a Gloss Red and White Jasper, named Short Ribs. While most everyone else is having squealing fits of joy over the Saddlebred, it’s the Piggy that has me all excited. It’s the first-ever production release of that mold in a Gloss Finish.

The Saddlebred is nice - I’m sure it’ll be even more attractive in person, as is standard for these sorts of things - but the mold’s never been a huge favorite of mine, and there are still several more Specials to be announced in the coming weeks. It’ll be a while before I make any sort of decisions about what and how many. Since I might have a little less space to work with this year due to the potential new car situation, I’m thinking less will be more likely.

In fact, I spent most of Sunday - the parts where I was not tending to Vita’s scatological needs - prepping stuff to sell via every possible venue, now that it looks like I might have the time to actual do it right.

Off to work in a bit, so off I go…

Back in the Saddle

I've had some modest success on the thrift store circuit over the past few days. No horses worth buying, but I did walk away with a couple of good books, a stack of quilting stencils and a "new" iron. (We go through irons in this house like other people go through disposable pens. Makes no sense to buy them new.)

Actually, it was a bit of a relief that I didn’t find any horses or whatnot. I haven’t had much time to even inventory the sales stuff I got back in December. Plus, I was a bit bummed to find out that the "big ticket" item in that lot turned out to be body quality. I’ll still make money (eventually) but dang it, it’s always something!

Of course, right after I say "they haven’t posted any new news" about BreyerFest, they go and post something on their blog about the live show. Not of direct interest to me, but news, nonetheless.

Although I’ve been something of a critic of the BreyerFest live showing program over the years, I will give Reeves credit for taking the effort to actually promote and recruit that aspect of the hobby, because the hobbyist-based organizations certainly aren’t doing the job.

You got problems with fundraising, volunteering, trust, infrastructure, recruitment and just about everything else, but what’s the big heated debate on NAMHSA-Discussion? How many awards we can give each other at NAN!

Good grief, has anyone in this hobby ever heard the phrase "like shuffling deck chairs on the Titanic"? That’s what that is.

It makes all that snide snarking and carping about every move Reeves (or even Peter Stone) makes or doesn’t make seem rather hollow. "Build it, and they will come" is a movie catchphrase, not a legitimate marketing plan.

In other live show related news, there’s actually one of those Liveshow Benefit Program shows (now with Zuni!) within a reasonable driving distance of my house. (Reasonable driving distance = less than three hours one way.)

It actually made me stop and think about attending for about five minutes, until I realized I would not be a very good entrant. Most of my stuff would fall under the banner of collectibility, and well, I could see myself getting into a mess of trouble with that. There’d be the THAT’S NOT GLOSS, THAT’S SEMI-GLOSS, argument, then the THEY MADE MORE THAN 200 BUCKSKIN LADY PHASES, YOU NITWITS discussion, or the THAT’S THE 1988 VERSION OF THE SR, NOT THE 1980 meltdown …

Good grief, I never expected to turn in the model horse world’s version of Rich Morrissey:

http://www.newsfromme.com/pov/col346/

(Short version: guy knew everything about comics, and then some. I knew him, slightly, during my APA days. A wonderful font of obscure information, but also sometimes rather intimidating. To me, anyway, a mere dilettante in that field.)

I just got a shipping notice for Commander, so he’s next up on the blog post queue.

Minority Report

It looks like the there was a particularly vituperative "airing of grievances" on the NAMHSA Yahoo list over the weekend; I won’t call it entertaining, because it’s becoming such a regular and unwelcome thing this time of year. (Like an even less tasty version of fruitcake.)

My opinion on the whys and wherefors probably counts for diddly-squat, since I’m neither a voting member, nor do I attend many shows nowadays.

However, as someone accustomed to being on the outside looking in and someone who is (all too frequently) the voice of the minority on topics in both the real and unreal world (of model horses, silly), I can speak with some authority on that.

There’s a difference between being disagreeable, and "trying to shake things up". One does not need to become the former in order to enact the latter. Sometimes you do - especially when your opponent is being unreasonable or unresponsive - but most of the time you really don’t.

Alas, all too many people in the hobby either do not know the difference, or do not care. Which would not bother me so much, if there were not also hobbyists exploiting that lack of distinction.

Since I am in no mood to talk about it any further, here is a picture that is more in keeping with the more pleasing parts of the season - a French-beaded Christmas Tree!

I made the ornaments and the garland, too; almost everything that went into making it came from my craft stash, except for the wooden base, and a couple extra ounces of seed beads. (FYI: You’ll need at least a half a pound!)

French-beaded plants and flowers aren’t necessarily hard to make, but they are extremely time-consuming. So if you’re contemplating giving them as gifts, whatever you have to pay for them pre-made is probably worth it. Unless you’re daft, cheap, or have a lot of time on your hands in the month of December, like me.

Black and White and Red All Over (Again)

I got all caught up on the novel yesterday, but I’ve got a lot of catching up to do with everything else, so I’m probably going to fall a bit behind again. Ah, well.

Lots of news in the Breyer world this week. First up, another Red Pegasus (or Red "Pegassus") has shown up on eBay. It's just as authentic as all of the other Red Pegasusses that have shown up on eBay. Which means, NOT AT ALL.

Sheesh, sometime I feel like I should have a PSA about them, like they do with Smoke Detector batteries, health screenings, or the ones that tell kids not to take candy from strangers.

Listen to your crazy auntie in the basement: bidding on a Red Pegasus is the equivalent of taking candy from strangers.

Just don’t do it, folks.

Some people are anyways, just like they have with all the previous ones, some of whom will absolutely insist on its authenticity, in spite of all evidence to the contrary, and what do I know anyway, because I’m just poor, and jealous, and I don't work for Reeves, or judge or show, and am so unsophisticated that I like to put catsup on my steak …

Fine, whatever.

Next, the Vintage Club is now up for renewal, and the winner of the vote to choose a piece for next year is - the Matte Smoke Five-Gaiter?

Didn’t see that coming. All that online sturm und drang about how matte finishes weren’t vintage enough, and the vote somehow goes to the one selection out of the four that’s NOT glossy?

I kind of figured that the people making the most noise online were the ones who had the weakest understanding of what "vintage" actually meant, but that the voting actually showed some support for that theory is sort of funny.

Still hoping that the Gloss Dapple Gray Man o’ War shows up someplace, though. I want one something bad.

Reeves has also announced a "Live Show Benefit Program" to promote and encourage live showing, especially among youth participants, with a special model - a Black Appaloosa Spirit, named Zuni - as a raffle prize.

Lots of people are jumping up and down at the thought of it, but folks, they’ve tried this before: the Black Proud Arabian Mares from the mid-1980s were also part of a similar program. It’s not something new.

All the rules and stipulations that go along with the program are, though: the show application includes an entire single-spaced page of them, hoping to counter most of the problems that occurred with its previous incarnations and implementations.

The only problem I see with it - aside from the policing - is how they’re going to select the 30-35 qualifying shows. They want to distribute them as fairly an evenly as possible, in terms of geography.

This is an admirable goal, but as anyone whose been in this hobby for more than a couple of weeks knows, some areas have way more shows than others. Plus, they have to go through the additional hoop of being NAMHSA approved.

It’s probably not encouragement enough to get me back into live showing (yet), but I’m not the target audience. I do think the model is super-neat, but that may be because I have been eyeing the Spirit mold lately.

(As I explained before, though, the only one that’s currently in my price range - the Padre - kind of creeps me out. So no Spirits for me, for now.)

More Condition Issues

I sometimes joke that if I were any more clumsy than I already am, I’d qualify for a handicapped parking permit.

Well, just to let you know, I’ve fallen down the steps twice now, in three days. Nothing damaged, as far as I can tell, but I already have a rather high threshold for pain (on account of the clumsiness) so I might not be the best judge.

My Silver Filigree Weather Girl also survived a slight tumble, fortunately while still boxed. (It wasn’t me, I swear.) I have to say that I’m liking these new shipping boxes Reeves is using now. They’re a lot strong than they look, and a lot sturdier than the ones they were using previously, which looked and felt like they were made out of recycled paper towels. They are a bit snug in the size department, though. I know they’ve got size requirements to meet, but an extra half-inch here or there would definitely inspire a little more confidence.

While we’re on the topic, look what just happened to show up on eBay this week - a 1979 Lady Phase, with some interesting condition issues:

1979 Lady Phase

Before y’all get super-upset with the hobbyist in question, let me remind you that things were a little different back then. Making alterations - adding or removing markings, or tweaking the mold - wasn’t that big a deal back then. Even I did it: I will not go into detail, but I did some unspeakable things to an SR Red Roan Running Mare.

We were all young and kinda dumb. Plus, you know, there were a bunch of different buckskin Lady Phases floating around, and we didn’t bother trying to distinguish between them until much later, when we realized, duh, that some of them really were sorta rare. (And I didn’t realize that the Running Mare was an SR one until the damage was done.)

It looks like the latest NAMHSA controversy has flamed out. As expected, it was much ado about nothing. Not nothing nothing, but blown out of proportion to the actual incident. More proof that an e-mail list is good for nonlinear information (announcements, requests, questions that do not require lengthy answers) and not for anything that requires follow through, or follow up (debates, discussions, socializing.)

Just to clarify, the kind of web site or hub I’m envisioning probably wouldn’t include a discussion forum. Discussion forums are good for the things that e-mail lists generally are not (debating-discussing-socializing), but not so great with handling nonlinear information, especially when topics start to drift.

It’s the nonlinear information that I’m most concerned about: news and general information that should be available to most people - hobbyists and nonhobbyists alike - with just a click or two, without any further involvement or commitment. The bulk of it would include announcements about special runs, contests, live shows, volunteer opportunities, real horse stuff of specific interest to hobbyists, model horses in the media, etc.

(I'm not sure articles on more narrowly defined topics would be necessary, or helpful, at least in the beginning.)

The rest of it would be devoted to promoting the hobby online, especially to the hobby-curious, with general information of what the hobby is about, what it entails, and where to go for more information. The sort of thing I imagined that NAMHSA should have been doing from the onset, rather than going all in on a national show, instead.

If we want to get serious about making the hobby to grow and prosper, we need to make the online hobby presence less intimidating to newbies, and easier to navigate.

More Information Wonkery

Did a little Snoopy Dance yesterday upon receiving notification of "winning" a Mont Tremblant. I’m thinking of calling her Le Quatrieme, which roughly translates from the French as "the fourth one", since she will be my fourth Silver Filigree.

I suspect that she’ll probably be the last horse I get this year, though, since it’s very likely that I’ve used up the last bit of good karma I had to get her. I’m not writing off The War Horse drawing or any of the eBay auctions on my watch list, yet, but I’d totally understand if I come up zero for everything else for the remainder of the month.

Which is fine, actually. Bills to pay, and all that.

I see that they shipped out the Stablemates Hermes models this week - and no surprise, someone turned around and sold one already, for a nice little profit. It’s nobody’s business but the buyer’s and the seller’s, I suppose, but I does make me wonder if the buyer was fully aware of the circumstances surrounding the distribution of the model.

It’s become quite clear to me that the information about Hermes hasn’t been as widely distributed as it should have been.

Sadly, this is rather typical of the online hobby, as a whole. One of the things that drives me absolutely crazy is that, in spite of its relatively small and self-contained nature of the online hobby, reliable information does not travel well within it. Information that is - or should be - widely known or generally accepted just isn’t.

It’s not too bad in places like Fallen-Leaves or Blab where, because of the format, anything and everything becomes grist for the mill. The problem there is more of the "operator error" type: there are individual members of those boards who seem phenomenally clueless, but the information is still theoretically available to them. And sometimes, a question from a genuinely uninformed hobbyist will sparks a worthwhile debate or discussion.

Whenever I take one of my semi-regular trips to places like Haynet, or Breyer’s Facebook page, however, I always find myself taking a deep breath before I click. Questions of fact you thought were answered months ago, and in excruciating detail, are still up for debate.

It’s partly the audience: these are the kind of places where low-information, low-involvement, or very narrowly focused hobbyists tend to congregate, and where high-information, high-involvement, more general interest hobbyists have largely fled for greener pastures. These places have become largely self-contained, and where new or revitalizing information rarely seems to venture.

Part of me wants to help out in some of the lower-information forums, but the very format of these places simply isn’t really designed to handle either extended discussions, or to aggregate information, as the current brouhaha going on in the NAMHSA-Discussion Yahoo Group illustrates all too well.

Transitioning these low-information hobbyists to more high-information formats would seem to be the solution to the problem, but it’s not as simple as that. Some people are very wedded to their information sources of choice - and very much against others.

I agree, in theory, that the Blab forum format would go a long way in tempering some of the periodic dust-ups that occur on the NAMHSA-Discussion list, but there is a not-insignificant group of hobbyists who’d rather eat live goldfish than even venture there. Either because of the reputation it has among certain classes of hobbyists, or because the format itself seems too overwhelming.

If I had time to create a non-partisan, model horse news hub, I’d do it, but I don’t. I barely have time to answer my e-mails or edit my link list, much less start a hub.