A Celtic Arabian

In case you haven’t seen it, this is Breyer’s official notice about COVID-19, which is about what I expected:

https://www.breyerhorses.com/blogs/news/a-message-from-breyer-regarding-covid-19-novel-coronavirus

In short: nothing’s cancelled, but we’re monitoring the situation and will update you if there are any changes. 

On a lighter topic, the latest BreyerFest is… a Sham?

I had assumed that at least one of the Specials this year was going to be an Arabian, but for some reason I thought it’d be the Proud Arabian Stallion and not the Sham.

The four Proud Arabian Stallions that have been Special Runs for BreyerFest are either expensive or hard to find: the 2003 Raffle Model Saturday Night Fever, the 2008 Gloss Prize Model Thee Desperado, the 2009 Volunteer Model After Party (my favorite!) and the 2015 Raffle Model Que Sera Sera.

But the Sham isn’t quite as challenging: just the 1991 Wedgewood Blue Raffle Model, the 1996 Celebration Horse Tseminole Wind, and the 2008 Decorator Pharaoh.

Hmm. I guess it was about time for another Sham.

We last saw the Gulastra Plume coloring on the 2018 Stablemates Club debut of Darley; I was hoping we’d see it again soon, and Sham’s swishy tail is ideally suited for it.

Although I love Glossy Bay, and especially a Glossy Bay with Gulastra Plume, this is another model I am undecided on. I guess I’m just starting to feel a little Special Run fatigue, right now. Or is it that I find the pony-shaped holes in this year’s lineup disorienting?

(Please don’t let one of them be a Diorama Prize model. That contest has been nothing but heartbreak for me. A Translucent Decorator Bouncer as a Pop-Up Store item will be perfectly acceptable.)

I also continue to be mildly amused by the fact that while many of these Specials aren’t all that conceptually different from previous BreyerFest Special Runs – in that their only connection to the theme is in their name – there isn’t that much uproar over that fact this year.

Some of it may be hobbyists finally getting over that particular bugaboo, and the quality of the Special Runs themselves, but I also think everyone else’s enthusiasm for the theme may be overriding that perennial complaint.

As someone whose ethnic background can be loosely described as “Eastern Barbarian”, I find myself kind of meh on the theme.