Black and White and Gray All Over

And now, George Pérez. I mean, I’ve known that one was coming since late last year, but it hits hard in a different way, because I actually met him once. It is one of my most delightful convention memories, in fact. 

He was good friends with some artist/creator friends of mine. I was sitting with my friends in the Artist’s Alley at the Motor City Comic Con one year, just goofing around as they were fielding questions and sketch requests. George, who was one of the featured guests that year, just walks up to the table and starts singing show tunes. And my friend Mercy starts singing show tunes back. 

What a strange and magical moment it was: stuck in the middle of an impromptu Broadway medley with George Pérez! 

(No pictures were taken to record the event, alas. I think I would have been too dumbstruck to take any, even if I had brought my camera.)

This whole weekend was kind of downbeat, when I think about it. First, most of my seedling have shriveled up and died for reasons I absolutely cannot fathom. I’ve had seedling failures before, but nothing like this. All I can hope for at this point is that I can salvage something. Anything, really.

After (finally!) finishing up my sales list inventory, I also came to the sad conclusion that I will not be able to bring everything to BreyerFest as I had hoped. There’s just too much stuff – nearly nine pages of it, and that does not include the most recent collection pulls! So I’ll have to make some hard decisions on what I can and cannot fit in the car. Selling things online is currently not an option, at least until late Summer or early Fall. 

On a more cheerful note, here are two other pieces from the collection that brought me my Charcoal Running Foal:

A few years ago I discovered that I did not possess a complete Gloss Charcoal Family Arabian Family, as I had thought. I was hoping to find a complete family to purchase at some point to remedy this situation, but like so many things, I never got around to it.

Although the Foal above is not an exact match for my Mare (who is currently in storage), I really doubt that I could find better, and I am not going to try: bright white, perfect pinking, minimal molding flaws.

I’ve had several Alabaster Family Arabian Mares – both Gloss and Matte – and this example is also one of the best I’ve seen. Quality vintage Alabasters on any mold are challenging, but on Family Arabians even moreso, since they were tailored specifically for the toy market. 

I’m not at all worried about matching up my Alabaster Family Arabians, though. I have an insane number of Alabaster Foals – Matte and Gloss – as a consequence of a research project that went a little too far (don’t ask!). My Gloss Alabaster Family Arabian Stallion is actually an Old Mold Stallion with a crazy amount of shading – the kind you normally see on vintage Fighting Stallions, Five-Gaiters or Rearing Mustangs – and I just don’t think it’s likely I can anything that can even remotely match him. 

He does have a matching Old Mold Foal for company who is also pretty nice. My Old Mold Mare is… potentially upgradeable, and I’ll leave it at that. (You would not think that the Alabaster Old Mold Mare would be such a tough nut to crack, but she is for me.)