Rollercoaster

This week’s been a rollercoaster.

Up: I did get drawn for the La Molina and Masella! 

Down: I don’t have a Benasque, and I’m not about to go wandering through that minefield. I can actually afford it right now, but paying $600+ for a 350-piece release is not something I want to be a party to.

Up: I finally found the Walmart Bay Stablemate G3 Quarter Horse. Now I can see why he was such a toughie to get – the color is dark, rich and slightly metallic, and elevates an otherwise blah release into something special. 

This fellow (gal?) is almost Stablemates Club quality, not something I would have expected from a Walmart release. Woo-hoo, new Stablemate office desk buddy!

Down: Reeves decided to drop early access to the better bits of their Black Friday sale in the middle of the day during a workweek. Awesome for people who have access to the Internet at work or are glued to their phones 24/7. The rest of us? No Fylkirs for you!

Then there’s the latest Test Color Purchase Raffle Piece, on the Hess Belgian:

It’s obviously a Test for the 2002 Just About Horses Special Run First Frost, on the Five-Gaiter, and why they didn’t acknowledge this on the web site is a bit of a mystery to me, but whatever. 

First Frost was one of those Just About Horses releases that I bought first, and fell in love with later. It’s the kind of color that improves every model it gets put on, and I’ve been baffled by the fact that it hasn’t been used more since then. I’m guessing because it is hard to photograph well?

While I’m really trying to not get my hopes up, I’m actually in a position right now that I could comfortably pull off a $1000 Test Color purchase. And me being actually part (human) Belgian myself, I think it would be totally fitting.

But alas, my luck doesn’t really run that way. While it does sometimes seems like I have magical powers, they’re rarely of the kind that seems to benefit me directly. So – like everyone else who hopes to get drawn – I find myself wondering what this coaster has in store for me around the next turn. 

Retail Therapy: Pandemic Edition

I have at least three packages lost in the mail; the weather turned February-level cold so all the plants I had hoped to plant this week are still in the house (and all over the house); a fun box of bodies arrived nearly two weeks ago and are also scattered all over the house, and I haven’t gotten more than four hours of sleep any night in so long I can’t even remember now.

Not gonna lie folks: I am exhausted and not up for any nonsense for the duration. No griping, no conspiracy theories, no whining about whatever part of virtual BreyerFest you find unfair, no nothing. Take it elsewhere, I ain’t having it.

So in order to cope with all this, I have apparently engaged in an unseemly amount of retail therapy this week.

First, I did manage to score one of those BreyerFest One-Day Stablemates 4-pack. I was worried that I’d miss them entirely because I had a million errands to run that day, but fortunately there were still some to be had when I finally got home. So yay, me!

Second: Walmart Stablemates!

I was in the store for a completely different reason (emergency gardening supplies, see above) but I figured as long as I was in the store I’d swing by the Toy department and see if there was anything new.

I was hoping for the Unicorns, but I saw a complete set of these guys dangling from a peg hook, so I tossed them in my cart and went my merry way. The Paint Horse is my favorite – a Black Pinto Driving Horse, yay! – but the paint job on the Vanner is really beautiful in person.

They had a box of the Series 3 Mini Whinnies and grabbed a handful of them, too. Considering the circumstances we live in at the moment, groping them to get a complete set seemed inappropriate. So I consider myself fortunate that I only had one duplicate, and the teeny Hambletonian of my dreams:

In less stressful times, perhaps, I can complete this set. I stopped trying to get all the Mini Whinnies a while ago – too much to track and find, too little time or energy to do it – but I think I may make an exception with these guys.

(Or at least until they make some of these molds in Stablemates scale.)

Oh, and did I forget to mention that I broke down and ordered the two little Classic Brabants earlier in the week, because at this point, why the heck not?

I’m also hearing rumors that the Appreciation Glossies – Round Two are starting to ship. I don’t really care who it is, I just really need a shiny pony now.

Good News, Bad News, No News

The stores I went to earlier this week were a bust: nothing new on the shelves yet. As I was driving past a Walmart yesterday I suddenly remembered that I needed to buy some Romaine Lettuce. I noticed they were doing a reset of the toy department and decided to see if the newest Unicorn Series was in.

Nope, not yet. But they did still have some of the Series 2, and remarkably, there was a Rainbow Sherbet Magnolia to be had!

The collectors around here are so hardcore that I’ve never found a Walmart Chase piece in a Walmart ever, no matter how “common” they turn out to be. (Though at least they’re professional enough to not rip open the bags and leave all their unwanteds behind.)

I know they’re not particularly expensive on the secondary market, now that everyone’s had their fill, but you know I like to find things “in the wild”. If only for the purpose of injecting a small bit of color into an otherwise colorless week.

Yeah, I’m still not Seattle-bound. Yet. Or maybe ever.

I’m trying to not think too much about it. I’m having a hard enough time sleeping as it is!

Another thing that’s not going to keep me up nights? Whatever this photo is a reveal of:

You know that one of the things I dread most about the annual BreyerFest reveals is the almost-incessant “Othello is going to be the Surprise!” chatter.

If this guy happens to be an Othello, at least it’ll provide me with some small measure of peace and quiet. Until the “I hate the entire Special Run lineup this year” people start (predictably) complaining after the second or third reveal. (Sigh.)

My only hope and expectation for this year is a new Fell Pony.

Counting releases or announcements, True North has had six since his introduction in 2017, Duende five, and even Bristol has had five since his intro in 2018. But sweet, shaggy little Emma has had only two: her original release in 2015, and the 2016 Exclusive Event Black-Eyed Susan, in Red Chestnut.

I am going to assume that that’s because the original Emma has obviously been popular enough to still be in production, nearly five years after her introduction.

And yet the Bouncer release Brookside Pink Magnum has been in production since 2012, and in the meantime they’ve released both the 2013 Flagship release Icicle and the Decorator Christmas Ponies in 2017.

Most curious.

(A BreyerFest Bouncer would also be... acceptable.)

Rumors Have It

In other news, there’s yet another round of Unicorn Mystery Surprise Unicorns at Walmart. Like a lot of others, I am mentally and physically tapped out of the blind bag thing at the moment; unless there happens to be one in the assortment I can’t live without – not likely, but who knows? – I’ll either skip this round entirely, or buy them whenever the mood strikes, or the budget allows.

None of the BreyerFest Store Specials have been officially announced, but there’s a very credible rumor going around that WGC Marc of Charm will be one of them – with the model being used being the one he modeled for himself: Hamilton!

(Tentatively pencils him in on my must-get list.)

Speaking of Hamilton, I’ve also heard that the 70th Anniversary Collection will have at least one of each of the four primary releases in each case of six, with the other two being a random choice of the five, with one in ten cases having the Chase Piece Pinto Smarty Jones.

If that’s so, then the odds of getting the Pinto Smarty are about one in 60 – not great, but better than the Stablemates Chase pieces, which are one in 96. This comes out to about 250 pieces per every 2500 cases (15,000 units total) sold.

Back when Reeves had distinct definitions for all of the releases that were not your typical, Regular Run models, the term “Limited Edition” was used to describe models that were specifically advertised as being limited to one year of production. Not surprisingly, “Limited Editions” typically sold better than Regular Run models – often, ironically, outselling some Regular Run models that were discontinued after a single year of production!

The production quantities of these Limited Editions were in the neighborhood of 15,000 pieces, thus explaining the origins of my rough guess number. That was nearly 30 years ago, so I am assuming the actual production quantity will be north of that.

And also assuming that they keep the proportions of the other four models in this release roughly equal – at least initially – that means that about one in four of this assortment will be a Palomino Hamilton.

For the number geeks: that is about 3,685 pieces per 2500 cases/15,000 units – roughly the equivalent of a Brick-and-Mortar Special.

So again to all those people who are still freaking out about getting one: calm down! I don’t think the first new shipments of anything will even be hitting stores for another week or so anyway.

Personally, I am not in any big hurry, but if you could see the state of my house right now you’d understand why….

FYI: Yes, I knew all about the Riddle on MHSP. Aside from the fact that I am a little bit short of fun money this month, what I could comfortably pay for it even if I had that money to play with was well under what it even started at, so that was a complete and utter nonstarter.

Moving On

Figures: I buy a bunch of seeds in hopes of maybe getting a few direct-sowers in the ground ASAP, and of course it has to snow. Well, the beds do need a bit more cleaning up, and I have to finally finish up my taxes anyway…

The latest America the Beautiful Web Special, Bandelier has all the makings of a model that I’d want, but for some reason I keep forgetting to enter for him.

I guess I am hesitant to add another higher-end, lower production run El Pastor to the herd, no matter how pretty he might be. It’s for entirely personal reasons: I’ve had an Escondido on my sales list for a couple of years with hardly a looky-loo thrown its way, and it’s been bothering me.

The model itself is perfectly fine, but I have had a difficult time looking at him ever since the disappointment of not winning the Diorama Contest Sona in 2017 hit me harder than I thought it would.

(And it didn’t help that last year at BreyerFest it felt like literally every other 12-year-old girl picked him up in hopes of him being Sona, only to plunk him back down a hot moment later. Sigh.)

The next couple of weeks are going to be a bit on the expensive side for me (taxes, BreyerFest tickets, et al) so it’s probably for the best if I just move along and forget all about the El Pastor mold for a while.

However, I was able to find cheaper, less emotionally-fraught thrills on Friday: the Walmart Horse Crazy Singles!

I attribute finding them less to luck, skill or persistence and more to the fact that everyone else has since gotten their fill and moved on to the next latest, hottest thing, whatever that is. In this case, I’m okay with that, since it works to my advantage.

What’s interesting about the selection of molds they used here is that it shows that Reeves really does have some idea of who their Stablemates “heavy hitters” are, sans the mini Alborozo.

The only one of the four that doesn’t completely float my boat is the G3 Thoroughbred: as I’ve said before, his proportions are more cartoonish than I prefer, and I am not crazy about his long ears.

I wasn’t thrilled when they put last year’s One-Day Stablemates release of the Ruffian on this mold; as a result of my hesitation, the mold’s inexplicable (to me) popularity has made my acquisition of one a completely moot point for me. And being Glossy Dark Bay. And being a portrait of Ruffian. It was a dumb mistake on my part, I confess...

(Though seriously: the last one I saw sold on eBay for $125: that’s almost the same amount of money I sold my last spare Hermes for. And they only made 75 of him!)

I do like the paint job on the new Walmart release, though – it’s not your typical generic “overo” pinto paint job, and I think it complements the mold pretty well. (FYI: of the four, the Rivet is my favorite, only because the shading on him is amazing.)

Hot and Cold and Everything In-Between

Today seems like another good day to wrap up some stray bits of business, since I am currently semi-immobilized underneath a massive pile of clothes, blankets and dog toys, fantasizing about it being 100 degrees warmer than it actually is.

Which would make it, literally, not as hot as an average day at BreyerFest. (You will never – well, almost never – hear me complain about the July Kentucky heat. I live in Michigan, folks: humidity is what we do for summer.)

If like me, you are not venturing outside unless you absolutely have to, but still want to get your horse shopping fix, here’s a nice little treat Reeves is offering us: would you like an inexpensive Espresso? Not the drink, but the Foalzilla of the same name:

https://www.breyerhorses.com/products/espresso-springtime-filly

She’s already on sale, but if you use the DOUBLESHOT19 code at checkout, she’s only be $14.95. That is... practically body box price!

(Not making this up, guys: this is legit. Just thought maybe some of you guys would want to know, you know?)

And while we’re on the topic of shopping: while I greatly appreciate all the offers of trades and Walmart shopping runs on my behalf, I’m still trying to keep my new acquisitions to a minimum, beyond the ones I’ve already committed to.

If I do find any of the Walmart stuff locally that’ll be great, but I will also be fine if I don’t. In the flea market off-season, I have to get my “thrill of the hunt” fix somehow…

(… but definitely not for the next couple of days!)

It appears that NAMHSA is also making another serious effort to put its own house in order, in the wake of the NAN 2019 cancellation. Will the efforts actually lead to real change, this time?

As the years have passed since that first NAN show, the hobby has evolved greatly, and the Board feels that NAMHSA has not always evolved as equally. To that end, the Board will be strategizing and channelling all energy into making positive changes for the organization and for NAN 2020. While this does include using your feedback to improve NAN, the Board wants to make NAMHSA about more than just the national model horse show. Some of the exciting developments to come include a members-only forum, youth events, new and improved NAMHSA swag, and a REBOOTED NAN coming in 2020.  

For 2019, the Board has decided to hold an alternative event in the same vein as No NANSense in 2017. This year’s event will be based on the 2017 event, which was well-received and held a little bit of something for everyone. The plan is to take 2019’s edition to the next level. Stay tuned for more information regarding No NANSense 2019!

(Relevant excerpt from the NAMHSA newsletter.)

I hope so. I do like that they seem to be (finally) taking the hint that for the organization to survive, or even thrive, it has to step up and actually offer more to the hobby than a national show that only a fraction of hobbyists can afford to attend in the first place.

I am kind of overcommitted on multiple fronts right now, so I can’t offer much more than a public thumbs-up of this possible way forward, and occasional late-night inspirations as they strike.

And lastly, it appears that I may have stumbled upon a keen BreyerFest Costume Contest idea. Keen as it (a) is an actual “hero” of mine, (b) can be achieved mostly by thrifting, and (c) also involves a cape, because you know I am all about wearing capes in public.

FYI: It’s not Lando Calrissian – I do not have the necessary panache to pull that off effectively – and it’s not Ziggy Stardust, because no amount of dieting will give me the body for that. (But if they don’t play this song during the Costume Contest at some point I will be severely disappointed.)

Stablemate-o-palooza

So this is what I get for not trying too hard:

The Appaloosa Django came with my Stablemates Club order; in addition to the Glow-in-the-Dark set I finally decided on to capitalize on the weekend Stablemates sale, I tossed in a couple of Mystery Stablemates Bags just for the heck of it, too. I hadn’t purchased any yet locally – mostly because I haven’t found any to purchase – so it was going to be a win-win regardless of who showed up in those bags.

Then I stopped at a Walmart on the way home from work yesterday; Back-to-School sales are in full swing, and I really needed a new lunch bag for work…

After that, I swung by the toy department: the Pink Icelandic was long-gone of course, but everyone else in the Series 2 Mystery Box was still available, and I wanted them anyway – especially the Fleabitten Gray Dungaree. The Liver Chestnut G2 Saddlebred is lovely too, which came as a surprise; the photos I’ve been seeing of him online do not do it justice.

There was also a fresh, full box of the Mini Whinnies Surprises, but after a couple of minutes of poking around, I decided I had had my fun and let someone else have the pleasure of a lucky find.

This particular Walmart did not have the 4-piece Stablemates Set with the Bay Django and Dun Tushar, but at least a half-dozen of the older 4-piece Stablemates Set and a couple of the Classics Unicorns. Since I’m not all that into Unicorns at the moment, and that SM set is basically a renumbered “Reissue” of the Horse Crazy Set I already have, I took a pass on all of them.

Then this afternoon I went to the local Salvation Army to look for some new pants for work; I stopped in at the local Tractor Supply next door, and they had just put out their Mystery Stablemates a few minutes before.

I found the shelf label for the Stablemates Paint Kits, but they weren’t out yet, so I guess I’ll be making a return trip to the store tomorrow after work – that is, if someone else doesn’t get there first.

Since the secret to my success in Stablemates hunting appears to depend on my lack of worry, I’m not going to worry about that, either. And I’ll be fine, regardless!

I have a funny feeling those Paint Kits will not be a TSC-only exclusive, anyway. I just want to see the mini Alborozo and mini Magnolia in person, dangnabit.

I have to get up at an entirely unreasonable hour for work tomorrow, so that’s all for today, folks.

Striking Green Gold

After getting dismissed early from jury duty on Thursday, I decided to stop at the Walmart on the way home, and guess what I found?

It looked like they had just plopped a freshly opened box of Mystery Stablemates on the shelf, so it was more a matter of timing than luck or skill. (There is nothing especially special about the Pony. I just like the mold.)

I wanted to wait until I got home, but my curiosity got the best of me, and I opened them in the parking lot. I probably should have waited – you guys weren’t kidding about the overwhelming paint-store smell!

It’s not just the Gloss that’s responsible for the Friesian’s unique funk, but a combination of the opaque green-gold metallic paint, the Gloss, and the sealed bags they marinate in.

I think that these Green-Gold Friesians will end up being not all that rare, since they seem to be appearing at roughly the same rate/quantity as all of the other pieces in that Mystery assortment, and are being replenished somewhat regularly. They only seem scarce because everyone is rushing the stores and grabbing all the Glossy! Metallic! Friesians they can find.

The situation with the Copper Florentine Django is a little bit different: he’s appearing in one out of every four Mystery assortment boxes. That is rare, but not elbow-to-eyeball Black Friday Sale rare: that’s 750 pieces for every 3000 boxes of Stablemates shipped.

Since many of the other pieces in the assortment are in high demand also – the Reiner, the Bucking Horse Rivet, Tushar, and that especially handsome Alabaster Eberl Andalusian among them – I foresee many more boxes of those Mystery Stablemates being sold and shipped, and many more Djangos with them.

This is why I can’t muster the energy to worry about him. There will be more in the pipeline, sooner and later.

My second Friesian will be sold or traded in the near future (for the Metallic Blue Endurance Arabian, I hope?) There were no Unicorns or Mini Whinnies at the store I stopped at, and since I have too many other things to buy and/or worry about in the next several weeks, that’s likely the end of my Walmart adventuring.

Squishies

Had a close call earlier this week; I had to make a quick pit stop after work (bran muffin-induced emergency) and found myself in a Tuesday Morning – and ooh, they had some mighty fine high-semigloss Stablemates Mystery Foal Set variations!

They were quite tempting, especially since my attempts last week to track down the Walmart Specials – not to buy, necessarily, but just to see “in the wild” – met with abject failure. Every store I happened to find myself in during my work travels either looked liked it hadn’t been reset yet, or had already been plundered for all the gold. It was nice to see a store with actual models on the shelf, for a change.

Fortunately I managed to escape the Tuesday Morning unscathed, but tomorrow is payday and I’ll be in the same part of town….

…and they had an intriguing Classic Haflinger Mare that is bothering me even more than those lovely little Stablemates. She was seriously squished, kind of like my Woodgrain Boxer here:

He’s normal looking from the side, in case you were wondering:

The Haflinger’s side profile was also distorted – that’s how I noticed she was a little peculiar in the first place – so an even better example would have been one of the later Stablemates G1 Quarter Horse Mares with the twisted barrels. But I am in no mood to go digging through my Stablemates tonight.

I’m fairly sure it was a factory-originated flaw and not one that occurred in shipping, because her shading was exquisite – either someone at the factory took it upon themselves to make up for her other deficiencies, or her more dramatic contours enhanced her paint job naturally.

The Haflinger was obviously a one-off, possibly caused by a handling or machine error while the mold halves were still warm and freshly molded. More uniform examples like the Boxer might be – like Bloaties – a result of climate/temperature changes, issues with the mold itself, or a problem in the assembly process.

(The narrowness of more recent molds – like Duende, or the Imperador das Aguas – is most likely an issue with the metal molds themselves, I think.)

Although not as common – or beloved – as Bloaties, this molding flaw occurs with enough frequency that I feel like I need to coin a name for the afflicted. Collapsers? Squishies? Skinnies?

I kind of like Squishies, at the moment.

Chasing Rainbows

First we heard about the upcoming Classics release Day Dreamer, who is a Translucent Classics Harper with a rainbow on it.

Then we get an e-mail about the 2018 Stablemates Club Gambler’s Choice Finn the Mule, and one of the four potential selections is a Rainbow Overo Pinto:

And then news broke of an apparent Walmart Special Run Classics Unicorn named Skylar, who is a Pearly/Iridescent White Forthwind with a sparkly Rainbow-striped mane and tail.

This is an interesting development. So everything is coming up rainbows for 2018?

We have had a number of pastel and multicolored releases in the recent past – such as the Peace, Love and Horses Classics Warmblood Mare, some of the Unicorn releases like the Alaric, and a number of Test Colors – but it wasn’t until 2011 that we had a true “Rainbow-themed” release, with the Translucent Weather Girl Treasure Hunt redemption horse.

I’m all for Decorator finishes, but I’ve found the rainbow-themed ones aren’t really my cup of tea. (If I do happen to end up with the Rainbow Mule, I won’t be looking to trade. Generally I just go with whatever I get on Gambler’s Choice models.)

Actually, this is cool – if 2018 is going to be the Year of the Rainbow, that’ll help me out tremendously. One of the resolutions I was considering for next year was cutting back the horse buying to an absolute minimum: that means no retail “fun money” binges, no late night eBay pity purchases, and no Web Specials unless they happen to be one of the handful of molds or concepts that push my buttons (like the Traditional Man o’ War, or a holiday-themed Elk).

So it’ll just be obligate Club purchases, BreyerFest, and the incidental flea market/thrift store finds that mostly end up on my sales list anyway. Oh, and the Customer Appreciation Promotion, if they happen to do the “FREE GLOSSIES FOR EVERYBODY” thing again next year.

I’ll still be open to trades and genuine upgrades, and if something insanely rare and cheap turns up in my radar I certainly won’t turn it down, either.

But I’ve been liking the space my recent collection reorganization has given me, and goodness, I certainly could do without the paperwork all that buying and reselling entails. The extra money’s been helpful, but I’d rather have that time to focus on more creative endeavors next year. (Most of them not model-horse-related, unless you count Sparky and Jules.)

The Exclusive Event that’s coming up in the Spring also seems unlikely, though I’d rather wait to cross that bridge when I get to it.

Updates on the Duchess Project

Neither of my attempts to get something special outta Breyer worked this week (Moritz and the latest Test Color on Roy) so yep, I resorted to eBay again for a quick – and potentially profitable – fix. 

It’s a possible upgrade of something scarce I already have. I don’t have it yet, so the jury is still out on whether its actually going to be an upgrade, or profitable. Chances are likely neither, but better than my odds of ever winning a Micro Run or Test Color Purchase Raffle, so there’s that. 

Here’s another something I purchased recently that I was quite pleased with – the Red Roan version of the Duchess Western Horse and Rider Set: 

It was both on sale and on clearance at the local Tractor Supply: the whole shebang came to less than ten dollars, tax included! Score!

And right there is the main reason why I chose to collect the Duchess mold in the first place: it’s not a particularly hard or expensive mold to collect. Here’s a sampling of the others I’ve managed to acquire this year:

I think the Grey Thoroughbred Mare and Foal set is my favorite of this group; while it’s among the most common of the Duchess releases, the shading on this particular Duchess is especially lovely.

That all these sets are still boxed was not intentional. They just worked out that way. And the Grey Mare and Foal will be unboxed when the inventory situation is settled to my satisfaction.

I’ve discovered that one of the harder Duchess releases to find, ironically, is the Walmart Sunshine Stables/Sunshine Meadows re-release of that set from ca. 2012-2013. Other releases and re-releases in that series turn up with moderate frequency on the secondary market, still boxed, but the Grey Thoroughbred Mare and Foal re-release (#755481) is not one of them.  

It’s one of the few items where I am specifically looking for the boxed version, because it’s otherwise indistinguishable from the original release. 

Getting that set in a timely fashion is not a huge concern or high priority; I wrestle with enough frustrations in my life, and I am not going to add to those frustrations by actively chasing the unobtainable. It’ll come to me in good time, just like most things do. Eventually.  

The Libra Duchess

One of the pieces from the Grab Bag that I am definitely keeping is the Zodiac Series Libra, on the Duchess mold:

I think I received an especially well shaded one, and the pink undertones (not visible in any of the promotional pictures that I can recall) are both a nice aesthetic touch and a subtle nod to the nature of the sign itself – balancing out a cool color with a warm one, and a “masculine” color with a “feminine” one.

I’m also keeping her because I was reviewing my collecting goals for the coming year, and I had just about settled on it being the Duchess mold.

I loved her pinto release in the Gato y Mancha set at BreyerFest this year, which in turn spurred my unsuccessful (so far) attempt to acquire the infamous Wildlife Adventure set with the Pink Camo blanket and Baby Gorilla.

http://www.identifyyourbreyer.com/images/720601set.jpg

The Duchess mold should be just challenging enough to keep me interested and motivated, without taking up too much of either my shelf space or money.  

The only possible frustration I’m seeing is that outside of one release (the #663 Buckskin “Thoroughbred Cross”, ca. 2006-2008) the Duchess mold has almost always been packaged as a part of a set. With the exception of things like the Zodiac Series pieces (that I will probably end up with a complete set of anyway, over time) I’m the kind of person who prefers to keep sets as sets.

Generally that wouldn’t be too much of a problem, except that some of the sets Duchess came in (especially those from the Walmart Mustangs Series) also came with popular and very desirable bits like the Wolf or some of the more modern Classics Foal molds.

My initial searches turned up a lot of sad, stray and stranded Duchesses, and that makes me only want her more.

A Different Kind of Cat

The Store Special of Diablo DC, a Matte Light Dapple Gray on the Desatado mold isn’t all that surprising – I think most of us were expecting a Desatado release in the mix somewhere. Reeves refers to the Desatado mold as the “Criollo Horse”, and this year’s event is South American-themed.

I’ve passed on or passed along every Desatado that’s come across my path so far, so I’ll have to wait and see on this one before I make a decision. The Matte Alabaster finish is definitely a plus!

(Scroll down to January 22nd. Discussion of beautiful Raffle Model Cinza will be for another day.)

I was just thinking about what this year’s Nonhorse Special Run could be. While it’s likely to be – yet again – another Bull mold of some sort, I continue to hold out hope that Reeves is thinking outside of the box. Yes, I’m hoping for a different “Big Cat” Special Run for Fest this year: perhaps a Jaguar on the Cougar mold?

The Cougar mold has already been released as a BreyerFest Special Run once before, as part of the 750-piece 2002 Set “Bandit and Kohana”, with the now very, very popular Wolf mold. The Cougar mold has been out of production since 2007, and it’s high time for another release, I say.

The Cougar mold was introduced as part of a couple different Walmart Mesteno-Mustang sets in 2001 – Rufo and Diablo, and Azul and Fausto. It was then released in various shades of tan in subsequent sets, eventually getting its own stand-alone Regular Run in 2005-2006, as #3813.

I’ve had a few Cougars over the years – mostly body quality pieces via box lots and flea markets. I’ve since sold all of them too, partly because they were useless for research purposes: they had no context. I had no idea if I was in the possession of a standard issue Cougar from Set A, B or C, or a variation or oddity.

It exposed a hole in my knowledge and I wasn’t comfortable with that.

It’s something I’d like to rectify eventually, but my budget and timing have been conspiring against me on that. (I heard rumor that a few leftovers of the Bandit and Kohana set were in the Ninja Pit last year. Sigh.)

If Reeves thinks a spotted pattern a little too challenging to execute competently – and with the mold’s small size and textured coat, it may well be – I think many of us would be happy with a basic Black Panther. Pair it up with a Classic Horse and Rider and there you go – a Pantanal Play Set!

Probably won’t happen; a Brahma Bull modified into an Indo-Brazilian Bull, with short horns and droopy ears seems more likely:

http://www.ansi.okstate.edu/breeds/cattle/indobrazilian

The Brahma Bull hasn’t been in production since 2004, when the #385 Red Brahma was discontinued. If they can make the necessary horn and ear adjustments to the mold, and since the ears and horns of the Brahma are separately molded parts, I don’t see that being a big technical or financial hurdle.

Breyercano!

I must be going through one of my periodic personal system crashes; in addition to the back pain, nausea and allergic reactions, I spent most of Wednesday incapacitated by the Worst. Migraine. Ever.

My ears are still ringing somewhat, but at least I can stand up and walk a (more or less) straight line. And food tastes like food again!

This next model I am featuring may seem like an odd choice, considering all of the things I picked up in the "Ninja Pit of Death" this year. It’s a Sample Black Beauty, from one of this year’s Walmart "Sunshine Meadows" Special Run sets:

There had to have been at least one example of each of these sets in the Sample Boxes. I grabbed the one that I wanted, and left the rest behind for the more dedicated Classics collectors among us, because I know how you guys are. (Though I wouldn’t have turned down the Silver Bay Keen if I had seen him, either.)

The reason why I'm spotlighting him: in case you haven’t already heard, those Special Run sets are now being distributed throughout Walmarts in the United States, and not just in select stores in the Upper Midwest. Every Walmart I’ve stopped at in the past two weeks has had a selection - some more complete than others.

(NOTE: I am in Southeast Lower Michigan. The Shelby Township store at 23 Mile Road and Van Dyke store had the biggest and best, if you’re on the prowl.)

It was hard to resist the urge to grab a shopping cart, shove everything off the shelves into said cart, and make a mad dash to the cash registers at the first store I stopped at. It was only a couple days after I had gotten back from Kentucky, so I think I was still in Ninja shopping mode at that point.

What stopped me was that I remembered that I still hadn’t entirely dealt with the "Breyercano" eruption in my office yet:

(Note: this is only about half of it - excluding the pickups, Stablemates, and various still-unbagged ticket line items. Sigh. I was so bad this year. But according to my very rough calculations, apparently on budget! Woo-hoo!)

There were even some boxed Walmart sets in the Pit, too, but they got lost in the shuffle, for the most part. We were all too distracted by other boxed items, including those mysterious "Are they or aren’t they?" Regular Run models with Special Run rumbers that baffled us all weekend. (You might have already spied a Huck in the photo above: more on those, next time.)

Patching Together

That big project I’m working on is melting my brain, I swear.  I thought I’d take a little breather from it and catch up a bit on my sewing, until I realized what was up next in my quilting queue:

Points, curves AND insets? I might as well be painting a Reverse Dappled Palomino Roan Pintaloosa, sheesh.

(FYI: it’s a variation of a Depression Era pattern called "Imperial Fan". I found a pile of pieces and some templates at the bottom of a box of scraps, and in a not-rare-enough moment of insanity, I thought it’d be a fun reconstruction project. Yeah. No.)

Lots of news to catch up on. Let’s roll.

The talk is now that the Walmart Special Runs that have been turning up in some stores might be some sort of test, or just a regional release. All I know for sure is that very few people have been able to find them, and they’re not in my neck of the woods either.

There are two OTHER Classics Special Run sets turning up at some Mid-States stores that appear to be a continuation of the old Walmart Mesteno/ Mustang series. They’ve been shipping old Walmart overstock of their Mestenos to the "farm store circuit" for a few years now, so I’m guessing that means that's where the series will now carry on; these newest releases have the new Breyer logo, so it’s definitely not older overstock. Unless it is a test/regional thing, too. 

There are no Mid-States nearby, but I do have a local/regional farm store chain nearby that does get a very nice selection of Breyers in around the holidays, so this will be added incentive to stop in the next time I drive by. You know, just in case there are some enhancements to the selection.

(All I REALLY want is that "unreleased" set with the light gray Bronco and the white Wolf. Like everyone else)

The Traditional Totilas mold is being delayed until the beginning of the year. It appears to be more of a legal/technical issue, than one of production. It’s only a few more weeks of waiting, anyway.

The Lionheart Esprits are also delayed, but no explanation (or hints of) have been offered. It’s annoying, but my budget’s doing its end of the year tightening, so I’m okay with that, too.

Pictures of some of the 2013 releases are now floating about, including a new Classic mold, a new release on the Smart Chic Olena, a Vintage release on the Western Pony, and some glittery (!) Stablemates.

(Yay, glittery Stablemates!)

I’m going to wait until there are better pictures of the 2013 releases before I do any detailed commentary on them. I’m happy to see that the Vintage release of the Gloss Bay Pinto Fury this year did well enough to merit continuing the series, but the color they appear to have chosen for the Western Pony - Flaxen Chestnut Appaloosa, with detailed out hooves, mane and tail - strikes me as a little more Modern than Vintage.

I hope the splash spots are a little on the sloppy side, like the old splash spots were.

I’ve been periodically skimming the discussion on the Passage to the Pacific. Once I got a gander at some of the pictures of the SRs - including a Black Tobiano Pinto Galiceno, and another PAM, for crying out loud - I checked myself out of that discussion. The freakouts on MH$P are going to be bad enough to witness.

Shopping Roundup

I suppose all - or most - of you have found out about the latest Special Run surprise - this one being a Gloss version of Zenyatta’s foal, available on her web site. As of my posting this, there still do appear to be some left out of the 500-piece run:

http://www.zenyattashop.com/breyer-zenyatta-foal.html

Like Pavlov’s dogs, I salivated right on cue and bought one, too. Dark, chocolately bays have been my weakness of late - and in gloss? I was doomed.

Speaking of shopping…

While I love road trips (I’ll be taking one very soon!) I don’t take much joy in day-to-day driving. Getting stuck in traffic jams makes me wish that automotive engineers would stop trying to coax more horsepower out of smaller engines and just devote their time to finally inventing teleportation technology, dangnabit.

I had to do way too much driving for work this week; the only thing that made it bearable was that it gave me a chance to go to stores in areas I would not normally travel to. I like to multitask, so getting a little research done on the way to or from work? Excellent.

The first store I got to hit this week was the Tractor Supply, to check out their holiday selections. Like last year, it’s all Regular Runs, Holiday merchandise, and possibly a smattering of farm store stuff (those trailer sets cobbled together from factory leftovers.) I did really dig the Holiday Horse "Buena Noche", but I’ll save my natterings about him for sometime closer to the holidays.

And I finally managed to get a really good look at the Padre there: I still don’t have a Spirit mold in my collection, and all the other releases in that mold have prices outside of my comfort zone. However, his HUGE ZOMBIE EYES scared me away. Reminded me of that one Adventure Time episode. You know the one (or should):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZdtZIuVzmE

I don’t want a scary-looking horse staring at me while I sleep, either.

While I certainly haven’t been to every Walmart within driving distance of my house, I’ve now been to enough to conclude (for now) that they are only a figment of the Internet. Then again, I didn't see of the Mesteno Mustang SRs in these parts, either, so maybe it’s just a regional thing. (Which doesn’t make a lick of sense to me, since Breyers sell really well everywhere else around here.)

Then, just today, I swung by one of my "local" Tuesday Mornings to check out their latest offerings. Some of them received a small (and unadvertised) shipment of Breyer stock, mostly (but not entirely) discontinued Elvis Collection merchandise.

This store had a couple of Kongs and a couple of Bears; I took a modest fancy in one of the Bears, but I managed to escape without him following me home.

I will admit, it was a close call: my other two Bluegrass Bandits have nonrealistic finishes, and the pretty mahogany undertones they put into what would have been an otherwise nondescript matte black paint job were …intriguing.

Nope. Can’t do it. Gotta save the cash for the road trip. (Yes, it’s model horse-related. And yes, it’s something you’ll all hear about, when it all shakes out. No joke guys, it’s big.)

Tour de Horse

The worst part of the back attack was not being able to go to the flea market. It wasn’t the potential goodies I probably lost, but the window shopping I really missed. Even if I don’t buy something - there’s actually quite a lot I pass up, for a variety of reasons - I still like to see it "in the wild."

It’s also interesting to observe other people in the market respond to them - what’s the market like when I take myself out of the picture? What I like and what other collectors like are two different things: stepping back helps me judge the general market a little bit better.

Yep, even when I’m shopping, I’m doing research.

Since I’ve regained some of my mobility over the past two days, I’ve gone on a window shopping bender, sort of a "Tour de Horse," to make up for that lost opportunity. Yesterday I had a work assignment that was a little bit out of my usual way, and gave me the chance to stop at a number of toy stores, Targets, and other places with Breyers in them.

The only horselike purchase I was going to allow myself was the one Target Pony Gal SM that I’m still missing: I didn’t find him. All I walked away with yesterday was some deeply discounted school supplies (hey, I WAS almost out of graph paper!) but boy, I was tempted.

I wasn’t so lucky today, but we’ll get there in a minute.

One of the stops was a Big Lots: yep, as reported elsewhere they did have some Wal-Mart leftovers: a couple of the Classic Mustang sets, and the SM Flicka set. The discount on them was surprisingly minimal, at least compared to the Breyer merchandise they clearanced out late last year. That’s where and when I finally managed to pick up those oddball, noncatalog Stablemates Accessory Kits that Target briefly carried. They had some of the SR and RR MiniWhinnies Sets last year, too, but I had already picked those up at regular retail.

I wonder if this means that Big Lots will be a regular clearance venue for Reeves in the future, just like T.J. Maxx and Marshall’s? Interesting that most of the merchandise has been Big Box SRs, too. Hmm.

Some of our local Meijer stores have changed their toy departments around slightly, as I suspected: a slightly bigger selection of Breyers, but no store exclusive or store-first stuff (yet.) But they do carry Schleich now! Good to know.

Today I went to the local TSC, nominally to pick up some spray primer and sandpaper, but mostly to look at the toy selection. They finally had the Breyer stuff up: the Banner, the Bonanza Set, the Waiting For Santa Play Set, Nutcracker Prince, and some odd quasi-SR Stablemates Play Sets. (The horses are mostly re-issued RRs; it’s the combination of accessories with horses that make them SRs, sort of. That and their stock numbers. Another one of those documentation thingies.)

The Bonanza Set came home with me, though it’s still hanging out in the car until I can manage to sneak it into the house without anyone noticing. I almost bought the Waiting for Santa set. The price was decent - $29.99, only a couple bucks more than its premiere price on QVC, but I thought I was pushing it with the Bonanza set, so I left it behind for now.

The Duchess is very nice - she’s that beautiful Dark Bay/Mahogany color that I’ve been really loving lately (most recently seen as one of the Color Crazy Huck Bey releases.) It was the Cochise that sold me though. The Cochise in the JAH promo picture was on the Ginger, and she was the one piece in the set I was ambivalent about. I love black pintos, but for some reason I wasn’t loving her.

On the other hand, I came very close yesterday to buying a really sharp, semi-gloss Warmblood Stallion in the RR Bay-going-Gray, so the mold’s surprise appearance in the Bonanza set was a winner for me.

(I wouldn’t read anything into the Ginger mold’s replacement - maybe they just liked the Warmblood Stallion better.)