Hobbying In Place #1 Building the Airfix Handley Page Victor K2/SR.2

Building the 1/72nd Airfix Handley Page Victor K2/SR.2.

Once more “Joy” springs up like a weed during this time of pandemic meltdown. So let's get down into the weeds and learn how this scale modeler practices the fine art of social distancing. This is an art form in which I am well schooled. Let’s begin.

Victor from Butch O'Hare Show

For the last couple of weeks I have been downstairs building the 1/72nd Airfix Handley Page Victor K2/SR.2. Typically I claim to build either Soviet or Japanese in 1/32nd scale. This is none of those.

So very Tired...

The last few weeks I have been so very tired. No energy...one might even say "sad", but of course this would mean that either I or someone who knows me would be admitting that I do have emotions after all.

Too something to do real work (as if doing one's hobby was real work), so I pull out boxes of half built kits. The potential of finishing an old project, thinking about what could be...at least it's distracting.

Mandalorian Toe Clippings

Imagine you are listening to this music:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_VIjAL5IjU&list=PLohYzz4btpaSYEpaiJHcMIk0EeabT46fu&index=16

Through your eye balls you see these two tiny things, things that if you told someone they were toenail clippings, let's say, and you made three matching pairs, well OK. This is why when my wife asks about my hobby I grunt. Because if she knew I was remaking toenails she would have to think about that.

Advertising Manager of the IPMS USA Journal

It’s been ages since my last post.

A few months back (after much internal deliberation) I took on a volunteer role within the IPMS USA as the Advertising Manager of the IPMS USA Journal. I am a person who likes being in control of my free time. “Giving back” is not a natural thing for me, I wanted to be really sure the organisation wouldn’t be saddled with someone whose tasks were not getting done.

Dune Crawler Factory Studio Scale Model: Part 2

Here follows the second round of building my Dune Factory Crawler:

No calls from DV or AS.
Aw well.

Dune Crawler Factory Studio Scale Model: Part 1

Last year I built a study maquette of my own design a factory crawler from the the novel Dune. This model was built rapidly out of foamcore, insulation foam, paper and wood dowel. The goal was to send images of it off to Denis Villeneuve in hopes of contributing to the pre-production phase of the new Dune movie. Crazy.

Hobbies in Hong Kong

I spent last week in Hong Kong for work. In between appointments I was able to walk around. Normally while traveling I spend as little time shopping as possible, however, since a lot of hobby kits are shipped out of Hong Kong, I thought this would be a good time to poke around.

The nice people at the hotel provided me with this swell phone, type in the magic words and "Badda-Boom-Badda-Bing".

This was one of the early ones I found. This one was OK, I bought an old Fujimi 1/32 Canter truck. And a Hasegawa steamroller.

On my second trip out I found Continental Hobbies:

This view is misleading, in fact this is a pretty raw neighborhood. Here is the view taken from the shop corner:

A few blocks away are the outdoor markets. Various organs in piles, luggage, watches, vegetables and money changers. I don't think I want to see a watch ever again.

A view looking into the Continental. Looks promising. You never know in Hong Kong...I stepped into a lot of interesting places. 

Turned out to be the hobby store I was looking for. Inventory is literally stowed up in the open ceiling. No old stuff, everything from the last few years. Prices were about 25% - 50% lower than average retail in the US, but no shipping. This shop carried mostly armor and aircraft.

I spoke with the owner, he said he had been there for 50 years.

I bought a lot, here is a shot of my packing once home. For the other kits, I cut the parts off the sprues with my nail clippers and combined them in these boxes. The Saturn is a Lego kit I bought at the last minute and carried onto the plane home.

Here's the real haul: 1/35 Mini Art Household Crockery & Glass, Hasegawa 1/35 Hitachi Vibratory Combined Roller ZC50C-5, 1/32 ICM Polikarpov I-153, 1/35 Hobbyboss Soviet MBV-2 Armored Train, Trumpeter Mini Razor Saw and 1/35 Mini art Soviet Train Tracks.

I even had time to snap a few ref pics of trucks...

Enjoy!