The new secondhand updown loader

I'd have to agree on the IOM bus drivers.  Although they seem to know what they are doing, so does John McGuinness and it would be scary being on the back of a bike with him!

We sat upstairs toward the front on one of our rides (when the bike had a flat tire), and decided that, between the leaning, swaying and near tree misses that I would be better off downstairs next time.

The original "multi-level" Greyhound in the picture is a pretty well-known one, being designed by a famous US-based (French born) industrial and car designer Ramond Loewy.  So, the rarity of a cool bus for a while...



Wow, after looking at the website, he did so much more than the "a lot" that I thought he did... Impressive!

Yup! He was my inspiration when I spent hours building 1/24th AMT and Revel plastic models. Almost made a career out of it...
One of his best...

Model building career? As an enthusiastic builder in my youth (still collect kits in a closet at home) I'm curious... Movie industry, architectural, automotive?

Let's see here... At a quick glance around the office, I count 11 un-built models that I'm going to get at ... 'soon'!
F15Eagle, F50 Ferrari, FW190, '75 Scirocco, Lamborghini Diablo. P40, Graff Zeppelin, and on... That doesn't include the dozen railroad models, and the odd boat. I've still got the pieces of the Honda RC166 on one of my desks to glue back together again after the original glue dried up and pieces fell off.

Good to know there are other 'closet' collectors out there!
Just out of high school, I was going to get in to drafting in college, but got sidetracked into 'Industrial Modeling'. It was the fore-runner of 3D computer design before there were computers. Basically building models of things that were too difficult to draw. Mostly oil refinery piping or weird trusses and the like. There was also a fairly good market for those big 3D models of sky-scrapers, and airports, and shopping centers.
Alas, it all went ka-flooey when I decided that a career in snow-mobile racing was a more appropriate use of my time.
That lasted one year. Starvation would have set in, and then I discovered motorcycles. Also girls.

The end.

I was never any good at model building , me and glue don't get on make more mess than ??? its like when doing the house building stuff if a mastic gun is involved then we are in trouble

Just don't get your hands on any "super" glue Eddy... Literally!

Well J.P. perhaps it is for the best. I imagine, while I still see such models around, the market for jobs is pretty slim. Not to mention in the movie special effects business, where CG has replaced many model builders.

Got to see a bunch of the original Star Wars models in Chicago during a trip there. Pretty cool stuff.

Let's see, I have a very special Britten model that my wife got me from the Britten company. I'm kind of afraid to build it.

Also have various spaceship models (Jupiter 2 from Lost in Space, original Star Trek Enterprise, Babylon 5 "Starfury", etc.), Camaro models of various types and I think an NSR from the Doohan days all sitting around in boxes. Maybe when I retire...

I love glue!

armed & ready (Medium) by designthreedimension, on Flickr


I have one of those super-sized caulking guns that I use on construction things that is a little scary if you don't use it 'sparingly'... Now that I look at the picture again though, I realize I'm not holding it!

My youngest rotten-little-kid is a 3D artist and works for various digital video companies. He does the stuff for 'Once upon a time' tv show.



NOTHING is real on TV anymore. All the exterior shots are modified in some way. Very few sets are anything more than a few props and a blue screen background. I would have been SO out of a job had I continued on in 3D modeling. Of course, the snowmobile thing wouldn't have been so great either!

I'm very hesitant to get out any of the models again. I used to be pretty good at it. Won contests and all. Now though, I can't SEE any of the little parts. They must have shrunk since I bought the models. I'd also have to stop drinking coffee so my hands would be steadier.

Maybe I'll just stare out the window at the blizzard we seem to be having. Good thing it was a day off today. I was just watching a crow trying to fly upwind past my window. I've been feeding a family of a half-dozen or so. They're all in pretty good shape and this guy looked like he was actually having fun navigating through the trees.
Crows are crazy!

I too have been watching things in trees today

And some things in trees are to be avoided if at all possible ,lol