Chris Bucholtz

This isn't the social media platform the Director of Social Media should be monitoring - she's keeping our Facebook and external social media platforms straightened out and social-media warfare-free. The other board members are responsible for their own responses. I think asking the questions is important, though.

I am attempting to stay out of this because I do not wish to bring harm or discredit on the society or anyone who volunteers to work on its behalf, but Gil is extrapolating some stuff and I want to tamp it down before it gets a bit out of hand. "In this particular case, Chris did not "retire".... he QUIT due to "demands from the Eboard he could not abide". I FEEL THAT THE EBOARD SHOULD HAVE TO TELL US WHAT THOSE DEMANDS WERE THAT CAUSED A DEDICATED 18YR EDITOR TO QUIT." The E-board made no demands on me - that was not the reason I resigned. The E-board, on the whole, made few demands on me over the entire 18-year time I was editor. "Could those demands have been be legitimate? Sure! They may have INSISTED and needed more timely work from him to get the Journal back on schedule and due to personal and business reasons Chris could not meet those demands, so he quit. That's quite understandable." Nope - never heard a peep of pressure from anyone. "However, the past Eboard also tried to make Chris have his own Editorial Column "pre-approved by the Eboard" and Chris refused to do that that. If THIS Eboard demanded he do so, then I want to know why? He's run the Journal without such oversight for 18yrs so I think they should have to tell us why THEY suddenly need to control his material (and his opinion) for publication." I submitted the last three editorials I wrote for review - no problem! That did not bug me at all. In fact, I believe the supposedly controversial editorial I wrote last year would have been approved by the majority of those who were then on the E-board. This was not a problem for me. I resigned because the process for building the Journal was altered without my input in such a way that I could not exert a positive impact on any aspect of it - timeliness, quality, or content. I was not shy in my suggestions or timid about my cautions. I've been doing magazines for almost 35 years, so I like to think I know at least the basics. Anyhow, there will be a suggestion email address in the next issue. The address is contained in Ro Annis' message. You should use it.

Welcome back, Ron!

Not to criticize anyone, but how many websites make you download a .pdf to get the latest and, for some folks, most important news? And how many people recognize that "Mission Brief" contains hotel information? It's a layer between the reader and the information.

"If you tried to book a reservation from the 16th to the 20 th, it would not let you probably because the block was only for reservations from the 17th the 20th." Having the first day of the event unavailable is inexplicable. As for Tuesday, the day before the event starts, I know a number of us mentioned that Tuesday needed to be available in the block as late as July, so I'm bummed no one swung this with the hotels. If you're coming from the west coast, you just can't hop a plane and be there Wednesday when the show starts - flights west-to-east are going against time zones even if you leave at the crack of dawn. And if you're a vendor, you need to be on site for sales on Wednesday - so getting there Tuesday is kind of important. Oh well. We live and learn (hopefully, next time).

I suspect it's the same phenomenon with messed up many of us last year at San Marcos - the dates for the blocks were provided as just the dates of the show. Anyone coming from the West Coast as a vendor, for example, needs to get there on Tuesday to be set up for the show's start. And yet, for the last few years in a row, that has not been possible with the hotels - Tuesday is not included as part of the bock so it kicks you out (or so few Tuesday rooms are included the block fills up and, again, you're kicked out). It's an oversight that the e-board should address clearly in the parameters. Meanwhile, after 76 attempts, I got through on the phone to the Monona Terrace. All booked.

Yep. At 10:01, the Monona Terrace was unavailable on line and the phone wouldn't go through. I finally got a more expensive option 2.5 miles from the venue to work, so I have a hotel - but with more expense and less convenience.

Thanks for this, Jeff!

That big, ugly thing is Daedon Shoshonenis, an Entelodont that lived in North America from 23 to 18 million years ago. It was a 12-foot-long, 1700-pound monster that was omnivorous, and while it could certainly kill prey it probably did a lot of scavenging, primarily by intimidating other predators, which were largely non-social in North America at the time. Here, one is giving chase to a Parahippus Pawniensis, a three-foot tall horse that was one of the first to have fused lower leg bones for fast running and a single toe/hoof, with vestigial toes. Daedon came from the 1:20 Paleocraft kit, with virtually no modifications. Parahippus started life as a 3D-printed 1:35 "startled plains zebra," which has extra toes added from styrene rod and a new non-striped part job. The base featured plants from Silfor, Scenic Express and an unfortunate bristle brush that happened to be on my workbench at the wrong time.

The IPMS social media pages need to be run like any organization's pages. Coke doesn't allow some jag-off from Pepsi to come on their page and talk smack about them or their customers. GM has no compunction about deleting posts from the guy who insists his 1968 Camaro is haunted and it's GM's fault. Stauffers immediately deletes posts from that one person who posts about his exceptionally intimate relationship with stuffing. We are under no obligation to accommodate everyone on our own social media page, especially when the sole intent is to cause controversy and make the organization look bad.

Hey! Please volunteer! So we can screw you when weasels scream about something on social media! This is no way to run a railroad. Absolutely pathetic.

Amen to the Tuesday-night option. It allows us west coasters to be there for Wednesday.

Thanks for doing this, Jeff. It's very helpful for those of us who will attend as anything beyond a regular attendee.

Hey, Doug - could you write a little description of the changes and the process used to determine what they would be? It would be great to run it in the Journal to let people see how much thought goes into these things.

I can play the bass if needed. 🙂

If you read my previous, I DID call them. No joy. They've worked very hard not to collect $850 from me.

Actually, it does not: IT'S NOT YOU, IT'S ME. We're sorry, something went wrong. For customer service or reservations, please call one of these numbers.

...Aaaaaand, the Holiday Inn wants to charge you for a day's stay if you have to cancel. Sorry. Final straw.

....Aaaaaaand, trying to register at the Holiday Inn Express, I get this message: The Group Code you provided does not exist at this hotel. Check the code and try again. If it still does not work, please click here for assistance. I think someone's trying to tell me something...

Link didn't work for me; given phone number gave me an agent who didn't know what I was talking about, couldn't raise someone at the Embassy Suites in San Marcos, and suggested I call the property in the morning. Well, I guess I can skip this one...

There may well be chapters investigating the possibility of hosting, but rising costs and a good economy make that difficult. In 1998 we hosted the nationals in Santa Clara - the heart of booming Silicon Valley! - but our bid was put together in 1996, after a sharp economic slowdown in late 1995, when the convention center was eager to book space. By 1998, the economy had come roaring back and the convention center people would have loved for us to cancel so they could get some real, paying business! Right now, the economy is on the rebound, corporate live events are booming back and we may be forced to compete with two years of pent-up demand from other organizations. Having watched the ebb and flow of these things since 1995, this is just part of the broader pattern for the event.

I finished this baby January 2, after staring it in... 2002? It's a Hasegawa/Mister Kit mashup in 1:72 to depict a Serie VIII Macchi-built machine; the cockpit is Mister Kit and True Details resin with a Pavla seat with Eduard belts, and the wheel wells are mostly scratch-built. Mister Kit's photoetched gear doors were a pain to work with but ended up looking good. Missing details inside and outside the radiator were made with mesh, styrene strip and sheet and a lot of patience. The plane was painted with True North Africa mustard and light grey (matches for the Italian colors) and the camouflage was made with Mike Grant's "smoke ring" decals, which performed great (although they can be fragile). The markings for "Dai Banana!" came from a Sky Decals sheet and they were more persnickety than the smoke rings - Solvaset was my friend. The real secret weapon was the Valiant Wings monograph on the C.202, which answered many questions (questions that led it to go to the Shelf of Doom, perhaps?).

I use .1mm nickel-silver wire from Albion Alloys. I measure the length carefully, and install it with tiny beads of scenic glue. For runs of less than 4 inches, it stays rigid - perfect for 1:72 scale. A package lasts two or three fighters; if you're building an F.2A or a Gotha, get a couple packages. 🙂

Answers to Gil: I did paint the propeller, but the tail trim was a decal, and a nightmare to apply. I had to touch up the edges but they were kind enough to make the red an exact match for MM insignia red.

This is the Eduard 1:72 Albatros D.Va, finished at Lt. Walter Wolf's Jasta 5 plane from June-August 1917. The kit is OK but it's 20 years old and is missing some details (tachometer and gun mounts in the cockpit, radiator inflow and outflow pipes, etc.). I dressed up the details a bit and then used Print Scale's decals sheets (separate ones for the individual markings and for the Bavarian pattern). If you've ever hung wallpaper, you have a leg up with that Bavarian pattern - not fun applying it across a compound curve, and the entire Albatros D.V fuselage is a compound curve! It's rigged with .1mm nickel-silver "rod" from Albion Alloys, and features some Cooper Details wheels and Mini World Spandaus (although darned if you can see 'em in there!). An article will be in the Journal at some point.