About Me

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No Fixed Abode, Home Counties, United Kingdom
I’m a 60-year-old Aspergic gardening CAD-Monkey. Sardonic, cynical and with the political leanings of a social reformer, I’m also a toy and model figure collector, particularly interested in the history of plastics and plastic toys. Other interests are history, current affairs, modern art, and architecture, gardening and natural history. I love plain chocolate, fireworks and trees, but I don’t hug them, I do hug kittens. I hate ignorance, when it can be avoided, so I hate the 'educational' establishment and pity the millions they’ve failed with teaching-to-test and rote 'learning' and I hate the short-sighted stupidity of the entire ruling/industrial elite, with their planet destroying fascism and added “buy-one-get-one-free”. Likewise, I also have no time for fools and little time for the false crap we're all supposed to pretend we haven't noticed, or the games we're supposed to play. I will 'bite the hand that feeds', to remind it why it feeds.

Thursday, February 20, 2020

M is for Mushy-mush Mushington!

Before the winter's entirely over and after seeing the story the other day about one of the big Northern 'mush' races struggling to find a course of the correct length than was snow, not mush, I thought these were timely after a fashion . . . or indeed a manner!

Arctic Explorers; Esquimaux Dog Team; Esquimaux Novelty; Esquimaux Sled; Esquimaux Sledge; Esquimaux Sleigh; Esquimaux Toy; Inuit Dog Team; Inuit Sled; Inuit Sledge; Inuit Sleigh; Inuit Toy; Small Scale World; smallscaleworld.blogspot.com; Timpo Esquimaux; Timpo Inuit; Timpo Sled; Timpo Sledge; Timpo Sleigh; Timpo Toys;
Not a patch on the sublime Britains Herald sledge team (which I don't have!), but aimed at a different price-bracket and consequently cruder, yet more robust, is the Timpo arctic sledge with Esquimaux/Inuit musher.

13 pieces (unlucky for some . . . especially if items are missing!) go together to make up the model, which was sold assembled. One of my dogs is the wrong pose, but one of his feet lines up with a hole in the base so I could bluff the assembled shot below.

Arctic Explorers; Esquimaux Dog Team; Esquimaux Novelty; Esquimaux Sled; Esquimaux Sledge; Esquimaux Sleigh; Esquimaux Toy; Inuit Dog Team; Inuit Sled; Inuit Sledge; Inuit Sleigh; Inuit Toy; Small Scale World; smallscaleworld.blogspot.com; Timpo Esquimaux; Timpo Inuit; Timpo Sled; Timpo Sledge; Timpo Sleigh; Timpo Toys;
It's a stunning piece, even it if lacks the subtlety of the Britains one, although you have to ignore the totally inaccurate arrangement of the dog-team, who are always in-line, lead by the pack leader and spaced so that they can't reach each-other with a bite!

The traces simply loop loosely over the dogs heads and given that both horse leathers and these dog-leads are known for their increasing brittleness these days, I was treating them with such care - so's not to break them - they kept popping off; as I got a couple over the heads one would come loose again, it was like a fiddly game of whack-a-mole!

Arctic Explorers; Esquimaux Dog Team; Esquimaux Novelty; Esquimaux Sled; Esquimaux Sledge; Esquimaux Sleigh; Esquimaux Toy; Inuit Dog Team; Inuit Sled; Inuit Sledge; Inuit Sleigh; Inuit Toy; Small Scale World; smallscaleworld.blogspot.com; Timpo Esquimaux; Timpo Inuit; Timpo Sled; Timpo Sledge; Timpo Sleigh; Timpo Toys;
The Britains set was different from the others by depicting Western explorers rather than native peoples, the green one is a Marx reissue and I think the brown one holding a fish aloft was by Ideal, also an American make, also a reissue?

The musher can take the same snow-shoes as the rest of the line, and; once equipped with a knife, makes a good bar-brawler or bear-fighter!

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