Happy birthday to us

Today Motorised Dandruff turns 1 (Hitler would be 120 if he hadn't got carried away and annoyed people). Its also the 250th post, and so its time to have a bit of a ramble on where we have got to over the last 365 days of the year.

We have gone from 1 unpaid feature writer to 3 unpaid feature writers, and yet have managed to deliver a higher standard of drivel with less spelling mistakes on average mainly because the other 2 can operate a spell checker. Seriously though, I would like to thank Evan and Darryl for their willingness to join in and write articles on a wide variety of topics, which has certainly taken the pressure off me at some points. As Elwood said in the Blues Brothers, 'we're getting the band back together' and it has been a lot of fun again.

I suppose I should make some comment on my experience with this over the last year. I'm not quite sure where I was going when I started this,which in a way has been a blessing as there have been no expectations or targets to hit. I set out to get more people modeling in the scale, and also to get more people interested in the scale in a way which reaches a wider audience than the journal or local shows. One thing I have found useful is a statcounter to show how many people have actually been reading the blog. Without it I think I would have given up a long time ago (just for interests sake we are averaging 43 visitors a day). Its also been an interesting experience in terms of getting to grips with a new form of media, and what its good at and not good at. I don't think it will ever replace the journal, but there are some things that it does a much better job of.

In real terms where has the scale gone in the last year. The biggest development is that the rumors of the demise of the Trackside range were greatly exaggerated. Kudos to those involved in the rescue, and all the best for the future with it. I also think we have seen more people modeling or at least thinking about it.

So, where to from here? If I could predict the future I wouldn't be working for a living. What I would love to see in the next 12 months are;
-A modular layout displayed at the 2010 convention with a variety of modules from all over the country (I'll point out now that I'm going to a wedding that weekend so can't make it, but thats no reason not to try)
-Some new kitsets released, and the return of the full Trackside range.

As for myself, in 12 months I'd like to actually have a home layout of some description (at very least a test track) with hand laid track. I'd like to have made a ka, as without one its pointless to even do the rest of the work towards my Paikakariki layout.
I also hope still to be writing this blog with help from an expanded team, and have so much modeling to report that we are struggling to list it all. I'd also like to get better acquainted with the spell checker.

My final thoughts; Go out and do some modeling. And thank you all for reading, from the team.

'When we had hair...'