Being an active member of LI-DOG has been one of the best Organization membership experience’s I have enjoyed. Making our parks and public places more dog friendly is an integral part of Long Islands suburban appeal. Encouraging dog friendly activities, responsible dog ownership and socialization is at the forefront of what LI-DOG strives for. A well socialized and behaved pet should be at its owner’s side enjoying the beauty of our Island and its expansive parks, beaches, and public places.
Many of you may know Zara our AKC Whippet and others may know that I have an online gallery of dog portraits, and shop featuring dog imprinted items. Every year LI-DOG runs several fund-raising events. The first one will be BARKS & BREWSSat., June 28th, Noon to 3 PM at Great South Bay Brewery Bay Shore, NY 11706. The next one is Barkin Brunch, Sunday, OCTOBER 5th from 11 AM to 3 PM, at The Refuge 515 Broadhollow Rd. Melville, NY 11747. The last one
Howl-O-Ween Costume Contest & Pawty, Sunday, October 20th, 12 to 4 PM at The Pine Grove Inn 1 1st St., East Patchogue, NY
Each of these events features a fun time for our canine friends, a great opportunity to meet other dog loving families, great DJ music, varied food and drinks, specialty vendors,
doggy activities and of course a great display of fund-raising raffle prizes for you to choose from. Among the vast array of gift baskets and prizes at these 3 events is an opportunity to win one of my dog portraits. To all the people who have won a portrait; I hope you enjoy it as much as I did creating it! For all of you who would like to win one, I look forward to meeting you and your dogs at these great events.
You’re a Pontiac Solstice owner, you get in your car, you roll down your windows, release your convertible top from the windshield, click the trunk release, the trunk clicks open, and the driver side or passenger side buttress doesn’t release. If you Google the problem; you will find out how to release it and get the top down. After a wonderful top-down ride; you close it up and all seems well.
It isn’t! the next time you take your top down, the buttress doesn’t release; you now know how to fix that problem however, you now have a new problem. The problem you will find out is that; the release cable has disconnected from the buttress release mechanism.
Here is a quick easy fix, that takes a bit of mechanical skill and some simple improvised pieces. Read my instruction’s and I believe my photos will make perfect sense. I am a Car and RC hobbyist and have a good mechanical skills.
Open your trunk and put your top up using panel pullers remove all the trunk lid push pin retainers. You might find it easier to do when you climb into the trunk and sit on the raised area.
Once the inner panel is removed you will see two cables that actuate the buttress releases. Follow them up to the connection points. If the cable is connected and you click your remote you will see them work. If the cable is disconnected it will not.
Now that you identified your problem look at the one that works; you will see the one that works has a ball on the end that is connected to a spring that acts as a release for the buttress pin on your top when it is closed.
Now look at the one that doesn’t work the cable is probably retracted, pull it out to expose the ball on the end, put it back through the lop that attaches it to the spring.
Use a round object like a sharpy cap to hold back the spring by placing it through the trunk chrome ring that the post goes through. The cable will comfortably leave enough room for cable to be retained by the new fasteners you will improvise.
Using a new or used push pin cut off the stem, using a Dremel smooth it out to create a disc. Drill a 1/16th hole in the middle and cut a very narrow slit in it. Get a very small hobby spring cotter pin.
Using needle nose pliers snap the new black disc over the cable next to the spring now snap the miniature cotter pin over the cable next to the ball end retainer.
Remove the round object used to hold back the spring. Now test with your remote. Success it now works
For added ease of operation cote and let cure the entire mechanism and spring surfaces with CowRC…
This article is a continuation of an article, I wrote about niche businesses in May of 2016; it was about the growth and commitment to customer service at Cow Performance Company AKC CowRC.
In 2016 CowRC was 8 years old, the product line featured about one hundred items. They were: Magnetic Pit Mats, Aerosols, Grease, Air Blasters, and Gear. These were the basic core products for a small segment of an even smaller niche of RC Hobbyists. From 2016 through 2024 our business not only advanced and grew but the marketplace we serve evolved. CowRC and its commitment to customer service remained at the forefront of our business as more and more users of our products made us the go to for RC Maintenance.
Today, the importance of maintaining your RC vehicle has become a critical part of ownership, enjoyment, performance, and durability of your RC; car- truck- boat- plane, or your very own creation. Your RC maintenance program starts when you unbox or build it, continues when run it, or compete with it, and finishes when put it back on the shelf prepared for the next time you use it. Just like their full-scale counterparts’ today’s RC vehicles require service with products designed and formulated for them.
As we are preparing to celebrate the new year 2025, CowRC completes its’ 16th year of serving the maintenance needs of RC Hobbyists with over two hundred uniquely designed and engineered items to choose from. We have continued our customer first commitment and our reputation has grown on that foundation.
Within our small niche of RC’ers is a group of scale builders who not only race, crawl, drift, and rock climb their vehicles; when they park them, they go into scale garages. CowRC miniatures now find their way into these Garages just like the real products go on the shelves and workbenches of their owners. These tiny replicas are symbolic of how taking care of your RC’s has become part of the hobby.
CowRC, and its commitment to quality and service has been first since the original barn doors opened. We are proud of our reputation and how the importance of RC vehicle maintenance and performance has grown.
“Remember when friends were more than a number of; that you collected on your social media ap and cookies were a delicious treat you actually could pick up and eat! My dear friends the times are a changing.”
As many of you know I have been around and involved in the advertising and marketing world for a long time.As a matter of fact, it all started for me in the mid 1960’s. I have experienced going from Hot metal type to computer generated type, from creating new ideas with brain power to let’s see what comes out of the computer.
For a long time, many of us have enjoyed the benefits of social media and have built businesses and followings around it. We have also experienced as providers-built followings the benefits were restricted and even removed. Just like the dot com bust of the 80’s at the end of the day money has to be made. In many cases we are all paying for benefits that may have started out free and now are fee based.
So, what is the big deal? Traditional advertising as we knew it has been ravaged; traditional retail is in a state of adjustment; how to drive it; what drives it, and how to bridge the gap of addressing each generational group needs to be defined. This process takes time and in our fast-moving market place with so many channels getting a clear focus has become more and more difficult.
It is absolutely imperative to define and capture your customer base. To that end every business however small or large needs to define and have control of its ability to communicate directly and capture all potential consumers of their products and brand.
2024 will be marked in many cases by the loss of third-party cookies. This will leave a huge gap in businesses’ ability to take advantage of what used to be available. We have gone from the age of “location-location-location” to “audience-audience-audience”. Capture them now and build for the future.
These are my thoughts and opinions and I would appreciate any comments…
In July of 2018 while discovering I could still draw; I completed an 8×10 pencil portrait of “ZARA” our much loved Whippet. However I did not make any commitment to starting an art project. I did like that my drawing skills were good and drawing was at least enjoyable! I wrestled with the fact that my entire career had been based on creating “art that works not works of art” and it would take a huge commitment to develop a no fee based project that had no client requirements or deadline. My creativity as well as my artistic drive was always based on fee first; the better the fee the better the performance!
As summers and winters rolled by; I stayed committed to the project and it became a flexible part of my daily schedule. My Wife and I split our time between New York and Florida. When in NY we spend a lot of time with family, friends and of course our grand children. Covid put an end to our longtime commitment to lure coursing competitively with our sons and our whippet kids CJ and Zara. I started showing some of the portraits locally on long island and was invited to teach a class for teens on sketching dogs. The shows and Teaching have become an annual commitment. My e-commerce business involvement keeps me pretty active. There is always golf and my Trophy winning two-seater in the garage. If you add in the joy of summer on the east end of Long island, LI dog Pac walks and events it fills up a lot of my time. Each portrait can take between 6 and 12 or more hours and I like to draw in a very relaxed environment.
When winter comes it’s off to South Florida, it usually starts with condo craziness, it is a little quieter in Florida, so I have a little more time to draw. I also show my car at local events, play more golf, spend lots of dog beach time, and tend to e-commerce commitments virtually, my wife and I get lots of time for casual living and enjoying summer type weather for the next 6 months of the year.
As the effects of Covid retreated and new normalcy returned, while in New York in the summer of 2022 I was recognized with a 3 page LI Newsday Story about My life and Drawing Dogs…My teen Drawing Class was done and I was nearing completion of all the AKC portraits and had 30 or so to complete the collection; it was May of 2022! When I started there were 180AKC breeds, 12 more had been added over the years bringing it up to 192. My goal was to finish it up before I left for Florida in November. That did not happen!
In July of 2022, I passed out from a 95% artery blockage… my entire plan for completion was upset. Things got back on track by the time I had to leave for Florida… It was now the week of April 3rd 2023, normally it is Dog week for us in Florida. Our Son comes down with CJ we celebrate our son’s Birthday; CJ and Zara do dog stuff all week.
275192 the last entry until next years update
This year also marked the completion of all 192 Portraits of the AKC recognized breeds. After 4 years and 8months they will all be on permanent display at abm545gallery **. My current plan is; to do an annual update of any new breeds as AKC accepts them and develop an online shop based on the gallery portraits, with some of the proceeds directed towards charitable causes.
I want to say a special thank you to my son Heath…on one of our early morning walks almost 5 years ago we discussed if I could still draw and in my usual fashion now I can honestly say “Yes I can!”
These are some links that refer to this story as it evolved.
Last summer upon my arrival home to Long Islands, Jump off point to the vineyards. I had the unique opportunity to sit with a very talented and sensitive fellow dog lover. We discussed the gallery my life and my work. Soon after an afternoon photo shoot provided the graphics for the Jim Merit article that appeared in Newsday’s Part 2. In my career I have been involved in millions of impressions for advertising, being quoted, and interviewed. I have never been written about for my artistic endeavors or how they have evolved. This was a whole new experience and I certainly was pleased with the results.
Thank You to Newsday, Long Islands Newspaper, Jim Merit, Writer and Steve Pfost, Photographer
Jim Merit full text of article:
A Dog Show: LIer’s Show Represents AKC Thoroughbreds
On this particular Monday afternoon, Alan B. Meschkow of Ridge begins one of his American Kennel Club breed-inspired dog portraits as he always does: beginning with what he calls “the triangle.”
The triangle is what Meschkow, 77, a former advertising executive and later consultant-turned-artist, calls the dog’s nose and eyes. These facial features are the starting point for the dozens of show dog portraits he has created over the past four years, including the Cavalier King Charles Spaniel he is currently working on.
“The nice part is his really high forehead, big eyes and very, very cool pug nose,” Meschkow said of the little breed loved for his gentle nature and family friendliness.
Meschkow is also working on sketches of rats and cairn terriers and a bluetick coonhound – the latter a dog “with very distinctive eyes”. The whole thing will eventually be put online with 150 other dog portraits on pinterest.com/alanmeschkow.
And in July and August, about 40 of Meschkow’s dog portraits are on display at the Longwood Public Library in Middle Island.
Some may see their 70s as a time to (finally) expire, pursue hobbies, or spend more time reading or traveling. For Meschkow, his eighth decade brought more than a reset.
“I consider myself redirected, not retired,” he said.
Talent rewarded
Meschkow was born in Brooklyn and his family lived in Jamaica Estates, Queens, until 1953, then in Plainview. He graduated from Plainview High School in 1963. As a child, he says, he often made pencil sketches of cars on loose-leaf paper, thinking he might become a car designer.
“When I was about 10, I sent General Motors some pictures I had drawn, and they wrote back a nice letter thanking me for my ideas,” he said.
But with a father, uncles and cousins working in plumbing, he said: “I could very well have become a plumber, even if I didn’t want to.
He was saved from what could have been a heartbreaking decision by winning a full scholarship in 1963 to the School of Visual Arts in Manhattan, where he took classes. He also took business classes at Nassau Community College.
“My first artistic interest was drawing cars, machines, inventions and mechanical things,” Meschkow said. During the 1960s, he worked as a technical illustrator in the defense industry on Long Island and later as a graphic designer, a career derailed both by the computerization of the 1980s and a “freak tornado” in 1988 that damaged his Plainview studio. Meschkow worked in retail advertising and later as an advertising consultant before retiring in 2004.
His dog portrait project began in 2018, when Meschkow returned home from a summer morning hike in Blydenburgh County Park in Smithtown with Zara, her whippet and son, Heath.
During the walk, Meschkow explained, “We were talking about things I wanted to do and Heath asked me, ‘Can you draw again?’ ”
The answer to the question was given when Meschkow came home, picked up a pencil, and drew a 1937 Hudson coupe he had seen on the street.
“It reminded me too much of work, but I had really never done anything with dogs, and there was Zara,” he said. He took a few pictures of his dog, sketched it out and just like that, “the joy of creating a simple work of art was back.”
“After all these years of exploiting my artistic talents for financial gain, a spark was ignited when I put pencil to paper,” he said.
The following month, he embarked on a project which he has since pursued with relentless stubbornness: to draw a portrait of each of the thoroughbreds recognized by the American Kennel Club, the venerable registry that promotes and sanctions events, including the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show held in June in upstate Tarrytown. (Meschkow says his project is independent of the AKC, though he doesn’t rule out approaching the club for official recognition in the future.)
“We think it’s wonderful that someone wants to document the beauty, form and function of our treasured breeds,” said Brandi Munden, AKC vice president of communications and public relations. “We can’t wait to see the results.” Working 10 sketches at a time, Meschkow approaches 160 portraits, of the 200 breeds recognized by the AKC. There may be more, of course, if the AKC continues its tradition of adding breeds to its registry – most recently the Bracco Italiano.
Meschkow begins each portrait by studying photos of dogs that meet the AKC Breed Standard, a description of the ideal dog of each recognized breed. He works with mechanical pencils on Strathmore Bristol, a thick, high quality paper with a smooth surface for drawing.
“I work with very light strokes, building layers on top of each other, which create a realistic image that tells you, the viewer, that you are looking at something that is looking at you.”
Each portrait takes six to 12 hours, depending on the details involved in capturing the breed’s appearance and temperament. Long-haired dogs, like the Bergamasco, a large hairy Italian sheepdog, take the longest, he said. He estimated the project has taken 400-500 hours so far.
Occasionally he will base a portrait on a single dog, as he did two years ago for family friend Kalena Champlin, 44, of Westbury. While at a restaurant in Florida, Meschkow took a photo on his cellphone of Champlin’s beagle, Cash, a top show dog champion and gun dog competition winner who was sitting under the table . “It catches Cash’s curious nature,” Champlin said of the sketch. Both Cash and Zara portraits are included in the Library and Online Collections. Florida is where Meschkow and his wife, Gail, a retired elementary school teacher, spend November through May in their high-rise condo in Hallandale Beach, just north of Miami Beach, Florida. Meschkow plays golf, takes his sporty 2007 Pontiac Solstice to car shows, and walks the beach and nature trails with Zara, who has competed in AKC events.
Finally an “artist”
In Long Island, he and Heath, whose whippet, CJ, is an AKC Field and Show Champion, are active in the Long Island Dog Owners Group, for which Heath regularly organizes pack walks. at local parks and beaches. Over the past five years, Meschkow has also put her creativity to work for the children of his daughter, Jodi. He built an 11-room dollhouse for his granddaughter, Raquel, and an auto shop and 1/24th scale residence for his grandson, MJ. And later in July, Meschkow will play mentor to Gen Z, leading a dog portrait basics workshop for teens at the Longwood Public Library.
Meschkow hopes to give students “a better understanding of what they see when they look at something, so they can draw it more effectively” before finishing and framing an original sketch. “My intention is to leave them with a memorable experience, artistic guidance and things that could carry them through life,” Meschkow added.
With a second Pinterest page, beautifulmugs dedicated to mixed portraits, Meschkow has plenty on his plate.
“Now that I can call myself an artist, I’m one of the lucky ones who doesn’t need to retire. I can draw what I want, where I want, when I want,” he said. Two years ago, when he was 75, he laid out a “25-year plan” which he hopes will help him break the record set by Al Hirschfeld, the legendary Broadway cartoonist who worked until his death at age 99.Says Meschkow, “I’m physically healthy, and it’s not physically difficult to draw. I can do this until I’m 100.
See more Looking for a sneak peek into Alan Meschkow’s multi-year pet project? About 40 of his original drawings of dog breeds recognized by the American Kennel Club are on display until August 31 at the Longwood Public Library in Middle Island. For more details, visit longwoodlibrary.org or call 631-924-6400.
