Hey Magnum, Good reply. I'm 37 and been in the hobby for 17 years myself, I just had to comment on the post as it ended with "to prove I could crush my club members, here is a picture" and I thought back to when I was young and thought I could conquer the rest of the world and the problems the attitude caused me.
I learned it wasn't the case after spending almost 3 months in boot camp, I wasn't as tough as I thought I was.I loved the Military, learned to fly RC while stationed in Japan in 1985.
I love to help new members and visitors at our club, we are fairly new and need all the members we can get, I was a beginner once too and thank everybody that ever helped me, Now is my turn to give something back to the hobby. If Puddlemaster was here I would do anything I could to help him out.
I recently shipped a new plane to a 12 year old kid in California to help him out, didn't cost him a cent for shipping or otherwise, but it kept him in the hobby and he now flies really well from what I'm told ( I don't know if you were ever on RCO last year, but if you ever followed the Radley story, you would see what I'm talking about) It feels good to help out and spread the hobby we love so much.
But back to the subject, Just pointing out the fact that an attitude can get you into trouble.