After clearing out lots of old shoes from the shoe cupboard, and starting to clean up my man cave, I find myself ironing all my shirts for the week as well as any other stuff that needs it.
Where did I go wrong?

Nice interview with Martin Bower: http://ghatf.blogspot.com/2008/12/martin-bowers-model-world.html

Why is it that everywhere I go in the world, rain seems to follow?
Case in point, I recently got away for a few days with the family to Lanzarote. Hot and sunny right? Wrong!
The day we arrived, the island has the worst rain for ages - it was horizontal! It was so bad that we had two new indoor swimming pools in the bedrooms! Typical.
Oh, we had good days and fair enough, it was February, but come on!
Same thing happened when we went to Florida - thunderstorms and lashing rain.
Puerto Rico? Seven days of rain!
You know, I feel like taking a holiday in a place that is begging for rain, once we arrive you can pretty much guarantee it!

Had a good push today on painting and finishing the detailing on the Gunther.

I have painted about 80% of the base coat (hopefully it's the right colour!) and done all the basic painting on the diorama base. My only worry is that there isn't enough time before the South Cheshire Militaire to get it finished to the competition level that I originally wanted.


So, it may just be a display on the SFM:uk table - it might even be in progress during the event! We'll just have to wait and see ...

Just been having an interesting conversation about the history of communications and the subject came up about old interconnected networks.

Now, I was sure there used to be a system that used the sewers of Paris - got confused with Minitel - and then stumbled across this post by Molly Wright Steenson who is writing on the origins of the pneumatic tube network.

http://www.activesocialplastic.com/2009/01/pneumatic_post_in_paris.html

A really interesting read and a very good blog too!

Wear a hat!

Seriously, it's so cold out there that my lack of hair on my head is becoming a serious danger to my health and, even though I may look like a bruiser, I really need to find my hat to keep warm!

I know I put it somewhere safe (isn't this always the case?) ...

Well, having got the blogging bug anew, I thought I would resurrect this thing and make a concerted effort to keep it up to date (yeah right).

Anyone for a semi-mid-life crisis?

Over the next few weeks, I'll be tweaking the layout, adding some gubbins and generally enjoying myself!

It's been a long time since I've posted anything. To be honest, I've not really had much to say!

Model-wise, I've completed a couple of new builds and have several on the go - the main one being a 1/35 Gunther (a walking tank from an alternate WW2). I'm attempting to get this finished in time for the South Cheshire Militaire model show at the end of the month.

You can look at the photos on Flikr and follow the build diary over at SFM:uk.

That's it for now - back soon!

Yep, that time of year again.

The car is frozen solid and, after battling penguins to get inside, I find out that it won't start.

Very, very annoying!

Time to think about a new car methinks.

It's been a while since I posted anything and I have now completed three different builds that have been ongoing for a while!

First up is the 1/20 Maschinen Krieger Krupp Kröte:


Although the Kröte itself is finished, I still have to get around to completing the base and a figure to go with it.

Next off the conveyor belt was the 1/35 Dinomania Group Build entry, Dinodistopia:


Finally, I finished the 1/20 Maschinen Krieger Luna Pawn modification, the Meteor:


More photos can be found on Flickr.

Given my usual glacial building pace, this was an extreme challenge!

The idea, devised by Homo Ferratus, had only three rules:

1. You must use 1 Ping Pong ball!
2. You must build it within 1 hour!
3. Don't cheat, watch the time! ;)

So, I ploughed through my sprues and bits and gathered a few things that might come in useful ...

After a manic 45 minutes cutting holes and randomly gluing on parts, then shooting some white primer on, I had this:


The final 15 minutes were spent waiting for the primer to dry and quickly brushing on a Games Workshop wash (Gryphonne Sepia). Once my time was up, this is what I had:




Not too bad for an hour I thought!

Later on, I went back and adding some more decals and ID stripes and here is the final thing:



I also came up with some background for it:

Wächter Orbital Surveillance Drone

Deployed in NEO and Lunar orbit, the Wächter is an AI surveillance drone utlised by the SDR to watch for Mercenary troops and vessels. The Mercs spent a lot of time hunting these drones down, first in modified AFS patrols and later with Fireball and Fireball SG hunting teams.

The Merc success rate in disabling the Wächters was very high, and the assembly and deployment of replacement drones was too much of a drain on SDR resources to enable them to be replaced quickly enough to be an effective deterrant to Merc plans on the Moon and surrounding space.

More images can be found on Flickr. Forum threads discussing this build can be found at SFM:uk and the Maschinen Krueger forums.

As you can see, there has been quite some progress over the last two weeks. To summarise:

• Triceratops is done
• Panzerhoudah (for want of a better word) is in progress, with a new floor and sculpted padding. Need to add seats, boxes and cargo.
• Panzerhoudah driver and riders built (using a kit from Miniart), need to clean up and then paint.
• Two of the machine gun walking figures are built, I have started painting one, but not too happy with how the face is looking (I HATE painting faces, just can't get it right!).
• The diorama base is nearly done. I have sculpted additional cobblestones and need to lightly sand and add some of the details before painting.

So, it's slowly getting there - good job there's still a couple of months left before it needs to be completed!