Those Wargaming Habits that Drive us Mad (and make us laugh)

Every hobby has its little irritations, and tabletop historical wargaming is no exception. In my latest video, I dive into a viewer question that’s been waiting patiently in the comments for its moment in the spotlight: “What are your pet hates in the hobby?” Now, this isn’t a rant in the angry sense. It’s more of a warm, self-aware chuckle at the small things that make us twitch across the tabletop, even while we’re enjoying the best hobby in the world. Because if we’re honest, most of these “pet hates” are things we’ve all done at some point.

I talk about the sight of unpainted miniatures on the gaming table — especially when they somehow manage to defeat a fully painted army. There’s also the familiar frustration of stunning demo games at wargames shows that have no signs, no labels, and no explanation of what battle or rules you’re looking at. For a hobby built on history and detail, that little missing bit of information can make a big difference.

Then there are the smaller visual things, like plain bases that never quite got finished, or the odd effect of scale creep when miniatures from different manufacturers end up mixed into the same unit. Individually, these are tiny issues, but once you spot them, they can be hard to ignore. Of course, not all pet hates are visual. Some happen mid-game, like players who constantly nudge and re-adjust their units, somehow gaining that mysterious “extra inch” of movement, or the enthusiastic dice throwers whose rolls resemble an artillery barrage more than a game mechanic.

Through it all, the tone stays friendly and self-deprecating. This isn’t about telling anyone they’re doing the hobby wrong. It’s about recognising shared experiences in tabletop wargaming, miniature painting, and historical gaming culture, and having a laugh about them together. If you enjoy hobby discussion, reflections on wargaming culture, and the everyday realities of life with toy soldiers, this video is for you. Watch it, see how many of these pet hates you recognise, and then join the conversation — because every wargamer has at least one!

Learning New Rules

So what's the easiest way for you to learn a new set of rules? Personally, I've never been one to be able to sit and read a whole set of rules cover to cover. No matter how interested I am I find it hard to focus when just reading. I’ve always been like this, and way back in the mists of time, when I was at University, I instinctively sought out alternative ways to study, rather than just reading textbooks. Friday's episode of The Quarantined Wargamer explores the subject of how we learn new rules and suggests some techniques for getting those pesky facts embedded in our grey matter. 

We all have different ways of absorbing new information, and I certainly don't have all the answers. So what are your tips and tricks for learning new rulesets? I'd love to hear from you, either in the comments below on my YouTube Channel. If you like enjoy the video please hit the Like button and consider subscribing to my channel. 

Next week I'll be talking about why we should Encourage rather than Criticise those starting out in our hobby. 

The Shrinking Wargamer

It's not gone unnoticed, but this wargamer is getting smaller. I'm not talking about the inevitable height shrinkage that comes with old age (not quite there yet!) but my 'horizontal' footprint is diminishing and has been for several months now. Back in April, I turned fifty and I was diagnosed with Hypertension and in my GP's usual offhand way I was advised to lose weight. I've been here many times before but I had never been as heavy as I was at that time (I was starting to develop my own gravitational field) so I knew I had to make a real change to my diet. The problem is that after a lifetime of diets I think anything actually labelled a 'diet' is by its very nature, doomed to failure. At some point, the diet comes to an end and the weight inevitably piles back on. I imagine that the vast majority of people that have struggled with their weight like I have will recognise the phenomenon only too well.

This time I can't let it happen again, not if I want to keep mobile (my knees complain VERY loudly these days). Let's face it, I'm far too young to have mobility problems especially if I want to continue to enjoy my hobby and all its associated activities. Standing for long periods during games, walking around wargame shows or exploring museums or historic sites had become increasingly painful and the Salute show earlier this year was a watershed moment for me. I could honestly see a point in the not too distant future when I would be forced to abandon an event because of the pain in my legs. I'll probably need a knee replacement at some point in the future (the damage has been done) but in the meantime, at the very least, I can take some of the tonnage off the joints to ease the pain.

I'm pleased to say that I have lost the best part of six stone (38 kilos) and am closing in on my first target weight. I still have a way to go, but I'm confident I can do it because I have a new regime that can best be described as a non-diet diet. One of my key objectives, when I started this process in April, was to lose weight without becoming obsessed with hard and fast rules. I didn't want to count calories or ban particular foods or even increase my exercise all that much. In short, I wanted to make changes that would produce results without having to think about it. This sounds like the holy grail of diets but I think I have done it and the results so far seem to confirm that. So how the hell have I done it?

Yum. I love bread. 

In short, I have cut out a lot of the bread I used to eat. I have switched to oats and fruit for breakfast instead of toast and of course, I have largely cut out cakes and sweets. Within a few weeks, I found that I didn't miss the latter and learning to say 'no' has been one of the big successes of this effort. The main change I have made is that I have given myself permission to break the diet occasionally. I can still enjoy a blow-out takeaway or a fancy meal out now and again, so long as I don't follow up by falling off the wagon entirely. It helps that I have always enjoyed plenty of vegetables and fruit in my diet, and while I'll NEVER be a vegetarian, I'm not weeping myself to sleep for want of a steak! I'm also not much of a drinker so I don't have to reduce my alcohol intake to cut calories. So in some ways my diet was already on the right track, I just needed to cut out all the extra stuff I was eating. And that's it; no fad foods, no medical supplements and certainly no surgery!

What about exercise I hear you say. Well, to be honest, I'm not a 'sporty person' and never have been. Most physical activities I could do would be too high impact on my dodgy knees, I refuse to waste money at a Gym and I hate swimming (unless it's on holiday in the Med!). I have been walking more, mainly because my legs hurt less and I don't have so much tonnage to drag around, so I guess I have increased my activity but its a chicken and the egg scenario.

So there you have it, my solution to a lifetime of indulgence. Hopefully, by the time Salute 2020 comes around, I'll be a shadow of my former self and bounding around the excel exhibition centre like a spring chicken. You have full permission to bully me if I don't keep up the good work. Seriously, keep me honest, keep me on track and in return, I'll stay around dishing out easy victories for my opponents in the wargames scene for years to come! 

Post Comments Fixed

For the last couple of weeks I have been struggling to fix a problem with Post Comments that forced me to temporarily switch to using Google+ Comments. The embedded comments at the bottom of each post wouldn't load and neither I nor visitors were able to read existing contributions or add new ones. This has happened before several years ago and I was able to fix the problem by editing the code of the site (based on advice from the help forums). This time though I couldn't find a fix and the imposition of Google Comments has stretched on for much longer than I would have hoped. I dislike Google Comments (even though I like G+ as a social platform) because only people with a google profile can comment and this leaves a lot of readers unable to interact with my posts. 

The problem has now been fixed and regular comments have finally been restored. I'm not entirely sure what I did to cure the problem but I have been tinkering with the site template and settings and one of these things mush have fixed the issue. I'm just grateful its working again and wanted to thank readers for their forbearance over the last fortnight. 

SELWG 2018 - Close, but no cigar

My annual pilgrimage to Crystal Palace show didn't happen this year thanks to a spot of car trouble (more on that in due course) although it shouldn't come as much of a surprise to me as its been something of an on-again off-again affair for months. Initially I though I was going to miss the show because my Teacher wife has just had a numerically significant birthday and we were planning on taking a holiday during the Half Term break. However that plan went out the window several weeks ago and I tried really hard not to show my happiness when I realised I would be able to attend SELWG after all. I guess its Karma therefore that my excitement at attending the show should come to an (almost) crashing halt late last night.

I've never experienced a tire blowout before so I guess I should count myself lucky that it happened at relatively low speed and where I was able to pull into a lay-by. I say lucky because just a few minutes earlier I was travelling at 70 mph on a badly lit road. Not only did the wheel fail but it shredded in a way I hadn't thought possible and when I pulled over there was literally smoke rising from the tattered rubber that used to be a tire. I then attempted to change the wheel for the spare, whereupon I found that even my weight behind the wrench was not enough to get the wheel nuts off. The impossibly tight bolts even stumped the AA who arrived 40 minutes later and that was the point I realised my plans for a day at SELWG had bit the dust for the last time. So rather than writing a long post about one of my favourite shows - with accompanying photo's - I've spent today at home trying to sort out my car.

I've commented on this before but the SELWG show seems to have an almost supernatural effect on the weather. Every year, regardless of the prevailing conditions in October, the day of the show is nearly always a bright crisp and beautiful autumn morning. This year was no exception and when I looked out at the weather today my heart sank even lower. So I guess all that is left to do now is wait to see the pictures posted online by those that were able to attend, and plan my trip to SELWG for next year. Maybe I'll have better luck in October 2019!

Tutorial: How to make a mess

Wrong materials; wrong tools; wrong technique. But I don't care. Today I'm doing a bit of terrain building. I just had this overwhelming urge.....

Oh, and I don't have a mancave, a workshop or even a shed to work in so my first major terrain building exercise is taking place in the living room. Guess I'd better tidy up before the wife gets home from work! 

Gaming my way to Happiness

One of the regular reasons wargamers often give for not indulging our hobbies is work, be that the type that earns money or the type that keep the house running. Many of us are busy trying to hold down a decent job - sometimes two! - just to make ends meet. And when we aren't making money for 'the Man' we have a list of household chores as long as your arm to deal with. Finding time to play with our toys can often be hard to justify. I'm sure most of us can cite many moments when the 'work/life balance' has tipped a little too far in favour of work and most of us can cope with that in the short term. But when this goes on without an end in sight it can be detrimental to our mental and physical health. I'm a firm believer in hobbies being an effective remedy for stress. 

I was recently sent on a Mindfulness course by my company and when I stopped laughing at this 'bunch of hippy nonsense' it did make me think about how I use my hobby as a distraction from everyday life. Without getting all metaphysical on you I think that having a passion or even an obsession that isn't work related is one way to clear the mind. The so call mindfulness coach I spent a 'delightful' afternoon with, believed that meditation was the answer to dealing with stress. I'd argue that concentrating on skillful activity - especially something utterly removed from your regular job - is a form of meditation, and the benefits are just as measurable. Before you think I've 'lost it', let me explain myself.

Grab a dictionary (or Google) and it will give a definition of meditation that will probably read something like this; the act of focusing ones mind for a period of time, in silence or with the aid of chanting or music, for spiritual purposes or as a method of relaxation. Well that pretty much sounds like a typical painting session to me. I get 'in the zone' by blocking out distractions such as the TV by listening to music. Some people find the sound of talking soothing and enjoy listening to Pod casts while they paint. The effect is the same as meditation, its about cancelling out other distractions and bringing focus to the hear and now.

Now having expounded the benefits of gaming as a means of stress relief I have to say the last few months have been a bit spartan in terms of painting and gaming for me. The reasons have been many, varied and often hard to define. The summer holidays are always a hard time to fit games in as many of our group have busy summer schedules. I've also missed several games with The Rejects and the last two games have had to be cancelled at the last minute. In fact I was supposed to have a game today but this has had to be cancelled because our glorious leader, host and umpire Postie is feeling under the weather. It can't be helped but I was rather looking forward to a game today and I have been talked into going shopping with the wife instead (eek!).

I've lost count how many times I have written about a slump in hobby activity but I know that the next few months will see things turned around. Over the winter we have the Analogue Painting Challenge and I'm trying to prepare as bast I can for that. I have a lot of figures that need to be mounted and primed before the starting pistol fires so I will be cracking on with this process in the next few days. I also have a bit of holiday time scheduled so hopefully as well as painting I can get a couple of games in with the Young Padawan. I may even get a few Solo games in, something I haven't indulged in much before. It'll be interesting to see if I can outwit myself... everyone else does. 

Wargamer vs The Elements: A Battle Report

It was a sunny Saturday morning in 2016 and the weary wargamer (me) had been hatching a plan. I had all the raw materials for some terrain work and now saw an opportunity to forego the housework in favour of some groundwork. My felt gaming mat and some styrene hills were going to get a desert makeover and today the weather looked bright and dry enough for the repainting to take place out in the garden. 

Thus was set the scene for an epic struggle between the time starved wargamer and the elements. 

Order of Battle

One wargamer (wielding three cans of spray paint)

   Vs

A Gentle Breeze (that might as well have been force 9 for the destruction it wrought)

The Action

I used car spray paint for this project, selecting three beige colours that would compliment the sand colour of my felt game mat. I started with the darkest colour and worked my way through to the lightest until I was happy with the result. I also painted my collection of Styrene hills from TSS in the same style. 

Needless to say using spray paints inside the house would have brought down the deserved wrath of my wife, so I decided to spray the mat and my styrene hills out in the garden. However the supposedly 'gentle' breeze played havoc with my plans. 

And wind blow leaves and sycamore seeds didn't help either.

My plain sand coloured felt mat is ideal for draping over my small games table or laying out on larger ones, but was rather plain so it needed a little bit of a makeover. The finished effect is better seen indoors but this is what it looked like when I had finished. 

 

Exhausted victory! 

Analysis

I need a man cave, preferably shed shaped. 

Plethora of Projects

I had to share this picture of my my messy desk if only to shame myself into tidying it up! I normally have a much more ordered work space but at the moment I have multiple periods and multiple scales taking over. Actually things could be even messier because I have ordered some 6mm Romans from Baccus but I'm still waiting on delivery for these. 

It could be worse!

It has to be said though that some of this isn't even my mess, its my daughters! The 40k Termagants (I think that's what they are called?!?) are her first attempt at proper painting, using simple but core techniques like dry-brushing and washing. I'll post more detailed pictures when she has finished the bases. Also hers is the tentacled beast in front centre. She has yet to undercoat that but has already learnt the hard way that poorly cast resin can be a nightmare to clean up!

The 15mm Churchill tank in the foreground however is mine. Although I have sold a lot of my 15mm stuff I had a few unpainted models that I wanted to keep to paint for display rather than gaming. I'm painting this as a 'Kingforce' MkIII, hence the reference pictures stuck around the top of my desk. The base for the Churchill has being painted separately and can be seen in the top right. Also present on the table are the two 6mm Timecast buildings I bought at SELWG. I have cleaned them (I wash everything prior to painting to remove grease and release agent) but have yet to undercoat them. There are also some 15mm sci-fi figures that I picked up at SELWG (another Shiney moment!). I haven't done anything with these yet, beyond wondering why I picked them up! Last but not least there are half a dozen 6mm Italian Vehicles nearing completion. I'm not basing these as they are 'set dressing' only, not game pieces. These will be placed around my Italian airfield as parked vehicles.

Picture courtesy of Ray's Blog

Part of the reason for my lack of progress this week has been my sudden and completely unexpected social life! Thursday evening Ray, Tamsin and I met up with Miles over from the US on business. We enjoyed an excellent Greek meal and an evening of even better conversation. One of the single greatest rewards of writing a Blog like this is the people I have met and the friendships it helps forge. I have made a lot of friends through my Blog (including the Rejects) and now I can add Miles to a growing list of international friends. Hopefully he can make it over here next year for the Salute show and a game with the Rejects.

Clearing the paint desk will have to wait a while as I am off on a short holiday from tomorrow. Nothing fancy, just a few days in Clacton to see family and do some retail therapy away from home. Hopefully by the time we get home my miniatures from Baccus will have arrived and my painting desk can get even more cluttered! 

Looking forward to SELWG

I'm in a bit of a funk at the moment. I'm not talking "needing medication" depressed, I'm just feeling at a very low ebb (this is just a phase folks, not an illness). I guess we all have periods like this when things get on top of us but for the last few weeks its been like a dismal cloud hanging over me. It's a combination of a lot of small things rather than any one big issue but the end result is that I haven't slept well in weeks. The cumulative effect over time means that when I get home from work I'm too tired to be bothered with anything other than falling asleep in front of the TV and can't motivate myself to do anything creative.

Just ignore me... this is self indulgent, self absorbed moaning about nothing and everything!

The net result of this funk is that BigLee's Miniature Adventures has been a bit quiet of late, and for that I apologise. Inspiration has been low and I have run out of things to paint - in the same way the women "have nothing to wear"! I have the usual lead mountain stashed away in various boxes throughout the house but nothing is speaking to me at the moment and I can't seem to get the motivation together to do anything. Which is why I need a good show like SELWG to buck up my spirits and reignite the fires of inspiration!

I'll be bringing my daughter with me this year (the Young Padawan that so effectively demolished me in her Guest Post last month) as I continue her indoctrination in the Tao of Wargaming. I may be an embarrassing dad in public but get her in a room of other wargamers and hopefully she will realise I'm not that strange after all! I have been making a modest shopping list and am looking forward to seeing some great games (and maybe playing some too) and meeting a lot of old friends. And after we have finished inside the show we are going to hunt some Dinosaurs in Crystal Palace Park.

Now if that doesn't cheer me up nothing will!

Top 10 Impulse Buying Disasters

Wargamers can be a flighty bunch, flitting from one project to another accumulating a pile of lead (or plastic) in the process. I certainly was until a few years ago when I made a conscious effort to clear my backlog of unfinished projects and not buy anything new unless I had a firm plan for it. Of course like most plans mine didn't survive first contact with the enemy. Despite my best efforts I have bought several items that I later regretted. Some were mistakes, others were pure impulse overriding common sense. Here's my top ten in reverse order.

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A Wargamers Top Ten Impulse Buying Disasters

10 - Charity shop gaming mat
I've bought plenty of gaming mats over the years but one was a classic mistake. I picked up mat from a charity shop but didn't open the box in the store before buying it. When I got home I found that the mat had been very badly painted to represent hills and a river. Fortunately the mat only cost me a quid and it quickly migrated to the bin when I discovered its clumsy customisation.

9 - The inadequate tube
I bought a large 'map tube' to store a 6x4' gaming mat in. When I got home I found the tube was actually only 3'9" long. A friend of mine ended up with the tube which he used for the innovative purpose of storing maps in!

8 - Scale creep
Scale creep is something we are all familiar with but still managed to catch me out. I bought some figures from a bargain bin at a show only to find they were completely out of proportion to my existing collection. Most remained in my lead mountain for a long time only to be given away years later.

7 - The wrong tanks
Another rookie mistake I made occurred when I started collecting historical forces for the first time. I merrily bought loads of 15mm WWII vehicles based on what I liked, rather than building a particular army list. This was a case of shinybloodyitus pure and simple and several of the models I bought never made it into any of my armies.

6 - The 'special offer' 
I'm not normally one to get swept away by marketing or 'sales' and try to keep a level head when buying stuff. But at Salute a few years ago I was about to leave the show after a long successful day shopping and saw a special offer on a KR model bag. The fact that I didn't need the bag didn't stop me from picking up this bargain. The bag was eventually sold several years later at the SELWG Bring a Buy for a third of the price I had originally paid for it.

5 - The unused army
I'm guessing I'm not alone in investing in painted figures only to never use them. But I have gone one further, an entire army that never saw action. Way back when I first started wargaming I played Warhammer Fantasy Battle and bought my friends Dwarven Army when he decided to change forces. They were very nice models and remained very nice for several years because they never came out of the boxes I bought them in.

4 - A shattering experience
Another impulse buy made at Salute was a rather nice looking WWII building. The 15mm resin model of a row of bombed out houses came pre painted and really looked the part. However I should have realised the structure was far too fragile for resin and within hours of getting it home I dropped it, breaking it into twenty or thirty bits.

3 - Bargain basement varnish
I had run out of my favourite varnish and rather than wait for my on-line order to arrive I bought a cheap can of spray varnish from a high street discount store. I've no idea how old the can was, or if it had been stored badly by the retailer but the varnish came out completely opaque. Fortunately I tested it first, narrowly avoiding ruining a newly finished infantry platoon.

2 - Twice as good
I have a big collection of books and not surprisingly most are about military history. I came across a nice collection of second hand books on a stall at a living history event and after a bit of haggling on the price walked away with two great books on German armour in WWII. When I got home I found that I had both books already. Worse still they had the prices I paid for them written on the inside cover in pencil and it was less than I had just paid at the show!

1 - There's Sable and then there's Kolinsky Sable
The worst purchase I ever made has to be a whole set of Games Workshop brushes I bought several years ago. For the last decade or more my brush of choice has been the Winsor and Newton Series 7. They are expensive but the quality is outstanding with some of my current brushes still going strong after 10 years service. Why I bought the set from GW is beyond me and after just one use I threw the lot in the bin. Maybe I bought a duff bunch but I have never encountered brushes as poor as those and I really should have known better and stuck with my tried and trusted series 7's.

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So having now made a public spectacle of myself the question is, what were your worst hobby purchases? You don't have to list ten, but what about your top five worst impulse buying disasters? I can't be the only Wargamer out there with a tenuous grasp on his money!

New Painting Chair

I'm not normally one to sit and paint for long periods, partly because in recent years it really hurts my back. I recognise that this is all part of getting old but but its also a symptom of poor posture. I normally sit at my painting desk on a dining chair which is slightly too high and inevitably results in a hunched, bent over, position during long painting sessions.

Buying a replacement chair has always been on my to-do list but never seems to have become a priority, especially when I looked at the price of suitable chairs (The equation being one chair equals lots and lots of models...I'll take the models please!). However I recently came across this nice second hand leather tub chair and quickly realised it was an ideal replacement for my normal seat.

The chair would ordinarily be too low but this one had four casters on the feet raising it by a couple of inches and making it pretty much the perfect height. The arms needed a little bit of restoration to repair some minor scratches and scuff marks and in the end I changed the casters for larger, more robust ones. All in all a pretty simple repair job and now it sits in pride of place in front of my desk.

My wife - bless her - has been chuckling at me since I first brought the chair home and started repairing it. For some reason she has found my 'childlike enthusiasm' (her phrase, not mine) quite amusing. According to her all I need now is a smoking jacket and pipe to complete the picture! 

Repainting my Mat-o-War

I'm still waiting for the last few figures I need for my Desert Raiders game so in the meantime with today being fathers day (ergo "Dad can do what he likes, even if its painting day") I have been 'tinkering' with a few peripheral jobs that needed my attention. I've painted some more Z-Gauge track (again ordered from Japan) which means I now have about 7ft, ample for my games. But the other odd job I have undertaken today is repainting my Mat-o-War. The mat is actually designed to be painted and is thick enough that you can paint each side differently. I've left the reverse side plain for now but the 'gaming' side has been given a makeover. 

Back when I bought this mat I used an assortment of spray paints to 'desertify' the surface (yes, it is a word... albeit one I just mashed together) but it always seemed a bit too dark. Last year I also bought a load of hills from TSS but these are very light coloured and stand out quite starkly against the darker tones of the mat-o-war. I bought the hills in two batches and the colour of the flock covering them differed quite a lot so what I had was a mat and hills in various shades of sand. In an effort to bring them all together I have revisited and repainted the mat and hills using some new spray paints I bought specifically for the purpose.

"Don't worry darling, it'll grow out!"

I started with a dusting of Desert Yellow to give a consistent 'base' colour to the mat and hills. Over this I used several cans of Ivory/Ibis White from the Halfords vehicle paint range. These sprays are excellent value and I can't recommend them enough for this sort of job. The result is quite soft edged and suitably light in tone which now more closely matches my figure bases. The hills now blend much better with the mat although it has to be said the above picture doesn't do the finished look justice. You'll just have to trust me when I say they look much better.

The state of the lawn however is another matter.

Just Because

I'm having one of them days when all I want to do is flatten something with a tank (or in this case an APV).

I shot this little sequence at War and Peace last year. Wanton destruction, but great fun to watch over and over again... I must stop fantasising about doing this to the neighbours cars!

Christmas...its been complicated

I hope everyone has had a very nice Christmas and I trust you were all on the 'Good' list this year. I, on the other hand, began to think I was on the Naughty list because most of my holiday consisted of groaning into a bucket, consumed by waves of nausea. Needless to say I had to forego the usual convivial festivities (including my Mother-in-Laws legendary Christmas Dinner) although I was able to shake off my nausea long enough to open a few presents and see the kids enjoying theirs. The only silver lining is that my present haul this year was very good with a fine selection of books and a very nice W&N Series 7 brush set from my wife. 

 

 

  

Anyway, here's hoping that you all have a very good New Years Eve and that next year brings better fortune than last. Personally 2014 has been a horrible year for me and I for one will be glad to see the back of it. 

Merry Christmas

Wishing all my readers a very 

Happy Christmas 

and a prosperous New Year

Long time readers will have seen this model before, his image gets trotted out every year when I find myself lacking a new Christmas themed model to paint. Actually this year I did have a new model lined up but I haven't had the time or the inclination to paint much at all since I started my new job. Things are settling down a bit and I'm determined to lay brush on metal again in the new year. In the meantime I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas with plenty of nice treats, good times with your families and of course hobby related presents!  

August Book Roundup

Its been yet another very slow month as far as reading or even painting is concerned, so I actually have nothing to review for August. I've been officially Unemployed by means of redundancy for a month now, but despite the sudden increase in 'free' time I don't seem to have found the time or the motivation for anything hobby related. August seems to have shot past in a blur of job hunting, interviews, housework and summer family activities, including a short holiday to Devon. But today the wife went back to work at her school and I have to admit the house seems terribly quite without her around. My daughter goes back to school on Thursday and then the solitude will really hit home. Guaranteed I'll be talking to myself before the first day is over!!

Unemployed but happy: Me at the Cobbaton Combat Collection while on Holiday in Devon last month. 

I haven't been entirely idle though. I've been spending a lot of time job hunting online and once we settle into a new term-time routine I'm going to gear up my efforts, get out and visit some agencies and start knocking on doors (metaphorically speaking). I have been applying for a lot of jobs, but not nearly as many as I would like.  I really need to get some turnover going to generate more interviews and more opportunities. I'm also determined to schedule some proper hobby time each day (after the housework is completed of course!) and get some reading done, so maybe I'll actually have something to review next month!

Horsing Around

I got a lot of painting done last night mainly because I managed to remain focused on my work and didn't allow myself to become distracted by silly things. Mind you, I didn't feel quite myself towards the end.

Ahem...on a more serious note, I did actually get a lot done last night. I've prepped a load of new vehicles and finished basecoating 40+ others. I also indulged in some retail therapy, purchasing some very expensive, but very nice, models direct from GHQ in the States. Postage costs from the US are frankly extortionate (20% the order value in this case!!!) so I'm not sure I'll do this again unless its a significantly large order. This isn't unique to this company, I've encountered high postage costs with several retailers and manufacturers from across the pond. .. its almost as if the US of A doesn't want to sell to anyone outside of North Amarica?!? Surely not!

Stocks and Shares

I have one last set of pictures from my recent Dorset Holiday to share and then I promise to shut up about it. These were taken on probably the best day (for weather) we had during the week at Corfe near Swanage. One of our many stops that day was the village of Corfe and its Model Village before walking up the mound to the real castle.

I see a set of Stocks and I just have to pose for a photo (this is for you Fran!). Now throw the key away...

The model Village includes a scale model of Corfe Castle as it would have looked around the time of the English Civil War  before the Parliamentary forces systematically destroyed it to deny its use to the Royalists.

The Model village is a detailed reproduction of the town of Corfe itself, complete with a miniature version of the miniature village....

...and if you look carefully (extreme left of the model about half way up) there is even another Miniature version of the Miniature Village, within the Miniature version of the miniature village.!

Corfe castle as it looks today is a shattered but picturesque ruin. 

The Parliamentarian Sappers did a good job of ensuring the castle could never be used as a defencive structure again. 

I did my best to repair the mess but I was never very good at D.I.Y. 

OK, that's the last pictures from Dorset. I haven't done any painting since the end of the Challenge last month, but that will change over the weekend when I get my brushes out. Unfortunately this probably won't include anything made with Kalinsky Sable because the wife wants me to decorate the bathroom!

Unwelcome Visitors

Well I'm back from my holiday in Dorset and its been a busy week. I feel much more rested mentally although physically I'm done in - we cram a lot in when we are away! Luckily I still have another week off at home and this will give me a chance to catch up on some much needed sleep and proper rest. I'm also hoping to get a few painting projects started, but first things first, I have a load of pictures to sort out and post. I'll have them ready in a day or two and will post the best ones of some of the better museums I have been lucky enough to visit in the past week. 

The big downside of the holiday is that I missed Salute this year. I was travelling back from Dorset on the Saturday and we traditionally try to fit in 'one last attraction' into the trip home. This time we opted to visit Chartwell, the home of Sir Winston Churchill, and I was rather looking forward to the trip as I haven't been here before. Unfortunately I overlooked the fact that this is a National Trust property and would therefore almost certainly be a little disappointed by the whole experience.

True enough, the day started with us having to pay for parking as well as entrance to the house and gardens. OK it was only three quid but added to the £32 entry fee (two adults, one child) this was a very expensive day out compared to other 'attractions' we have visited during the holiday. Then the fun really started.

One of the things I never like about National Trust properties is the 'type' of person they seem to employ. Most of the staff are friendly enough but every one seems to be from the same social demographic; Retired, white, upper middle class, tweed wearing and just slightly supercilious. As a Dagenham lad I always feel like I shouldn't be there, making their properties look untidy and generally 'lowering the tone' with my working class background! OK, I know I'm generalising and being a little prejudiced, but there are few groups of people amongst whom I feel so uncomfortable just by being in the same room. And I was paying top money for this privilege! 

Aside from my admittedly class biased discomfort amongst NT staff the main thing I dislike are the overbearing and frankly snobbish rules that go with visiting places like this. Firstly, no photography, a personal hate of mine (I've written about it at length here) and one that I cannot see any good reason to impose on visitors when they have been asked to part with so much money to gain entry. Of course they also make you leave all your belongings at the entrance with no liability accepted for the safety of your camera bag and its contents. 

I also hate the fact that every room has one of the aforementioned stuffy staff members in it (presumably to stop you taking pictures with the camera you can't take with you). I'm not sure if their primary role is as informal room guides or as rules police but they hardly ever seem to know what they are talking about. One guide was muttering a load of rubbish about how popular and publicly adored Churchill was throughout his life and never once mentioned the fact that he was sacked from Government several times in his long career, faced votes of no-confidence as PM and then lost the General election in 1945. Churchill was undoubtedly the right man with the right background at the right time to lead Britain in wartime, and although he's a hero of mine even I'm not so starry eyed as to overlook the mans obvious and many character flaws. Indeed it was those very flaws that made him perfect for the job as a war leader. 

A perfect example was a copy of a memo on display from Churchill to General Alexander in August 1942 pressing him to destroy Rommel's forces in North Africa immediately. At this time 8th Army was still reeling and retreating towards their last line of defence at Alemien and was in desperate need of resupply and reorganisation and its leaders were in no real position to carry out these orders. But the Prime Minister was motivated by political rather than martial concerns as he was facing the prospect of a no-confidence vote in the House of Commons at the time! Alexander, and Montgomery refused to act until they (and their troops) were completely ready at the end of October and it was their patience and refusal to be bullied by the PM that lead to Alemein and the victory Churchill sought. For me the museum and the staff were just a little too deferential to the former PM and did history a major disservice as a result.

Aside from the poorly informed staff there are few other sources of information as you go around the house. In an English Heritage property you would expect to see information boards in every room, and probably some form of audio guide to listen too as you go around, but in many National Trust properties there is a definite lack of information... unless of course you buy the overpriced guidebook on top of the entrance fee! 

Now we get to the real bugbear of our particular visit, the public rebuke my poor wife received when her phone started to ring. Most of the time her phone isn't even turned on but on this occasion she had forgotten it was still on, and then she received a call. We hardly heared the ring tone over the noise of all the talking visitors but when she realised it was her phone she quickly tried to retrieve it and turn it off...at which point a 200 year old tweed wearing staff member swooped across the room and in a loud voice told her to turn the phone off and step outside if she wanted to make a phone call! My wife was mortified with embarrassment and I was frankly a little ****ed-off at the very public, self important and over enthusiastic rules enforcement that had been laid down on her. And that pretty much finished the day off for us.

I'm not going to say the house wasn't interesting to visit, there were several items on display that I enjoyed - such as the visitor book signed by Montgomery - but without any proper information I reckon most visitors would have walked past this without realising the significance of the object. There were many other small items throughout the house that caught my eye but only because I'm interested in the period and know a bit about the man himself but on the whole the lack of signage really lets the general visitor down. I think the problem is that NT are treating the house more like a shrine than a museum and its almost as if they don't want visitors at all.

OK, rant over. It was just a pity that we ended the week on such a disappointing note, after having had such a great week in Dorset. I've almost finished working through my pictures from the holiday and in a day or two I'll start posting some from the various museums we visited... every one of which were happy to allow and didn't feel threatened by their visitors taking pictures!