Oh s$#@! Scottish Drivers!; Salute; The Angry Lurker

As I posted yesterday, my wife and I spent a holiday in the UK over the past week, most of it spent in Scotland.

Before I begin my little rant, let me first say that Scotland is a beautiful country, and is easily one of the prettiest places I have ever been.  The Highlands are incredible, the weather was awesome, and the people were very friendly.  However, they are maniacal drivers!!!

Let it also be known that this was my first attempt at driving on the right side of the car, using a gear shift to my left, and driving on the left side of the road.  Overall, Id have to say I picked that part up pretty quickly.

Dont worry, I can fly this

Whats up with the people tailgating and riding your ass everywhere?!?   Im by no means a granny driver - I have my share of speeding tickets, and my motto is '60 means 70' (if the speeding limit is 60, you can easily go 70).  If I caught one more Scot riding my ass, there was about to be a bit of American justice brought to town!!

We encountered lots of single lane roads.  Quite quaint really, and if you think about it, a real nod to what you think would be the speed of life in Scotland.  However, I hit so many single lane roads with a speed limit of 50, with blind hills and blind corners.  Fraying the nerves, to say the least!

WTF does this sign mean?!?  Oh shit!!!  This is definitely meant for foreign drivers.

Finally, whats up with rotaries/roundabouts?  In theory, I think these are a great idea, but not when they are 3 and 4 lanes deep!  Who has the right of way (Ok, this one is my fault)?  To be honest, I never figured it out, and I finally decided that the best policy was to just 'punch it' at a congested rotary and pray for the best.  (Luckily, no problems!  I think that is the Scottish policy too!)

Ok - rant off.  Again, let me reiterate that I absolutely LOVED Scotland.  We were greeted by friendly people everywhere we went.  The landscape and scenery were absolutely incredible.  They even have a monster for God's sake!  I would go back in a heartbeat.  After all, who couldnt love a country that has:

I AM William Wallace!  Wallace Monument in Stirling:

God, I hope William Wallace wasnt as crazy as Mel Gibson!

And, the view the morning we left this amazing country - the Isle Of Skye bridge:

Next up was Salute in London.  I dont have many pictures of this.  I do have a few videos, but to be honest, they werent really worth eating up bandwidth.  This was a great show - a massive vendor hall, games being played all around, harassment by Imperial Stormtroopers, and I got to meet in person several people that I know through blogging and forums.  I put a serious dent into my yearly 'little man' spending during this convention.

My loot

One of the other highlights of my trip was getting to meet 'The Angry Lurker' who in fact, didnt really seem angry, or too lurker-y, at all!  Im sure most of you who see my blog already know who Angry is, but if you dont, check out his blog here.  Fran (if that is his REAL name) was a great guy and it was really cool to meet the guy whose blog Ive followed for several years now.  Maybe he gets grumpy while gaming, or losing, or????  I dont know - I just didnt see the whole 'Angry' thing.  I also got to meet the rest of the Rejects.

Kevin Dallimore is AWESOME!

My wife and I just returned from a vacation in the UK.  We had a terrific time, but one of the major highlights had to be my meeting with Kevin Dallimore.

Unbeknownst to me, last year for my birthday, my wife (God bless her!) emailed Mr Dallimore and arranged for me to have a private 'painting lesson'.  We had discussed a trip to the UK, but this sealed the deal!  Im sure most of you who view my blog know who Kevin Dallimore is, either through his books:

or from his painting (you see his figures all over the web - Foundry, Copplestone, Front Rank (I think) any many, many others).  Here are a couple random figures from Kevin's website:

So, with much excitement, and a little trepidation (after all, I didnt really KNOW anything about Kevin), I got on the train from London to the outskirts of town headed for Kevin's house.

Upon arrival, I was greeted with a huge smile, and we immediately got to work!  Kevin, as it turns out, is a GREAT guy - great sense of humor, very welcoming (a foreigner in his home for God's sake!), and an incredible painter.  I met his lovely wife Caroline, who served me my first cup of English tea, and she makes a helluva good biscuit!

I brought several figures of my own that I had recently painted to be critiqued, as well as several primed, but not begun, so Kevin could demonstrate.  After all, all I really wanted was to watch how he worked to try to pick up a few things.

He repainted a face or two on one of my 'completed' figs - one of my biggest complaints of my own work was that my paint didnt 'pop' enough, and he seemed to agree.  Here is one of the repaints - a tough figure to work on:

He also painted a face (and skin) on this fallshirmjager (wow!):

He then began work on one of of the figures I brought - a sci fi chick from new startup company Effigy Miniatures.  When he was done, not only had I learned a ton of stuff (I hope!), but I also had a totally painted figure:

But if that wasnt enough....

My wife was dying to meet Kevin.  We made sure we were in the UK during Salute, so I made sure we got my wife a ticket too.  While there, even though he was busy running the cool looking Captain Scarlet game, as well as judging painting entries, Kevin made the time to meet my wife, talk to us a bit, and take pictures (me left, Kevin right):

We also talked to Caroline a bit more, who handed my wife a box, and said 'give this to Jay once you get home'.  Of course, I was dying to crack it open, but my wife managed to hold me off during the 12 hour trip home.  Inside, were several figures from Kevin's own personal collection.  I was absolutely stunned, and very proud that he thought enough of me to send them on to a new home!  They know have a place of honor in the front of my collection!

The master and the apprentice (Kev's left, mine right)

15mm Barbarians from Copplestone

He also sent a very cool looking Goblin archer, whose picture I have somehow already lost!  Finally, he sent an incredible 'diorama' of some AMAZING Prussian soldiers.  Seriously?????

If you ever get the chance to meet Mr Dallimore at a show, etc, you should definitely do it.  Also, if you arent the painter type and need stuff done, you should definitely give him a shout!

Tomorrow, I will be posting a little about my trip, including some stuff on crazy Scottish drivers, the Angry Lurker (who actually doesnt seem all that angry at all!), and a few other random thoughts!

More 15mm ACW

These took me FOREVER!  I started these the same day I started Mass Effect 3....and ME3 got most of my time!

I wanted to try out Old Glory and Blue Moon Manufacturing (which these are a mix of) to see how they compare to Peter Pig.  As I mentioned before, I have decided that I like PP's figures better!  Dont get me wrong - the OG and BM stuff are great.  Very nicely detailed, and a lot of them have great character.  On the down side, when I choose 15mm, I want a true 15mm figure.  Also, a few of the Blue Moon figures had some really bad sculpts - the faces were just blobs.

My next project will be some 10mm ACW figures...

a couple comparison shots - Peter Pig unit on the left, Blue Moon and Old Glory on the right.

Michonne

The Guild hosted a quick speed build over Easter weekend with the theme 'Prisoner' here.  I immediately got to thinking of any figure I had that could be used to represent!

So, my homage to Michonne of the Walking Dead!  Good stuff for me - I finished this is around 4 hours (which HAS to be some kind of record for me!).  "Michonne" is from Hasslefree Minaitures, while the two zombies are from Victory Force Miniatures.  I sculpted the collars, Michonne's belt, and a bag on her back, and attached two pieces of 15mm 'barbed wire' as chain.

March 2012 Totals and Mass Effect 3

March was a pretty slim month for painting.  I got involved in Mass Effect 3 (which I just finished - more on that in a sec), and my last save was about 25 hours (all in the month of March).  Normally, that time would be closer to 10-12 hours for a video game, so that really took a chunk.  I finished off a zombie, a few Old West characters, and several 6mm tanks.

If you have been a follower of the Mass Effect series, you must get Mass Effect 3 and run it through.  It is a great 'space opera' with a great story, great gameplay, and really nice looking cutscenes.  Throw in Commander Sheppard getting a little bouncy bouncy from some fluzie reporter and Yvonne Strahovski's cyber character, who can go wrong???

I know who - this guy angry elf

Maybe you have read about the controversy of the ending?  I wont spoil it on my blog, and there is a decent article here about it.  Honestly, the last 10 minutes suck some pretty big donkey.  It does kinda stink that someone has put 75ish hours into the game series only to have a the ending be pretty much worthless.  No closure, no happy ending - hell, there really isnt an unhappy ending!  Like I said, I wont ruin it just in case you are going to play/not finished yet, but Id be interested to know what you think.  And again, the 24 hours and 50 minutes you will play getting to the end are more than worth it - just turn your machine off before you have to make the final decisions!!!

Completed, for March, 2012:

28mm infantry completed: 5
1 Zombies (Victory Force Miniatures)
4 Old West (Black Scorpion Miniatures)

1/285 armor completed:  10
5 T72 (GHQ)
5 BMP2 (GHQ)

In progress, March/April, 2012:
1/285 armor in progress: 10
5 M1A1 Abrams (GHQ)
5 M2 Bradley (GHQ)

15mm Infantry in progress:18
18 ACW (Old Glory and Blue Moon Manufacturing)

Ive been dinking around with the ACW figures the last two weeks.  Im nearly finished with them - I need to get my ass in gear and finish them off.  They have been sitting on my table too long.  The main reason I wanted to paint up the Old Glory and Blue Moon was to get a decent sense of their figures as compared to Peter Pig.  I know lots and lots of people LOVE OG and the Blue Moon stuff, and totally hate the Piggy, but without being totally completed yet, I have to say that the Pig is definitely my 15mm figure of choice.

Im also working on (well, primed and have half a base coat down) some 1/285 US stuff for Desert Storm.  I really love the tiny tanks!

2012 Completed Totals:

25-28mm infantry completed: 23
15mm infantry completed: 15
15mm cavalry completed: 10
20mm infantry completed: 8
1/285 Infantry completed:  8
1/285 Armor completed:  10

Purchases in March, 2012:

Another $0 month!  April will be a different story - I have already pre-ordered quite a bit!!!

Total Purchases, 2012

$77