Jubilee's Old and New

As I'm sure many of you are aware, this weekend is the Queen's Diamond Jubilee. After 60 years as our Monarch I suppose I should say "God bless ya Mam" but I'm an Atheist and not much of a Royalist either. But I do like all the Pomp and Ceremony and if there's one thing we Brits do well (aside from moaning about the weather) its a bit of Pomp and Ceremony.

So in recognition of the celebration I thought I would post this embarrassing picture of me and my Sister, taken at the time of the Queens Silver Jubilee way back in 1977. This was our fancy dress outfit for a street party which by the looks of it was accompanied by typically British wet weather.

I'm not sure what plans we have for this extended holiday weekend but over the next few days it will be hard to visit anywhere and not encounter some sort of themed event or celebration. I doubt though if I will be wearing a costume this time around!

Dagnabbit that hurt!

Ouch!

I've been painting miniatures now for going on 30 years and in that time I must have accidentally stabbed myself with a scalpel more times than I care to remember. And you'd think by now I would have learnt my lesson. Oh no, not me. Just call me 'Pin-cushion 'adley' from now on!!

As you can see from the picture its not a serious wound... this time. If you look just below the blood gushing from my finger (I'm melodramatic, sue me) you can just about see the scar from a real accident I had a couple of decades ago. As I recall I was trimming a model down to size, the blade slipped and before I realised what I had done the knife was embedded in the bone of my finger. To say that it hurt a lot would be an understatement. Worse still the cut was so deep I must have severed some nerves which resulted in a permanent loss of feeling in the tip of my index finger. Needless to say the moral of the story is be careful when handling knives... a lesson I clearly haven't learnt myself! 

Anyway, on to other matters.

My posting schedule will probably drop off a bit next week as I have a very busy few days planned. I'm actually on holiday although we aren't planning on going away. I've got a couple of days earmarked for gaming though. The rejects are gathering this Saturday for a final run through of our Broadside Demo Game and then the following weekend is the show itself. Of course taking two days out of the half-term holidays to play games has left me in debt to Mrs BigLee (I have expended my supply of Brownie Points, and then some!) so I'll have to make it up to her and the kids. This means I'll probably have to endure several shopping trips and a few days on the beach. If I'm lucky I may get to a museum or two as well , but that might be pushing my luck!

The end result of all this frenetic activity will be less time either at my painting desk or at my computer blogging. I've scheduled a couple of posts for next week so BLMA won't go completely quiet. Hopefully the plus side will be that I end up with shed-loads of photo's to share with you the following week. 

Fort Amherst

Fort Amherst is Britain's largest Napoleonic fort and was built to protect Chatham Docks by attack from the land. Although described as Napoleonic, Fort Amherst actually traces its origins back to the Dutch Raid on Chatham in 1667. The Royal docks were plundered, thirteen ships destroyed and two (including the flagship Royal Charles) were taken by the Dutch Navy. Fort Amherst was part of the subsequent defences put in place to ensure nothing like this could happen again.

Guns line the Ramparts around the site

Large parts of the Fort are yet to be restored.

Its been a long time since I was last at this site and a lot has changed. Above ground the extensive Chatham Lines and outer defences of the fort have now been opened to public right of way. Its is possible to walk unobstructed across the whole of the site. Fort Amherst Heritage Trust now owns and manages over 20 acres and is restoring the fort one section at a time.

24 Pounder

The Fort was an important part of the regions defences during WWII. The tunnels were utilised by the Anti-Invasion Planning Unit and by Civil Defence, who used a section as their headquarters. The Civil Defence role was particularly important as it coordinated services for the whole of the North Kent area in the event of bombing. 

Tank Traps in the Memorial Garden

3.7 Inch Heavy Anti Aircraft Gun

Below ground there are extensive tunnels and walkways through the chalk hills linking the various sections of the site.

Tunnels below the fort snake through the chalk hill

Recreation of the ARP station that was sited inside the tunnels at Fort Amherst

The volunteers at Fort Amherst run tunnel tours twice a day at 11am and 2pm. The tours last about 90 minutes and are very interesting. One word of warning though, the tunnels are extensive and the tour route includes several sets of steep stairs, so if you have mobility issues its worth planning ahead and asking if special tours can be organised. Having said that the standard tour isn't too taxing and gives the visitor a unique view of the hidden site below ground. 

RIP Fish

Now I can haz all your d20

Sadly I must announce the passing of one of the members of my gaming group, the Dagenham Dungeon Delvers.

Fish was given Honorary Member status last December having been hanging around our games for years. His usual contribution was to sit behind us purring loudly and occasionally meowing until someone gave him a scratch behind the ear....much like his owner, The Evil GM.

He was a venerable cat of over 20 years old, which in human years would have made him well past retirement age. The old fellow only had one eye - after an accident in his youth - but had recently become completely blind and deaf...which only made his meows louder.


RIP old buddy. Your presence at future games will be missed.

Panzergrenadier Progress Report

I'm plugging away at my Panzergrenadier Company and have just started the process of sorting and cleaning up the final platoon. In the meantime I have given the kiss of life to my 'old' Panzergrenadier Platoon and brought them up to a standard that I'm happy with. They no longer look out of place next to my newly painted HQ Platoon.

Panzergrenadier Platoon as originally finished

I started by looking at the Halftracks and was reasonably happy that they matched up with my newest ones. The only change that needed to be implemented was an application of 'mud' to the tracks and lower portions of the chassis and bodywork. In the past I have used various products for the mud but this time I decided to try the coloured plaster that I use on the bases. This is actually wood filler so it is slightly grainy and if applied right can be 'clumpy' and dries rock hard, making it an excellent mud simulator for all my vehicles.

Looking at the infantry stands it was immediately clear that the bases needed to be improved. When I originally did these I just covered the whole base with static grass without any detail or 'mud' showing. So when I looked at them again the first thing I knew I needed to do was remove some of the existing static grass. This was actually easy to do with a small modelling spatula and a wet brush (to dissolve the PVA). I then repainted the dirt areas and the bevelled edge of the base to the same colour scheme as my existing stands.

The next job was boosting the highlights on the figures as they were a bit 'flat' in appearance. I decided not to make the highlights as sharp as on the HQ Platoon so I just used Grey Green (886) straight from the pot with no added white. This still gave good highlights without obscuring all the green of the Fieldgrey (830) base colour. With all the touching up completed I gave the models a thin spray of Testors Dullcoat and left overnight to dry fully.

With the painting completed I added some 'Late Summer' Tufts to make the bases a bit more interesting. This really brought the stands together and makes them look 'part of a set' when placed next to the recent HQ Platoon I painted. The last stage was adding the Base Labels and varnishing the bevelled edges with Winsor and Newton Matt varnish.This isn't quite as Matt as Testors but being brush applied it gives a thicker and therefore stronger layer of protection to the base edges.

The 'Restored' Platoon next to the newly painted HQ Platoon

All in all I'm quite happy with how this little restoration project turned out and can now turn my full attention to the final platoon in the company. I have a busy couple of weeks ahead so I'm not sure I'll make as rapid progress as before but I'm still hoping to have the whole project wrapped up by the end of June.

Southend Air Show 2012

On Saturday I took my family down to Southend for the annual Air Show. The Southend Air Show is a free event (if you ignore the parking fees) with a varied selection of aircraft on display. Like all of these events the actual line-up is largely weather dependent but this year - with glorious sunshine throughout - there were no cancellations and the show proceeded as planned.

The Blades Acrobatic Team

The Blades Acrobatic Team

P-40 Kittyhawk

Battle of Britain Memorial Flight

Spitfire PR Mk XIX PM631

Avro Lancaster

Trig Aerobatic Team  - Pitts S-1D biplanes

Black Cats Helicopter Display Team

Breitling Wingwalkers

Eurofighter Typhoon

Family Shot

This was a great show made even better by the excellent weather. As usual I shot hundreds of pictures but managed to trim this down to about a hundred which are shown here as a Slideshow.

Wargames Illustrated 296

Wargames Illustrated is this month focused on the Jacobite Rebellion of 1745-6. As always though there is plenty more inside its covers to tempt players of all periods to pick up a copy. Mine arrived as the first of my new subscription and now that I have had a chance to read it I have to say its a corker of an issue! (I know I say that most months but its true).

I don't think I have ever been tempted to wargame the Jacobite Rebellion of Bonnie Prince Charlie, nor have I any desire to paint eye wateringly detailed Tartan on kilt wearing highlanders. But despite this I really enjoyed reading the themed articles in this issue. Andrew Bamfords opening article gives an excellent overview of the conflict as well as being beautifully illustrated as you would expect from this magazine.

Two more follow up articles round off this theme. The first contains a series of historical and what-if scenarios for the invasion of England. The second article looks at the wargaming potential of the situation back in Scotland where the Jacobite's went of the offensive in an attempt to secure their homeland with the aid of an allied French Army under Lord Lewis Gordon.

Moving back in time to a set of rules that has proved very popular in recent times. Wooden Oaths looks at the Saga rules for Dark Age warfare and the latest supplements and new factions available to players of the game. I have to say this is a very tempting looking game, especially as entry to the period takes very few models meaning new players can get started relatively quickly. This is definitely a set of rules that I can see going from strength to strength over the next few years and I will be very surprised if The Rejects manage to avoid playing it at some point in the future.

There are two other articles that made this issue worth buying on their own. First off a look at adding foliage camouflage to tanks by James Brown. I've seen this product on sale (from various manufactures including Gale Force 9) but until now haven't been tempted to buy it. However I may give it a go soon if I can pick up a packet at the next show I attend. The other article I found very useful was the ongoing series on painting by Matt Parkes. As I have said about his earlier articles they are shaping up to be a very interesting and useful series and I have enjoyed every one so far.

One of the things I like about Wargames Illustrated is that they regularly feature photo reviews of the main wargames shows around the world. This month they feature an excellent series of pictures from the recent Cold Wars show in the US. I'd love to do one of the big shows in the States at some point in the future, but I'll probably have to win a large sum of money first (unless someone takes pity on me and pays for my flight..wink, wink).

I say this every month but This issue really is very good, quite varied, full of amazing eye-candy and well worth the cover price.

Captcha the Frustration

Dork Tower by John Kovalic 

One of my favorite webcomics - Dork Tower by the talented John Kovalic - has posted a classic strip in its site. Kovalic sees Passwords and Captcha's the same way I do... through a red mist!

Click the caption below the picture to see the whole strip.

Every website with a forum or online shop now needs you to register and set up a password. Every blog requires you to decipher a Captcha before submitting a comment...and its doing my head in! I understand that security online is as necessary as locking the front door of your house. It's a sensible precaution to keep the hackers, spammers and phishers out in the cold. But I also think that sometimes our security precautions can become just a little bit paranoid and over zealous.

I disabled the Captcha feature on BLMA about two years ago and since then I can count on one hand the number of genuine Spam comments that have bypassed the filters (and that includes the brief period of Trolling I suffered). I check my comments several times a day so none of the bogus comments that have been posted stayed visible for long!

I'm not advising everyone to turn off their security features en-masse, I understand that for some sites these are valuable and vital precautions. But it might be worth asking yourself if your Blog really needs such high level security. I have definitely seen an increase in the number of comments to my posts since I disabled Captchas, maybe because its now a lot easier and quicker to do so.

War Hero in my Family

I've been watching a new-ish TV series on Channel 5 called War Hero in my Family and its really rather good. The format is rather like the BBC series Who do you think you are? although as the title suggests it focuses on usually a single relative of a given celebrity and then only those that served in some capacity in the Second World War.

Personally I'm not all that bothered about the 'celebrity' aspect of the series - I'd be just as interested if the programme was about regular folks ancestors - but its the war stories the programme tells that I have found so engaging. Last Tuesdays episode for instance featured former cricket captain David Gower (who I like) and DJ Sara Cox (who I can't stand). Other celebrity's that have been featured have included Chris Tarrent, Helen Lederer, Paddy Ashdown, Ann Widdecombe, Quentin Willson and actress Lisa Faulkner.

I found the story of David Gower's uncles very moving. One was the captain of a Destroyer in the Arctic Convoys and was later awarded the DSO for his part in the D-Day invasion. The other uncle (younger brother of the destroyer Captain) was a Captain in the Royal Artillery and was killed on D-Day in the advance towards Caen. His story in particular was shocking in its abruptness but also because of the family pictures David still has showing a gentle looking young man who should have had his whole life before him.

I've been privileged to meet and talk with many Normandy Veterans and their stories are incredible and vivid even 68 years later after the great invasion. They were lucky that they have had a chance to tell their stories but many young men never had that opportunity. One of the most important things that the viewer learned from the David Gower episode was that we should talk to our elderly relatives before its too late. The WWII generation is fading away fast and at some point in the next ten or twenty years we will suddenly find that they are all gone.

This first series is almost over but can still be viewed on the Demand5 website.

Broadside : A Simultaneous Discharge of Guns!

Posties Rejects will be at the Kent wargames show Broadside, on the 10th June. We are running our first Demo game at this show; the The Battle of Amiens 1918 (largely organised by Postie, Fran and Ray... I take no credit). Obviously we want the event to be a success but unfortunately it seems there has been a problem with some of the Magazine Advertising for the show (see Curt's Clint's Blog Anything but a One for details) so we are doing our best to promote the show ourselves.

I hasten to add we have no allusions about the meagre impact our respective Blogs might have on visitor numbers compared to the benefit of advertising in a national magazine, but we have to try and help. Here's a slideshow of my pictures from last years event and I think you'll agree that considering it was The Milton Hundred Wargames Club's first show they did pretty damn good!

So please come along and support this excellent show and while you are there come and say hello to the Rejects. We will be sporting our personalised and very sexy 'Rejects polo shirts' (as seen at Salute last month and modelled below) so hopefully that will help you tell Fran and Ray apart!

Fran and Ray modelling the Rejects polo shirt....ahhh, they look like Brothers!  (Picture: Angry Lurker)