Curse You, Pickled Egg!

I can't sleep. Now and again I have a night when the brain just won't shut down. I lay in bed will all manner of useless, disjointed rubbish bouncing around my cranium and I just can't drift off to sleep. Tonight is one of those nights, so I decided to get up, have a glass of milk and then go back to bed and try again. I don't hold out much hope for success. Last time this happened I was awake till nearly 4am.

Oh, in case your wondering, I didn't eat a pickled egg before bed. It just sounded funny when I was trying to come up with a title for this post.

Night night.

The Pristine Tomb

I caught the middle of a rather cheesy B-Movie the other night while looking for something to watch. I've no idea what the film was called, and I didn't hang around long enough to grasp the plot (if there was any). One of the reasons I swept past this film so quickly was the scene I watched. An adventuring archaeologist - a rip off of a popular Harrison Ford character - was entering a tomb he said had been sealed over 3000 years before.

Before I proceed let me say that I enjoy films and can ignore some level of disconnect from reality. I'm happy to allow willing suspension of disbelief (or "Willy Suspension" as Baldric put it in Blackadder Goes Forth) if it means enjoying a good story. But this movie took things to a whole new level.

First off there was no Dust. A tomb unopened for 3000 years and not a speck of dust has fallen. The ancient artefact's looked like they had come straight from the props department (which of course they had). Second there was the ubiquitous trap sprung by three millennium old rope that was as elastic as it was the day it was bought from the hardware store. Finally the walls of this underground stone chamber wobbled... dear lord... I thought the age of wobbly walls ended with the William Hartnell era Doctor Who.

I guess the thing that irked me most was that it looked just how a tomb would look in some D&D games. No debris, no dust or sand blocking doorways, every item found is in pristine condition and every trap works perfectly. When I think back to my very early days of dungeon crawls such a scene would never have bothered me. It's not that I've lost my Suspension of Disbelief, but I guess I've learned to like a little realism in my fantasy.

Painted White

I just came across this stunning image of the UK from space taken yesterday by the Terra Satellite and posted on-line by NASA. I didn't go to work yesterday for various reasons, but the snow was a significant factor. I took the time to read my book, did a little painting and did some writing... and generally felt very guilty about taking the day off work (honest). But having seen this stunning picture of the UK blanketed in snow I feel less guilty. We are experiencing very unusual weather and the forecasters are already predicting this could be the coldest winter in the UK since records began - and were not even half way through yet.

I've gone to work today (more roads were salted/gritted so driving is a little safer) but I have a feeling this won't be the last 'snow day' I have this winter. The only problem with being in work is that looking at this picture of Britain undercoated white is making me think about all the painting projects I have yet to get started.

One Year Old and Counting

A couple of days ago this blog hit its first anniversary. This is a significant moment for any blog, to have survived its first year not only intact but thriving. In the first year it has received over 42,000 page loads (28,000+ Visitors) which is both amazing and humbling. Thank you everyone for your support. During the last year I've managed to write a staggering 435 posts and here are a selection of my favorites and some of the most popular pages.

• In January one of my first big articles was about Lead Rot, Myth or Reality. I was very happy with the way this article shaped up and it has proved a consistently popular page, receiving hits throughout the year.
• In February I posted pictures of my completed Hannibal Barca model. I still consider this my best work of the year and the model has pride of place in my display cabinet.
• In March I posted a series of article leading up to Salute 09 called The Seven Days of Salute. To date no series of articles had proved to be as popular and to have generated as many hits as these.
• In April I managed to visit the Bovington Tank Museum just a few days before falling seriously ill with an infection.
• After a four week recovery period I finally got back to work and back to painting. In so doing I decided to write about my new found love for Windsor & Newton Brushes. Another extremely popular post from May was Dungeon Floor Tiles. I also wrote about my good friend Dave Stokes and his art blog.
• June brought a local wargaming show, Rampage 09, and multi part photo report of the event.
• In July I posted an article about Writing a Campaign Journal which I was very happy with. I also attended one of my favorite wargames shows at the Eastborne Redoubt.
• I usually visit a Living History event during the summer but in August I went to one I had never done before, at Damyns Hall in Rainham. This was only its fourth year but was excellent and I will definitely be attending again this summer.
• Before the kids went back to school in September we visited the Royal Engineers Museum in Chatham. I also wrote a review of Das Reich by Max Hastings.
• October saw the return of the SELWG show after a two year hiatus due to maintenance work at its home in Crystal Palace. Also in October I posted a review of the excellent book Band of Brigands about the development of the Tank in WWI.
• I did my Last show of 2009 at Dragonmeet in November. My daughter also went to Ypres with the school and wrote a Guest Post for me which attracted some nice feedback.
• I wrote a well received post on recruiting new players at the beginning of December as was my article on The Golden Age of Gaming.

All in all its been a very successful and very busy first year for this blog and I'm hoping it will continue to grow and develop over the next 365 days.