Welcome to the Mainly 28s... semi-obligatory "blog" page.

3 December 2007

Well, the in-laws have gone, and now my sister's also been and gone. I've done a bit of work ont he Marder II again- after the planning stages, I've now proceeded to a bit of cutting- see the How I made the AGNM Marder II page.
It might not seem like too much, but it was very messy and also rather time-consuming ctuuing such huge chunks of resin out of the hull-top.

24 November 2007

OK, rather than lose bits, I split the Marder II build onto a seperate page (How I made the AGNM Marder II). This will also eventually form the basis for an article for a magazine, so I may occasionally gloss over steps in order to leave more "meat" for the article.

23 November 2007

The start of a new (and hopefully more regular) set of updates. I'll be charting my progress on Master vehicles for the various companies I do work for as I go.
I've been asked how I go about creating my masters. Well, in most cases the course is about the same- I get inspired by something, do loads of research and then start building! My current project, the Marder II for AGNM, started out after a chat with Vince. I suggested a tank-destroyer, and mentioned that I'd be willing to do a conversion based on some of his existing components- kind of like the original! After some discussion, we settled on the Marder II- a combination of the PzKpfw II and the 7,5cm PaK 40. (Remainder of text moved)

28 October 2007

OK, so the last couple of months have flown by. And I mean flown. I had my in-laws here for five weeks. It was a great time, and I really was sad to see them go again. The one downer is that I was informed that I was being made redundant a week before they arrived. So much for having stuck through several persons leaving (although, in hindsight, I should have smelled a rat), and even saying that I'd stick with the company no matter what. Hell, I even turned down a couple of good offers shortly before that little bombshell. Bummer.
Of course, I had to keep up a brave front for the in-laws, so no morose sulking. Now that they've gone, though, I can afford to be a little "down".
It appears that I suffer from the standard in the industry- I'm either "not senior enough" or I'm overqualified. Go figure.
Of course, the fact that I've just had the in-laws here and now have to concentrate on job-hunting (just after moving into a new house) has some wargames repercussions too- I've gotten behind on everything. The Hetzer that I'm doing for BAM is almost done, but the tracks are giving me some hassles.
So- anyone out there willing to take on a test manager?

21 August 2007

Getting closer to a normal service again! I've gotten about halfway through the new (and hopefully final!) Harry Potter book. While it's good, it's very dark by comparison to the other ones, and the characters do feel a little "worn out". I'll admit that I enjoyed reading the books so far, but I do feel that the series is reaching the end of its' useful reading life. As an aside to that- I've been re-reading some of my old Forgotten Realms novels again. Some have stood up to the test of time, but one or two are showing their age. Perhaps it's just my outlook on life that's changed! I still enjoyed the first two books in the Horselords trilogy, but book 3 really didn't do it for me. Curse of the Azure Bonds is still as good as I remember, though.
As far as the reviews section goes- I've already added the reviews for Song of Blades and Heroes and the Black Hat Miniatures samurai. Coming soon are some Road Kill figures as sold by Occult Games, as well as some Tiger Miniatures figures, and perhaps some from Pontoonier too. I also just need to finish writing up the reviews on some Brigade games figures, as well as adding back some of the BAM ranges that were left out in the re-organising of the site earlier this year.

16 August 2007

Getting there! The downstairs part of the house is now almost completely done, and I've begun unpacking my books and wargaming goodies. In the next day or two I'll be adding a few reviews again (the scanner's also been unpacked already, so I can start doing pics). A new section of the site is the "other reviews" page, where I'll be adding bits that don't immediately connect to wargaming, such as the books I read on my commute to and from work, or movies I've watched that don't all into wargaming-related genres. First up there is a book called Hal Spacejock by a UK ex-pat living in Australia. The highest praise I can give is that it reminds me of Douglas Adams.

27 July 2007

It seems that you can't please everyone. Today a brave soul calling himself "Rank Bajin" claiming to be resident in Texas posted (sic) "Mainly 28's" yep - wargaming for the unreconstructed racist - help celebrate 300 years of institutionalised colonialism! Tosser.[/quote] on the WAB Forum. While I may have grown up in South Africa, and have some pretty strong feelings about the country, I strongly resent being called a racist and a tosser. I will eventually be drawing the moderators' attention to the rather unwarranted personal attack. I have always kept my personal views out of my wargaming, although I have a personal site elsewhere, on which I make no secret of my views of the "new" South Africa.

26 July 2007

Well, it seems that my persistence has paid off. I've been informed that my replacement cooker will be delivered early next week- Tuesday, most probably. Talk about a load of fuss. I will say that the company we bought it from has been very good about it- their manager has actually gone to a fair bit of trouble by way of contacting people from his end in order to ensure a speedy delivery.
   I'm also starting to appreciate my new house more- even though I still have tons of work in it before I can really settle in. This weekend we're going to remove the carpets downstairs- followed by a weekend of sanding using industrial sanders! Then it's just a coat of varnish/oil/whatever SWMBO decides, and I can actually settle into my office.

24 July 2007

Mwahahahaha! I think I'm cracking. After all my hassles getting into the house and getting gas and electricity and such, the cooker's defective. I face a six-week wait for a replacement (or I can take another model off the site, but if it costs more I need to pay in the difference)! At least my internet is now working, and I have gas and electricity everywhere that I need to. All that remains now is to sand down the floorboards in my "office" and the rest of downstairs, varnish all of them, finish painting the walls, put down decking on the concrete slab out back, and then I can begin upstairs.
   Looking at the bright side- at least it's getting to a point where I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Or is that just the freight train coming from the other end?
   I can also see a beginning to my wargaming again. I now have a few items to review again, and since I finally have the "office" getting close to finished (OK, I've actually installed the PC, but none of the peripherals yet), I may be able to start adding more reviews again. Brigade Games, Gungnir's Card Models and a few others are waiting in the wings, along with a new section on general books I plan to add soon. The first one on that page will be Simon Haynes' Hal Spacejock, which is a cracking good read along the lines of Douglas Adams, although he doesn't really want to be compared to DA. Another great series I've just gotten into is David Feintuch's Seafort Saga, a sort of Napoleonic-era navy-in-AD2201-in-space series. Books 1-4 are brilliant, book 5 is not quite in the same vein yet, but I'm only part way into it. I plan to get 6 and 7, and 8 if it's ever printed (DF passed away last year, after sending the manuscript to his editor).

19 June 2007

Hmmmm. Still no sign of the Tannhäuser stuff- a little disappointing, as they're just the other side of the channel from me, and a parcel to the US took less time!
BT also have my blood boiling. I finally got my phone line today- and had to spend 25 minutes on hold in order for them to "activate" the line so I can get broadband... Shouldn't this activation have been done as part of the installation, without requiring me to contact them again? Anyhow, I now still have to wait for Sky to pop over and do their magic to make my house broadband-enabled. Apparently this will now take place on the 3rd of July, as this is the first available slot for an engineer to stop in and connect a cable and a modem.
   As I tend to be fairly easily distracted, I guess it's a good thing. The new office is almost done- the walls will be painted tonight, and then it's a question of removing the carpet and doing up the floorboards, which are in good nick but just require a bit of TLC and some sanding/varnishing.

On another tack... I've decided to start a new period. I've gotten a copy of "Warfare in the Age of Reason", and am now debating which of the many armies to start with, as well as which conflict within the rather broad sweep of this intricate period. My main concern is that I'd like a smallish army, and preferably an easy-to-paint one, at that. Oh, and also something that I could, at a squeeze, use for more than just against one solitary enemy force... Suggestions, anyone?

7 June 2007

It's official now. I HATE moving, and I HATE beaurocracy even more. The previous owners of the house cancelled everything, right? Yesterday I get a letter saying that my internet's been rescheduled to the 19th because the line is "rented out to another company". The long and the short of it, though, is that I won't have internet access from home until a week after BT gets their collective fingers out.
All it takes is a simple entering of a few details on a keyboard somewhere, not rocket science- no engineer neccessary as the previous owners ALSO had Sky and all the rest. Aaaaaaargh.
On a wargames-related note- I ordered the Tannhäuser figures and also some of Gungnir's paper terrain, so the collection is stll expanding. Once I have my equipment set up again, I'll be adding proper reviews to the main site again, but for now I'm a little buggered, as I have no internet to upload with, and no set-up PC/photography set to take decent pictures.

4 June 2007

OK, so the last couple of weeks have been seriously hectic. SWMBO^* was asked to be a bridesmaid at a wedding in the US, so of course we had to go- we packed a two-week trip into six days. All in all, I'm very glad to have been there, and the wedding was great. The countryside around Hartford in Connecticut (particularly the area around Avon) is stunning. The people were also incredibly nice, and we're definitely going back there.
Anyway- back to the "hectic" thing. It's a long story, and I will be waffling on about it for a bit. it's all about the way houses are sold (or not) here in the UK, and the way it is done.

We put our house on the market in February after a fair bit of elbow-grease (SWMBO watches all the home improvement shows like "Location, Location, Location", "House Doctor", "Grand Designs" and such) and were offered the full asking price by the first couple to view the property. We accepted, and, in due course, were visited by the assessor of the company providing our buyers' mortgage. This gentleman did the survey, and sent a report back after two weeks in which he downvalued our house to below the market average for the neighbourhood (he insisted it was worth £11 000 less than our price). Of course we were shocked- three estate agents and the buyers had all agreed that our asking price was fair, so what had this guy smoked or sniffed? We were then told that we could appeal against this, which we then did. The estate agent then buggered off on holiday without telling us, and we were left waiting for a re-assessment. After five weeks we were told that this would not happen, in spite of having been assured that it would (the estate agent didn't want to cause the assessor any grief). As the estate agent hadn't done her job by this time (she was representing us, after all), I kicked up a fuss, and her manager took over the case. He looked at the papers, and agreed that our price was fair. As it happens, he actually kows the owner of the assessing company, and had a chat with him. This guy also agreed that the price was fair, but due to the way things are handled, the original assessor had to counter-sign any re-valuation. This particular individual decided not to do so- I can only assume he has a grudge against the area (or us, as we've dared to challenge his "valuation"). After many, many calls and immense pressure from us, plus from the estate agent plus his own boss he reluctantly agreed to re-assess the property. He added £6 000 back onto the price, bringing us back to the average for the area- but in the meantime the average price in the area has gone waaaay over that. Time taken to here- 14 weeks, 10 of which were spent convincing one little pocket Hitler that he may just have been wrong. So, now the sale can continue (almost) on schedule- or can it?

Nope, because now all the various documents are wrong, so they need to be re-drafted and sent for signatures, etc. Well, as we were off to the US, we managed to get all our stuff signed and off to the solicitors before we depart (the wedding would have been after our move into the new house according to all accounts). So, we get a call on the last full day in the States telling us that contracts have been exchanged, and we can continue our move on the 1st of June, as was planned all along. Or so we thought. When we called the removals company to make sure that they arrive nice and early on the 1st, we're told that we're no longer on their list- it's "taken so ong that they re-booked us as someone else needed the vans". We spent a good portion of the day trying to arrange a new removals company- to no avail as all were fully booked... On our return to the UK we frantically dialed all the numbers we could find, and eventually got to a removals company via a van-rental company. These guys managed to fit us in, and moved us to the new house on schedule.

I now face a lengthy period without internet at home as BT needs to "notify the existing line provider that they're taking over" in spite of the fact that BT supplies the telephone line into the house, followed by another week before Sky can connect me as it "takes a week for their equipment to recognise that a line is active and in use". Talk about a load of bollocks. All it takes is someone entering some data from a terminal- it's not rocket science.

That all said, the new house is great. It already feels like home in spite of the fact that we've not unpacked yet (remember the home improvement shows?), and I now have a decent-sized room for myself where I can store all my wargame goodies, and I have ample deskspace for the IT section and a painting area too. Best of all- the conservatory is so big that I can put my whole 9' by 5' table up whenever I want to (except when SWMBO is using it) and still have ample room around the outside to move around it.

The only down-side is that updates to the site may be a touch slower than I'd like as I now have loads of 1:1 terrain modelling to do, but they will be trickling onto the site.

Did I mention that I still don't understand how one little pocket Hitler can cause so much trouble, especially when he is the only one who is on that side of the fence? Everyone, and I mean everyone (including our buyers) agreed that his valuation was far below the correct price.

^*= She  Who  Must  Be  Obeyed