Salutations and Salute

Hello again!

Things have been pretty hectic for me recently, as you can probably tell due to the lack of posts here. After many years, my wife and I have decided to move house and you will all be familiar with how stressful, and time consuming, such an enterprise can be. A great deal of my Games Workshop collection has been sorted through and boxed up, though there is still much to organise. I have lost a few items but discovered a few gems I didn't realise I had!

My paint station is still set up but has been largely disused. We have been too busy working on the house move and I haven't have the quality time to work on any miniatures. Hopefully, we will be moving in June and I can get some painting in between now and then so I can play another McDeath scenario at the Oldhammer Weekend. But as it goes with these house moves, something could still go wrong and the whole transaction could go come crashing down. If this is the case, we shall still sell up (if we can) and will move into temporary accommodation. 

I went to Salute yesterday. Every year the event becomes an increasingly social one, and I had the pleasure of meeting several bloggers and Oldhammer illumni, most notably Dear Tony Blair's' David Wood and Mr. Grumpy Old Tin, who handed out a wonderful laser cut badge I have since misplaced. As always, it was fantastic to see so many different miniature games and figure manufacturers either displaying their wares or encouraging others to roll dice with their products, though to my eyes at least there seemed to be far fewer actual games being played this time around.

Of course there were plenty of friends to be found there too: Steve Casey was manning the Warmonger stand, Diane Ansell, Marcus, Dean the Streaker and Tony Yates (and Alex) were working on an enormous Foundry stand. I spent most of my limited budget there on ex-Citadel Vikings and as always, it was lovely to speak with them all.

I was also very impressed with Midlam Miniatures. Stuart (who travelled up with me) had a long chat with the two brothers who run the company about the old Metal Magic miniature lines - which Midlam still sell and I found some really, really useful pieces amongst their varied offerings. 

These pairs of wheels are really useful. How many of us buy siege weapons that often lack one or two of these, eh? Or try and put together a scratch built cart only to fail at the wheels? At two or three pound a pair these are great value, and the anvil you can see alongside was a mere £1.50!

This wishing well caught my eye there too, and is part of a wider range of scenic pieces that Midlam do. I would have bought more if not for the house move, and they are certainly on my wants list for future projects.

Otherworld Miniatures impressed me enormously with their huge range of D&D inspired sculpts. They really are beautifully designed models and their painted examples were gorgeous to behold. Sadly, their pricing put me off making any purchases this time as it was £4 for the smallest (halfling sized) models and compared with Midlam' s £2-3 price range for a single model and Foundry' s nearly unbeatable £10 for a pack of 8 or 9 figures. Maybe next year.

There was little true Oldhammer, at least from what I saw. I was expecting someone to do something retro with Space Marines considering their anniversary but I didn't spot a thing beyond an impressive cosplay chap complete with stuck on mohican hairdo and an enormous 40k game. Oldhammerers there were more of and I had the pleasure of meeting the famous Goblin Lee and having a good chat about his vast collection of painted slann, pygmies and of course, goblins! I bet visiting his house would be an incredible experience in old lead!!! Andy 'The Atom' Taylor was also though there (and I recognised him immediately after meeting him at the Foundry in March) and we had a pleasant conversation or ten about the quality of the facial sculpts on some of the Foundry viking range. Matthew Dunn continued his knack of finding unusual miniatures at very reasonable prices but I shall leave him to explain the contents of his swollen, swinging bag in his own time! Ha ha!

Warseer's harry was on the prowl too, and we had a good laugh talking about the show and Oldhammer in general. He had attended the show with Golfag Paul (another very well known Oldhammer hero) and the last we saw of his, he had lost Harry! Considering he was the driver yesterday, I hope he found Harry and managed to get him safely home again!

Having seen all there was to see, Stuart and I decided to head home. Apart from being caught up in an accident on the M11 on the way home it was an excellent day, spent alongside some excellent people and I look forwards very much to next year's event!

Orlygg