Holidays ramping up, got some projects on my painting bench

Halloween down. Veteran's Day, Thanks Giving, (throw in a Brother in Law wedding), Yule, Christmas, and New Year to go.

On top of that this coming weekend is a busy one. OryCon. I'm not tabling nor paneling this year so that's nice. I'm thinking of going to the gaming room and maybe setting up a table for Saga and spreading the good news!

That seems like work though so I might just lay off and be a customer for once and enjoy what others have to show.

The Monday after Orycon we are bringing back The Telling Portland 2014 for one last performance at PSU in the Smith Student Union auditorium. I've been working on my lines for the past week or so. It's all still in there, I have this day off from work. Timely as I first went to boot camp Thanksgiving Week 1989 and I was honorably discharged November 1993.

Tuesday is Veteran's Day and I also have that off. My Wife, Gretchen, bought us tickets to go see GWAR as an anniversary gift. I've been a GWAR fan for ... 20 plus years now?...  I was quite bummed to hear that Dave Brockie - Oderus - died this year and was worried about the fate of the band as he was the lead singer, original member, founder... all that stuff. They changed up the line up some and have some new lead people up front now and even added a female front person, Vulvatron!

This will, after a decade hiatus, be my 15th GWAR show and I will finally be a triple ace. I must get a patch or something to commemorate this. 14 shows with Oderus, 1 without.

RIP dude. Thank you for 14 awesome shows, one fun one with DBX, and decades of music that I have enjoyed. Oh, and some good football blogging.

Wednesday is back to work, the following weekend I hope to get an RPG game in as Sundays were, again, took up with rehearsals. I promise, RPG group... no more! Back to a regular schedule. November 15th is another Historical Wargames Day at Guardian though. There will be Saga and maybe some Lion Rampant.

The weekend after that is my BiL's wedding. I am a groomsmen. We will have a bachelor party, rehearsal, and wedding. In that order Thursday - Saturday.

Then, Thanksgiving.

There's November.

December is not as eventful, what with just Winter Solstice (and my new tradition of Thor dropping off a foam weapon for my kid), probably some Holiday parties, Xmas, NYE, NYE tradition of NoHos Hawaiian buffet, and a week off at the end of the year. My in-laws are coming too and I really like them. I hope to spend some time with them.

I will have to fit in at least one RPG and some war gaming.

Speaking of.... Maybe December will be a good time to debut my Pagan Rus faction for Saga!!?? The first few of my levies are finished, I am making them all wintery with snow flock on the bases. Here's some pics of them last week before I finished them up this weekend. I'm doing them in batches of 4. (all PR levies are Gripping Beast Plastic Dark Age Warriors)

Batch 2 with a brighter "linen white" coat on the tunics.

Batch 2

Batch 1 and batch 2 comparison. Batch 1 was base-coated in brown, tunic painted a very light khaki (white with a drop of cork mixed in). The quickshade is Army Painter "strong tone". They came out pretty dark so that is why batch 2 is primed in white and straight linen white was used on the tunics.

Both batch 1 and batch 2 are dry and flocked, ready for a matte finish right now. Will get some pics up soon. Of the 12 figures I am only giving them 4 shields. They're just levies with javelins, they don't need many shields. 

No pics yet but I also finished some modern "biker" types. Basically 2 males and 2 females with black tops (hoody, vest, jacket, whatever) and blue jeans. Not my best work but usable. I tried my hand at making the bases look like post apocalyptic streets. I've got a growing collection of moderns, mostly post apocalypse. 

As soon as I finish my PR Levy I will start a point of PR Warriors, then PR HG and Warlord. Will be a good start. With that I can proxy in some of my other units and play them. I also can use the Pagan Rus as my Jomsvikings. These minis are all metal, Old Glory to be exact. Here's some streaight out of the pack.

Interestingly enough, one of the things noted about Old Glory is that they are true to 25mm as opposed to the popular 28mm many of us neo-grognards are used to (scale creep). You can see the difference when holding a 25mm Old Glory and a "25mm" Reaper (or whatever newer brand).

I noticed, after handling my Rus Spearmen and Rus Command figures that the OG Rus line was... well... more like 28mm. Here is a picture:

l-r: Gripping Beast Plastic, OG Norman Heavy Infantry, OG Rus Spearman

Ever so slight but I notice it when handling them. The bottom line though? It don't matter to me when I set them all out on the table.