I Finished the Rat Ogres

I am quite proud of the rust effects on this blade. I got the idea and the method from an article in White Dwarf magazine.

Fantasy Football Woes and Some Work on the Rat Ogres

I reprimed the Rat Ogres today and then got started on their fur. The green stuff work I did is a lot less visible now that I have some paint on them. I'm pretty happy that it turned out well. I've also done the fur and blocked out the robes of the packmasters.

In Fantasy Football I ended up going 1-3 again, dropping me to 20-12 for the season. I have teams at 7-1 (1st of 14 teams), 5-3 (3rd of 10 teams), 5-3 (4th of 16 teams), and 3-5 (9th of 10 teams). Here's hoping that next week will be a lot better. The Fantasy Basketball season starts tomorrow. Hopefully my teams will live up to the hype.

Fantasy Football is Still Terrible

I am having a bad couple of weeks in Fantasy Football. As it stands now, I have one confirmed loss (the score is something like 105-35). In my other games, I need Tom Brady to outscore Troy Brown by at least 5 points, Ryan Longwell to outscore Doug Gabriel by at least 5 points, and Ryan Longwell to outscore Corey Dillon by at least two points. Looking at the averages for each player I have a chance to win all three games, but hopefully I can at least pull off one or two of them. Of course, I wouldn't be having these problems if I'd played Rex Grossman (23 points) on my two teams that have him on the roster. But no, I had to play Philip Rivers (10 points) on both teams. Oh well, I guess it could be worse. Even if I go 0-4 I won't be out of the playoff race in any league. It would be nice to go back to my days of 5-1 teams across the board, though.

Rat Ogres and Green Stuff

I decided to work on my Rat Ogres today and I started painting their fur, but I decided I couldn't live with the huge gaps between parts. I decided to pull out the green stuff and try out my sculpting skills. They look a little better than they did before I filled the gaps, but they aren't all that great. Hopefully the paint improves things a bit and hides the transition between green stuff and plastic.

All Done

I finished the Battle Standard Bearer today. He looks pretty good.

Progress and a Rant About the World of Warcraft TCG

I made a little progress on my Battle Standard Bearer today. I've got a lot of stuff blocked out and I should be able to add highlights and shading pretty quickly. I'm pretty pleased with the way he's turning out.

I ran into some trouble today when the severed hand broke off, but it glued back on with no problem. I think it broke because the standard bearer was one of the first plastic models I put together, and all of those were put together with superglue. I think it was even the cheap superglue. Most of my breakages so far have come on those first models I put together. Whenever I have a breakage, I put it back together with plastic modeling cement, so I should have fewer problems as time goes by.

My wife got her starter deck for the World of Warcraft TCG today. The decks are random, and she pulled a Night Elf Resto Druid with Herbalism and Alchemy, which is the exact character she plays in the online game. I think she is pretty excited about that. I pulled some sort of Priest deck, and I think I'll just end up buying a preopened Hunter deck online.

The Limited Edition Raid deck is supposedly sold out already. You can find a few on eBay, but I imagine we won't be able to afford one. All of the stuff Upper Deck is doing to lure players of the online game into the card game seems to me to be geared too much toward the hardcore TCG player. The Raid deck was apparently printed in too few numbers for any casual gamer to get one at MSRP. The loot cards which seemed so cool at first are packed so rarely that no casual player is going to have much chance to pull one. And the points cards aren't worth enough to ever earn anything good. The Ogre costume trinket costs something like 50,000 points. With each pack being worth 100 points, you'd have to buy 500 packs of cards just to get a stupid costume trinket. The local shop sells packs for about $4, so you're looking at spending $2000 just so one of your online characters can dress up as an Ogre sometimes. And even the unique firework trinket is 25,000 points. No one ever looks at fireworks that people set off in-game, so why would you spend $1000 to have one of your characters do it? The whole thing seems like a rip-off and I don't even know if I want to support the thing at all. I think they could have done a lot better by the fans of the game and I hope the whole thing crashes and burns. If it does, maybe the cards will become cheap enough to actually do something with.

Clanrats and Dogs

I decided to work on a relatively easy miniature next, so I'm slapping paint on my army's Battle Standard Bearer. He's basically a darker-furred Clanrat, so the painting is going fast. I'd probably be almost done by now, but I keep taking breaks. I think he'll turn out looking pretty nice. I've got a couple of Rat Ogres sitting on my desk to paint up next, but I want to look at some pictures of other people's work to get some ideas before I start in on mine.

And this is a picture of our least intelligent family member. Her name is Annie, but her nickname is Big Dumb Annie. She's clumsy and extremely affectionate.

And here is our sneakiest family member, Buddy. He has a foot fetish. He loves to lick toes and has made off with just about every sock we own. It's impossible to get a good picture of him because he won't stop moving. I think that Basset Hounds are not as low-energy as they are reputed to be. Buddy hasn't stopped running around since we bought him. I saw a three-year old Basset Hound at the pet store today and she was running around like a lunatic. I have no hope for my dogs someday being stinky living rugs rather than the insane licking machines they are.

I finally finished up the Night Runners tonight. It's amazing how many little details you can find that you have to go back and paint when you're "just finishing up a couple of things at the end." But they're done now, they look pretty good to me, and I can move on to other things. I'm not sure what I want to paint next. I thought about doing the Warp-Lightning cannon, but it's a big model and if I wanted to work on it I'd have to get out the primer and put primer on it, figure out in what order I have to paint and assemble it, get the crew all aligned so they match up to it, and it just sounds like a whole ordeal.

I'd rather just finish up the stuff I've already got in primer and work on the new stuff later. But right now I need to go to bed so I can get things done tomorrow, like maybe getting a haircut and shaving my beard in preparation for Guard duty or doing the dishes or painting miniatures or doing laundry. Sounds exciting, huh? Here are a few pictures of the finished Night Runners:

I worked on my Night Runners a little this evening. Last night I ended up painting the blue camo on and today I did the green camo, as well as inking the fur and painting their noses. I am a lot happier with the blue camo than the green, but they are both serviceable and I am not going back to do it over. All I have left now is some touch-up on weapons, some feet (there are a few with sandals that I haven't decided how to paint), most of the wristbands, and some of the various little doodads that are sculpted all over them. Hopefully I can get this unit finished up soon. Maybe after that I'll paint the Warp-Lightning Cannon, as that seems like it will be a lot of work and I'd like to get it done with.

In Fantasy Football, Tiki Barber only scored four points for me and I wound up going 1-3 on the week like I figured I would. I am still ranked pretty well in my leagues, with teams in 1st of 14 (6-1), 2nd of 10 (5-2), 3rd of 16 (5-2), and a stinker in 8th of 10 (3-4).

Night Runners

I haven't done any painting on my Night Runners today, but I did sit and stare at them for a while while drinking a Coke. As I looked at my terrible attempt at highlighting, the thought came to me that the light blue on dark blue looked a lot like the extremely non-tactical camo you might find on a pair of pants worn by a kid from a trailer park who just may be the next Slim Shady, but not the real Slim Shady. Anyway, I think the Night Runners might look good in some sort of urban hip-hop camo. I'm going to experiment with it and see what I come up with. It might be sort of funny to have some glaringly blue and green skirmishers "sneaking" up the flanks of the battlefield.

I also got my copies of Arc of Fire and the Skirmish Campaigns book in the mail today, three days after the order was made. I ordered them from Brigade Games ( http://www.brigadegames.com/ ) and will probably be ordering future books from them as well based on the quality service. From the looks of the Skirmish Campaigns book I won't need to buy a whole lot more stuff to play all of the scenarios once I have the forces for the first scenario. I'll need a few more vehicles and some guns, but on the whole it looks like I'll be able to do very well for myself.

Truck Colors

I've been thinking about possible color schemes for the Ford, if it turns out to be a project I can do. I've found a couple of nice pictures on the internet. I like the shiny red look, but there are a lot of red cars out there. The dark green and black is awesome. There may be potential there. The truck is currently dark blue and that may be nice to stick with, but the more I look at the green and black, the more I like it. It's still several years down the road, but it's fun to think about how it would look while I drive around in it.

Also, based entirely off of television commercials I've seen, Ford > Chevy because Toby Keith > John Mellencamp. I think it's funny that the Chevy commercial plays up how patriotic owning a Chevy truck is when the guy singing the song thrashes on America and the government during his concerts. One of the funnier news stories I read this year involved Vice President Cheney walking out of a John Mellencamp concert after the singer went off on the current administration. Then Cheney got the last laugh in, saying something like, "He wasn't playing very well tonight anyway." PWNED!!!

I did a little work on the Night Runners, but it's going very slowly. I think I may end up having to paint them on an individual basis, because I can't seem to get anything going on a mass scale. I don't know why, but they're just killing me.

Fantasy Football is a Cruel Mistress

With almost all of my key players on bye this week, I had to patch together some interesting-looking rosters. As a result I have one confirmed win, two confirmed losses, and a game that depends entirely on Tiki Barber scoring 12 points tomorrow night. I doubt if he'll come up with those numbers, so for the moment I'm counting it as a loss. Going 1-3 for the week will drop me to 19-9 for the season (6-1, 5-2, 5-2, 3-4). Hopefully next week I can pull it back together with my main scorers (especially Torry Holt) coming back from the bye week.

'51 Ford

I joined a couple of Ford Truck forums to do some research on what is involved in a truck project. Before I talk to my dad about it I want to have a plan in mind and I also want to make sure for myself that this is something I would want to see through to the end. It would be a shame to take a nice old truck apart and lose interest or burn out halfway through. I think that if I have a plan and a general idea about time frame and costs I will be more likely to follow through with it. At the very least, I enjoy daydreaming about it while I drive around on my forklift at work. I also am going to order a book about restoring old Fords. I forget what the book is called and I don't have my Vintage Truck mgazine on hand, but it's something like "The Bible of Restoring Ford Trucks" or something like that.

Comparison Photos

Here are the comparison pictures as promised in my previous post. The first is a group shot of all the figures together, and then I have a couple photos of the tanks and infantry separately.

More WWII Skirmish

I've been looking at miniatures online trying to decide on a scale for my WWII games. My original plan was to do Micro Armor skirmish, but recently I've been looking at 15mm.

I took the army rosters from one of the Skirmish Campaigns scenarios and priced out the forces for it in 6mm and 15mm. I was surprised at how much the forces came out to be. I guess I've always assumed that skirmish-level historicals would be cheaper than Warhammer (the Dwarf army I just planned out would cost $384.00 retail, so I'll probably end up paying around $330.00 with the local discounts), and they are, but not by as much as I figured. The 15mm miniature list came out to $267.50, which exactly covered the German and Soviet lists. Due to the fact that most of the 6mm miniatures only come in packs of five, I would have to order more than I would really need, but the list came out to $148.15.

15mm would be nice because you can actually see the figures on the table and you can paint more details on the figures. It's also a more popular scale and the vehicles could at least be used for a mainstream game like Flames of War. I could even base the infantry individually on washers for skirmish games and make larger magnetized bases to stick them on for Flames of War.

6mm would be advantageous as far as price and space issues. Terrain would be easier to make as it would only have to be half the size. Painting 6mm also seems to be a lot quicker as there isn't as much detail to paint, although I've seen some GHQ Micro Armour painted in amazing detail on the forums. The scenario I priced armies for was meant to be played on a 4' x 6' table, but I could play the Micro Armor game on a 2' x 3' table. Space is an important issue when you live in a trailer, especially when you share it with a wife and two large dogs.

I'll probably go back and forth a little over the next little while, but I'm leaning heavily toward the 6mm because of the space and budget issues. I also have a bit of nostalgia for Micro Armor. When I was in third grade I checked a book on miniature wargames out from the school library. In the back of the catalog was the address for GHQ miniatures. I wrote to the company and requested a catalog. After I got it I spent days going through it, looking at the pictures and highlighting all of the miniatures I was going to buy when I got some money. I would even sneak and stay up at night with a flashlight to listen to the radio and look at the miniatures catalog. Every couple of years I would write in and get another catalog. I never actually ordered anything, but those little catalogs kept me interested in miniatures through a lot of years until I found other outlets like The Miniatures Page and http://zeitcom.com/majgen/.

Once my camera battery charges up, I'll post a 15mm/6mm comparison photo of some Shermans and some infantry.

WWII Skirmish

I've finally decided to jump into World War II miniatures. Today I ordered a set of rules (Arc of Fire) and the Skirmish Campaigns book 'Russia '41 - Drive on Minsk. Each Skirmish Campaigns book has ten or so scenarios based on a series of battles from World War II. This one covers Germany's initial entry into Russian territory. I figure I can acquire enough miniatures for each scenario as I go along and not be too overwhelmed by the scope of the war. The sample scenario I downloaded features a handful of tanks, some infantry, and a couple of self-propelled guns on the Russian side and similar numbers on the German side.

I'm not sure what I will do as far as opponents. Idaho seems to be a wasteland when it comes to nerdy hobbies. It's unfortunate that I don't live in the South or near one of the larger cities in Washington or Oregon, where it seems that historical wargamers are plentiful. I suppose I can play them solo until I find an opponent. I remember playing big solo games of Avalon Hill's Squad Leader which usually ended when I accidentally bumped the mapboards and sent all the counters flying. I've been shopping on eBay for a good copy of Squad Leader, but so far I haven't seen one in my price range. I somehow ended up with an extra box of Clanrats I don't really need, so I may sell it on eBay to help with the purchase of the game. I also want to get a copy of Victory in the Pacific, which I played solo a few times. My sister and I once played a full Victory in the Pacific game in the loft of our garden shed as well, probably my only wargaming experience with another person. I was quite young when I had those games and I didn't understand all of the rules, but I still had a lot of fun planning my moves and rolling the dice.

I haven't been very diligent about getting my Night Runners finished up. I am just not inspired by them. I think I was more excited about putting them together than I am about painting them, because they all have unique weapon and armor configurations. I just can't get excited about the painting process.

The Nutty Buddy

Go to http://thenuttybuddy.com right now and watch the video. It will be worth it.

I did some more work on my Night Runners today. I finally figured out what my block was. In the books and online, the Night Runners are painted in black armor with hard gray highlights. That color scheme didn't really go with my army, but I still wanted them to be dressed in dark colors. My problem was that the Midnight Blue was too dark and too purple. It looked ugly. So I switched to Regal Blue and they're starting to look all right. I've only blocked out parts of the armor so far. I still have to paint straps, wristbands, weapon parts, boots, and wash and highlight everything, but any progress is good progress. I'd like to have these units finished by the end of the week so I can paint another character or start on another unit. I may even tackle the Warp Lightning Cannon. I don't have a lot of big infantry units left, so I'm pretty happy about that.

I did some research for a Dwarf Army list today. I already had one written out, but I wasn't satisfied with it, as I had too many small units. So I printed off a few lists that are more balanced and will be working the kinks out of mine. At some point I will start acquiring the miniatures for that army, so hopefully as soon as I finish up these Skaven I can have some Dwarves ready to paint.

I also need to get my little Warlord armies painted up so I can build them up more. There are a lot of awesome miniatures in the Warlord line, and I'd like to get more of them. But I'd feel bad about buying more if they just keep getting pushed back behind Warhammer stuff.

I babysat my sister's baby for about an hour today. By babysat, I mean that I sat on the couch and took a nap while she slept on my lap. She woke up and farted a couple of times, but went right back to sleep and I figured that was that. After my sister and her husband came back, he and I went the the store to get some stuff for dinner. Apparently the baby farts were more than just farts. I am a bad babysitter because I didn't even realize she had pooped a lot. Like exploding out of her diaper pooping. If it doesn't stink, how are you supposed to know it's there?

Tonight I tried to paint the armor on my Night Runners, but I wasn't feeling inspired at all, so I did the dishes. I still wasn't feeling very inspired, so I painted their weapons instead. I have a unit of ten with hand weapons/throwing stars and a unit of nine with dual hand weapons. I have several problems with the armor. Part of it is that there are so many levels. They have shirts underneath, then breastplates and straps for the breastplates, and above all that they have all kinds of throwing stars, knives, and ornamental bits. I'll have to stare at them for a while tomorrow before I get it all sorted out. I may even have to paint them on an individual basis, which wastes time and paint, but may be the only way for me to get it right.

I am worried about at least one of my Fantasy Football teams this week. After yesterday's games, I was two points behind my opponent. To win, Rex Grossman and Thomas Jones on my team would have to outplay Edgerrin James on his team by three points. I felt pretty confident going into tonight that I had an easy win coming on, but that wasn't the case. Edgerrin James didn't really do anything, but Grossman turned the ball over like six times and Jones didn't do anything at all, so I'm probably going to lose. Thanks, guys. I guess next week I'll play Hasselbeck instead of Grossman. So I should go 3-1 for the week, bringing me to 18-6 (5-1, 5-1, 5-1, 3-3) for the season.

I decided to pass up on doing anything special on my Warlord's weapon in favor of getting him finished up. I think he turned out pretty nicely, and I'm especially proud of the severed head on his standard. In the pictures the clearcoat is still wet, so you can see it pooling in some areas. I also started on my two units of Night Runners, but didn't get too far with them.

In Fantasy Football this week Torry Holt is pretty much carrying all four of my teams to victory with this three touchdown catches. I'm pretty happy about that. And Denver is about to beat the Raiders, which doesn't affect my fantasy teams at all, but it makes me happy.

I am a little stuck on my Skaven Warlord's weapon. I've chosen to give him a Weeping Blade, for which the description reads, "This weapon weeps a black and corrosive venom which eats through armor and flesh." I would like to model the weapon with a droplet of this venom about to drop from the end of the blade, but I'm not sure exactly how to do it. I've considered using water effects, but I don't know how long they take to dry or if they would stay in the droplet form long enough to cure. I've thought about using the gel superglue, as it might not run as much as regular superglue. I still haven't done a lot of poking around on the internet, so I will have to run a couple more searches. I'm thinking a site on terrain-making or model railroading might have something.

I've also been thinking about a Dwarf army, but I'm disappointed by the lack of options that Games Workshop puts out for the Dwarf Lord. Inspired by a post on The Miniatures Page about some Reaper Dwarves that could fit in with the Games Workshop models, I looked through the Reaper section of Hobbytown today. I didn't really find anything I liked as far as Dwarves, but looking through the Reaper blisters is like Christmas for me. I always find a neat model I've never seen before. The trouble is that aside from the 20 models I bought for a couple of small Warlord armies, I can't justify buying any of the miniatures. I've already got so many miniatures to get for planned armies that I can't really pick up any random other stuff that doesn't fit into an army. I think that this Christmas I may ask for those around me to look through the miniatures for a few single models they think are cool and give me a variety of things to paint up.

I read an article in the new issue of Inquest on the WoW TCG, and the section on the loot cards (random cards that allow you to get upgrades in the online game) was a little disappointing. Apparently there will be three instant-win prizes, including a tabard, a hippogryph pet, and a turtle mount. The disappointing part is that the rarity for the redemption cards will probably range from 1 in every 50 packs (probably for the tabard) to 1 in every 500 packs (probably for the turtle mount). That makes it prohibitively expensive to try to get the online upgrades by buying packs of cards, and it also means that the loot cards will probably go for ridiculous amounts on eBay. In packs without the instant-win cards, there will be point cards that you can save up to buy real merchandise like pictures, playmats, and other collectibles. There will also be a selection of online items you can purchase with points, probably tabards, trinkets, costumes, and fireworks to start with. I was really hoping that the loot cards would be somewhat less rare and offer a larger selection of stuff, like maybe one or two cards per box offering several different items. I think that having more of that stuff out in the online game world would bring more attention to the TCG than potentially only having a couple of those items on each server. But, I guess Upper Deck knows what they're doing.

More Painting

I ended up mostly leaving the Clanrat Slaves alone after the last pictures I took. I did a few spot highlights and a lack wash on the weapons, then clearcoated them. I also did a clearcoat on the last unit of Clanrats I painted, as I forgot to do it before.

Last night I started on my army's leader. I've pretty much finished the cloth parts of his armor, started the flesh color on his standard, and blocked out the metal parts of his armor. The armor will have more colors in it, sort of like the Stormvermin, but I wanted to get it all blocked out in silver before I started adding details. Once I get him finished up, I'll have 111 miniatures finished, with 83 left to go.

I am very close to finishing the unit of Clanrat Slaves I've been working on this week. I just have to do some highlighting and a couple of small details. Today I did a couple of ink washes and painted noses and tongues, for those that have open mouths. So far they have turned out how I intended.

When I first started working on the unit, I considered painting them a lighter brown than my other Clanrats, or maybe even grey, but I couldn't really get a good color that I liked and I was using most of my light browns on the armor already. I didn't want to end up with armor the same color as fur. I decided it would be all right to paint them the same color as my other Clanrats because according to the fluff, Clanrat Slaves are basically Clanrats that have been captured in battles between Skaven armies. So, the Slaves would basically be just Clanrats from another tribe.

I wanted to paint them with duller armor and weapons to distinguish them as the lowest of the low. I picture Skaven as being very much like regular rodents. They like shiny stuff and status might be based on how much shiny stuff you have. The Warlord would get the shiniest stuff, the Stormvermin would get what he didn't want, the Clanrats would get the leftovers from the Stormvermin, and the Slaves would get whatever scraps they could find. I decided to use a lot of dull brown colors on the Slaves armor, and to tie them in to the color scheme for the army I threw in a couple of my duller green colors. I block painted everything in my five armor colors and when it came to shading I got really lazy. I used the same green ink wash for all of the green colors and the same brown ink wash for all of the brown armor and all of the fur.

I took a couple of pictures of them as they are now, which I will post. I stood them next to a unit of regular Clanrats for comparison.

Dice Addiction

I forgot to mention that I think I'm addicted to dice. I have a lot of dice, probably more than I'll ever use unless I fabricate reasons to use all of them, but at the game stores I visited this weekend I found myself lusting after many different hues, sizes, and types of dice.

I went to Utah this weekend with my wife to visit her grandmother, whose health is rapidly going downhill. It was a pretty good visit, considering the circumstances, although my brother-in-law's rabbit nearly killed me. We were supposed to stay at his house, but about two minutes after we arrived my allergies hit me hard and my throat started closing up. Apparently I can add rabbits to my long list of allergies. So we had to try finding another place to stay at three in the morning. All of the hotels were full and expensive as there was a BYU game that night. After about an hour of searching, we finally found a place that had an available room. When we got to the room, however, the lights were on, the TV was going, the bed had obviously been used in the last few hours, and towels were all over. So we had to go back to the desk to get another room. That room was unoccupied and we got a few hours of sleep before it was time to check out.

On our way out of Utah we stopped at a game store called Blakfyre Games in Orem. It looked like a pretty nice store, with lots of terrain and according to the calendar board there is gaming there almost every night. They also had an in-shop painting service that looked pretty nice, although I have no idea what the prices were like on that.

There is also a new gaming store in Boise called Empyre Games. I went in there today to check it out. The prices aren't too bad, and they carry a selection of Flames of War stuff, which is something Hobbytown doesn't have. They also have a Warhammer escalation league set up, but they play on Sundays, which means I can't sign up. Overall it's an okay-looking store, but I don't know if Boise can support three game stores. I may buy some Flames of War stuff there, though, and try that out. I've been wanting to do some historical miniatures, but I've got a few other projects in the way at the moment. I've heard people talk about Flames of War in a derogatory manner, calling it the Warhammer of Historical Games, but I think it's an okay concept and I'm sure the figures can be used with other rulesets without a lot of hassle. I'll probably at least get the rulebook and see what it's all about.

I've found myself hesitant to set up any Warhammer games with local people. I think some of it has to do with my general social anxiety. I also think I may be reluctant to run into the same situation I ran into with Heroclix. I spent a lot of time at Heroclix night being bored out of my mind because I was there for different reasons than some of the other guys. I always brought a team based on some comic team or theme, because I like the narrative that goes on in the game. I enjoy the whole spectacle of the game and being "in character" for the army or team I'm playing. I found that a lot of the guys I played against in Heroclix didn't care about the characters, they only cared about the powers and numbers on the dial working together in killer combos. I think that if that's all you care about, you might as well break the figures off their bases and call it "Number Clix." I suppose either style of play is fine, but when you mix the two, the Number-Cruncher will not find much of a challenge from the Theme Team Guy, and the Theme Team guy will not find much entertainment in the Number-Cruncher's lack of interaction in the storyline of the game. The short version of all this is that I don't want to show up with my Skaven army and play against a bunch of power-gamers. If that turns out to be the case, I suspect that I will probably spend a lot of time painting and modeling and not game very much at all.

Today I tried to speed-paint my way through a unit of Clanrat Slaves, but I burned out after they were about 60% painted. I figure I can finish up the rest of the unit over the next couple of days and still feel pretty good about myself.

My Fantasy Football teams went 4-0 this weekend, bringing me to 15-5 for the season (4-1, 4-1, 4-1, 3-2). Things are looking pretty good, although I still have a couple of teams with big holes in the RB and QB slots.

Apple Pie Is Good

My wife made an apple pie this week, and it was awesome. She certainly knows her way around an oven, and she used my mom's recipe, so I didn't even have to get used to something new. Just the same awesome pie from my past. When I turned 18 my dad told me that I would never again eat as well as I had for the first 18 years of my life. Which probably would've been true if I hadn't married this girl.

My Playstation 2 died today, which is unfortunate. It had been lagging quite badly while I played Madden 2007 this week, but today it kept freezing up during loading screens and I couldn't get it to stop. I'm actually kind of surprised that it lasted this long, as it's been through a couple semesters of college, a few moves, and a ton of dust. I've had it since before I met my wife, so I guess it was time for it to go. They probably only made them to last until the next-gen system came out anyway.

With no Madden to play today I pouted for a while and then I put together the rest of my Skaven army, except for the Jezzail team I don't have a base for and the Warp-Lightning Cannon, which I will have to paint before I assemble. But everything else is done. Before I play I will at least have to prime the remaining miniatures and make up three or four more movement trays. I guess I'll have to paint the Warp-Lightning Cannon as well, since it can't be assembled until it's painted. Here's a picture of the whole army:

I didn't do as poorly as I thought I would in Fantasy Football last week, going 3-1 overall to bring me to 11-5 on the season (3-1, 3-1, 3-1, and 2-2). Just as in Fantasy Baseball, my goal is to make the playoffs with all four teams. I have realized that although I never watch baseball and I love to watch football, I enjoy Fantasy Baseball a lot more than Fantasy Football. I guess I don't like the fact that in Fantasy Football you only get one shot each week to get points from a particular position. The rest of the week you just sit around and wait. With Fantasy Baseball, you will have 6 or 7 games every week, so if someone is having a bad week, you can switch them out on your roster and still get three or four good games out of that position. You also have to rotate your pitchers in and out as they start. I guess maybe I enjoy it more because it's more involved rather than just being a game of setting your roster and forgetting about it until Sunday.

I am still thinking about the '51 Ford that my dad has, but I think he's out of town and I don't really have enough of a plan put together to approach him with an offer. From the websites I've seen, it will be at least a two or three year project, possibly five or six. It would take less time if I were made of money and could hire people to do the labor, but that's wishful thinking. Besides, it's not really a project if you don't put in some elbow grease of your own.

I scored the Napoleon Dynamite 2-disc Special Edition for $10.99 the other day. I was going to buy the new Killers cd, but in the checkout line I saw the DVD on sale, so I took the cd back and took a copy of the movie from the shelf. When the cashier rung it up it scanned as $20, so I said, "They're advertised on that shelf for $11." She went over to the shelf, looked at it, ripped off the sale sign, and came back. I pretty much expected that she would charge me the full price, but she gave it to me for $10.99. She was some sort of lower management, so I guess she had the authority to give me the lower price. And who am I to argue with lower management?

Also, my blog's Hoff-o-Meter reading is sort of low at the moment, so I am going to give it a little boost here:

Fantasy Baseball

The Fantasy Baseball season is over for the year, and I did pretty well in my four leagues. I finished 1st (out of 14 teams), 2nd (of 12), 4th (of 12), and 6th (of 12). I am especially happy with the first-place team, as that league was made up of people from a message board I post on, so I was playing against people I know rather than a random group.

More Progress

I've done some work on my Skaven. I put together four of my Warplock Jezzails. It would've been five, but I lost one of my cavalry bases and so I'll have to wait until I get some more of those. I also got all of the parts together for a unit of Clanrat Slaves and a unit of Clanrats. I assembled the front line of my Clanrat unit. Maybe tomorrow I'll put together some more stuff.

My wife bought me a copy of Madden '07 for Playstation 2. I stayed up all night playing that, and my Denver Broncos are 7-1 so far. This week's Fantasy Football doesn't look too good for me, though. I think I'll lose a couple of my games this week. And I'll find out tomorrow where all of my Fantasy Baseball teams have finished for the season. And that's about it.