Christmas Book

My parents gave me a gift card for Christmas, which I converted into Kevin Dallimore's Painting and Modelling Guide: Master Class from Foundry. I haven't had a chance to read it in entirety yet. I just flipped through it for a little while and looked at the pretty pictures. Some of the sections I recognized parts of from his website tutorials, but there seems to be enough pictures and explanations to justify the cost. The painting style is somewhat controversial because of the sharp edges between colors, leading some people to say it looks like a meat chart with all the flesh tones sectioned off. I like the look, and I think all of the contrast really helps the figures stand out on the table. I'm looking forward to having a more extended look through the book, especially the suggestions for Old West characters.

I also ordered a bottle of ink and a piston converter for my fountain pen, as the pre-made cartridges only come in a few colors and are more expensive in the long run than filling your own pen. I tried it with some water and the converter seems to work pretty well. I'll have to use my current cartridge up so I can see how the converter works inside the pen. It's basically a syringe with a twist mechanism that moves the piston up and down.

Although they are far out of playoff contention, it was nice to see the Denver Broncos actually win a game this week. That Tim Tebow feller is a pretty exciting player, I suppose. I picked him up in both of my Fantasy Football leagues for the final week of the season, and he helped me win both of my games. It's the last week of the Fantasy season. Both of my teams snuck into the playoffs with the eighth and final seed. One team lost the first two games and fell into the 7th-place game for this week, which I won and gained a spot in the standings through the playoffs. The other team won a game, then lost and fell into the 3rd-place game, which  I should win for a little virtual bronze trophy. That's not as neat as getting all the way to the Gold from 8th, but it's a pretty good run considering my usual luck at postseason Fantasy Football.

It has been fun to watch so many football and basketball games on the Armed Forces Network here. My schedule lines up pretty well with the games, so I get to see most of the big matchups on a big screen. Sometimes it's hard to work in a support role, especially when I have to navigate all of the paperwork and figure out where to go when I need something. My combat arms background didn't prepare me very well to be an office jockey. But the sports on TV is nice and I may be able to get some more college out of the way, so it's not all bad.