Nuclear Winter Quarters

What a week that was... After a very busy working week, coupled with the lounge carpet shrinking after the carpet shampooer 'died in action' and of course, the memsahib being back and forth from the hospital for tests and suchlike, we decided that we'd go to (and here, I ask that Grognards brace themselves) a garden centre, on the search for autumnal decor for the conservatory, which I have decreed will be in autumnal hues all year, to soothe and calm the overworked brain and tired eyes. 

 It was also a chance to go out for a bit of lunch and feel 'normal' for a change, after over half a year of imprsioment by our noble and illustrious leaders. The quiche was excellent as was the coleslaw, however the salad was lacking somewhat. 

I did however buy a rather nice terrarium which caught my eye, and which, once safely home was decorated with a model scratchbuilt by the famed Andy Ritson in around 1984 and which is one of my cherished pieces.

I think it's rather nice and it draws the eye. My other idea was to add a few 80s kids on BMX bikes in HO scale as if they were approaching a forest, but I couldn't find any for sale anywhere. 

They will be out there, but I had more things to do than just surf. 

I also paid for my 300 piece Redoubt Miniatures Monstrose Royalist yesterday, so I hope to have them painted and back with me by the end of the year. In the meantime I am still waiting for the last half of my NMA army, which I hope to have based and finished by the time the Montrose stuff arrives. The NMA is well over double the size of the Montrose, so it'd not be a fair fight unless I only used a portion of it as an opponent. 

I just this morning booked a courier for my 300 Starguard miniatures from Riviresco ( http://www.tin-soldier.com ) and I am crossing my fingers that the 200 Traveller figures from RAFM are now in the mail to me. 

I have 34 days until I go into Winter Quarters, which as I think I mentioned lasts from November 1st until December 31st every year, and which, is a time to reflect on the gaming year, make plans for the comimg Campaign Season and pay for Christmas without resort to credit card debt. I have surprised myself with what I've managed to pile up in the last month, so that the'WQ'season will be busy this year, as I also have my Back Of Beyond force of British Indian Army types to work on. 

On Friday, I was listening to 'The Grognard Files' podcast where as well as a rather uninspiring discussion of the Aftermath RPG, there was a more interesting discussion of the 1980s film 'Threads' which to this day is in my opinion one of the most sobering bits of drama I've ever seen, being a realistic portrayal of the build up to nuclear war in the 80s culminating with my home city of Sheffield, being flattened, in the nuclear exchange. 

Oddly, at the time you'd have been hard pressed to see a difference in the before and after shots in certain parts of the city. Anyway, I digress... 

This got me thinking and reminiscing because, you see, I was an extra in Threads. 

How many kids can say that at 14 they survived being nuked? 

A group from my school, somehow got the chance to be extras in the filming of the post-bomb scenes, many of which were filmed at the now demolished Royal Infirmary, a truly wonderful Victorian hospital near the city centre. It was a freezing Sunday morning when we arrived and got the greeting and directions from the director, and being the scamps we were, with nothing better to do (Games Workshop wasn't open on Sundays in those days, so Alan and I had to fill our day somehow) we wandered off, and found the BBC makeup department. 

A tall tale, delivered in a believably earnest manner (we were roleplayers after all) found us sitting in make-up chairs surrounded by black and white images of victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, getting some serious make-up applied, emerging an hour or so later, so mutilated that when we went home in the dark, later that day, the passengers on our bus were almost retching, and my Mother who'd forgotten I was at the filming, cried out aloud when I walked through the door. 

On the downside, it was weeks before I fancied Mars bars or cornflakes, and I developed a fear of red gelatine based products, all of which, when artfully applied turn a fresh faced youth into a walking war crime. 

It was a great day out and very educational. 

There's a scene where the masses are all shuffling into the hospital through a stairwell, and someone above pukes onto them. Watch carefully and you will se a couple of the shuffling masses do a little sidestep so that someone else gets the puke. 

That was Alan and I, and the kid who got the fould mix of fruitjuice and tinned vegetable was 'Pottsy'. 

You see, inbetween scenes we wandered all over the place and found a bucket of fake puke. We also heard what it was for, so when Pottsy was pushing to get into the camera's eye later on, when the scene was being filmed, we obligingly allowed him his 15 seconds of fame and allowed him to 'respond to what comes from within' as is right and proper for a method actor. 

We also managed due our full make-up together with a few successful luck rolls to get into the BBC crew canteen rather than having a cold sandwich and a cup of third rate soup, and dined rather well, until we were finally rumbled by a BBC senior type who ousted us after we failed our 'Save Versus Adult' rolls. 

However, later on, we got our revenge after seeing him duck into a room, we quickly and I might add , artfully,  rigged the door to deliver a lukewarm, sticky beverage onto him, covering his head and his red 'Puffa' jacket. 

Fast forwards a few months to the morning of the Triples wargames show, and I am sitting there at about 7 AM on a bright and sunny morning with a new-found but short lived friend from the other end of the city, a well heeled lad by the name of Nick, on the wall of the disused station adjacent to the Royal Victoria Hotel, chatting about model kits and military things in general, when we see a bloody great mushroom cloud on the horizon. 

In unison we roll backwards over the wall and drop into the approved 'duck and cover' position, as any right minded kid would do in the early 80s, expecting to see a brief X-ray of each other and then become dust. Nothing happens... 

We stand up, dust ourselves down, and taking it in our stride, climb back up onto the wall. It's only a few minutes later when I realise that this must have been something related to Threads, and I excitedly tell Nick that it's OK, we are going to survive. 

It was strange how we could just accept stuff like that and then recover from it without our hearts missing a beat. 

Of course had it been something like being 1 minute late (instead of 2 hours early) for the show, it would have been altogether different and would probably have scarred us for life. 

It's also interesting watching the kids nowadays who have had 6 months of the current pandemic interrupt their lives, when we spent our entire lives until we were almost out of our teens being threatened with IRA bombs, nuclear war and experimental Left Wing dance troupes! 

I'm an old man now, amd although I do take things seriously (apart from Left Wing dance troupes),  I also take them in my stride as we did the threats we faced as kids. We just seemed to get on with living. 

Music, gaming and the opposite sex were wonderful distractions, and if all else failed we had Findus crispy pancakes and litre bottles of 'Quatro' to get out of our heads on whilst watching dodgy Italian fantasy films or the D&D cartoon series. 

On a serious note, I do think that's why the late 70s and 80s were the 'golden age' for roleplaying as so many dreamers and loners sought to escape the horror. 

Well, if you will excuse me, I have to drink my now cold coffee, and start planning my gaming year for 2021, which at this rate will be in a hermetically sealed bunker, somewhere in Sheffield as crazed packs of Millennials hunt down the over 50s intent on killing them for their toilet rolls and old school gaming stuff... 

TTFN