Sleepless In Sheffield - Again, Damn It! Of Pain, Britcon, Elephants & Model Farms

I've been awake since 2AM with truly excruciating pain in my left hand and armwhich even my various pressure gloves and a heady mix of ibuprofen, codeine and muscle rub isn't touching, so I'm in my studio listening to Smooth Jazz New York City, and the stead light rain which broke out at about 2:15AM.

 Britcon was a fun morning, yesterday. 

We met up with a few friends and chatted for a while, before having a look around the show itself, which is always a fun experience. I'm really warming to the new venue, as it is 3-4 minutes walk from our favourite parking place as well as our favourite Chinese buffet, so we can have almost as much fun as we did when it was in Manchester.

I was tempted by a few things, (you can always find dirt cheap 15mm armies at Britcon) but clove to my path and bought 6 of the 7 boxes of ripping Beast figures I needed for my fantasy project to add some Riders Of Rohan types and to beef up my Easterling style cavalry. I need a single box of the Goth Noble cavalry now and some elephants.

I was considering buying elephants from Gripping Beast and then adding my own crew which would have cost £53 including painting per effalump.  Which let's be honest, was a pretty fair price

 

However, I remembered HCH Figures, and so went over and had a look, and found that their splendid armoured elephants are £22 each PAINTED!

 

I'll replace the two crew with Easterlings but leave the mahouts in place as they look OK.

 

I save £23 per elephant this way, a deal too good to miss in my humble opinion. I'm going to take 2 each of the red versions in the pic below: 

 I'm giving serious consideration to doing less wargames related stuff in 2024 and taking up the fascinating hobby of farm modelling. It;s a thing, and there's even a specialist mag which looks more interesting than the wargames magazines on the shelf in W H Smith.

For me, it would be a scale model of Emmerdale Farm, circa 1977... Imagine the modelling opportunities and watching all thos ere-runs on You Tube, toi get the juices flowing. Perhaps there's a model farm covention circuit too, replete with the same stereotypes (only more polite and scholarly) we see at wargames shows.

 

As I type it's just before 4AM, so I'm going to pop downstairs, grab a cup of tea and my assorted medications and then place my order with HCH. 

I'm hoping to get a steroid jab in 11 hours, so I hope I'll get some sleep tonight as it generally helps and does so rather quickly.

 

Well, if you will excuse me, I'll sign off for now...

TTFN