Tricornicitus

The current symptoms (I know they are over exposed but I can't be bothered to re-photograph them as I fancy some Cotes du Rhone Rose, some cornichons and French Saucisse and an episode of something mindless (Howard's Way, Bergerac my new Star Trek box?) 0n TV.

I'm suffering from a malady that very occasionally I succumb to. Tricornicitus. The first time this happened was about ten years ago when I started to paint a lot of the Accurate 1/72nd Plastic AWI figures. I stopped because at about this time I started painting metal figures and also because you couldn't build an army (or anything like).

Then again when Foundry started to release their AWI figures I bought some and nearly finished a few, but other things intervened and I sold most of them To Giles Allison to boost his wonderful armies (yes somewhere in all that Gilesian magnificence are a few soldiers bought by me!).

Latterly, I started on the Musketeer Miniatures GNW figures and, like everyone else got frustrated by the slow progress of the miniatures (although recently with the annoncement of the Russian Pikemen I started on my remaining three Russian musketeers and got all the base colours down this afternoon).

Now I am being hit by another bout of Triconicitus. I have started work (like nearly everyone else at Guildford Wargames Club) on some of the Black Hat Marlburians for an undisclosed "club project". I am painting a unit of 16 Languedoc infantry and have six under way. Mike, the owner of Black Hat, is the club's very own Evil Emperor, gobbling up other lines and manufactureres like Pac Man. When I left the club last week with my three packs of figures I thought they looked rather squat (and I am very fussy about anatomy). However, as I start to paint them they look better and better ( at least from 14" away and with me not wearing glasses) so I hope to get my first little base of six done soon. It won't be for a couple of weeks though as I am off on another trip on Tuesday. I could have done some tomorrow night but it is the first meeting of the office Martini Club at a nice West End hotel. I mustn't have too many Martinis as an 11 hour flight the next day with a hangover would not be a good idea.

Fairly new member Keith also got some of the Black Hat figures the same time as me but he is making better progress (probably as he is an aficianado of the "Dip" method and fielded some very nice "dipped" Warlord Romans last week). He has just set up a blog http://scallwargaming.blogspot.com/ and I notice that he is as bad as me with his multiple projects (he has only recently embarked on historical gaming after years of Warhammer).

Work continues on my 1670s period Languedoc figures from the Mark Copplestone range. I didn't do anything on these today as they are stressing me out. They are so nice thatI just can't do them justice. Hopefully a break will enable me to come back and finish them next month.

Finally, my latest Tricornicitus flare-up was this afternoon when looking through my various books for WSS uniform details. I kept coming back to look at Seven Years War uniforms. In particular, I keep looking at Mark Sims Crusader figures. I think it is the Grenadier mitres. I am seriously contemplating getting a set or two...

Oh dear, I really must lie down!