Wining and Winning

My wife, Kitty, and I love wine tasting. Our favorite destination is the Adirondack Winery in Lake George, New York. It’s not just a stop for us; it’s a tradition. We visit four times a year. We try once a season and hit the mark almost every year. 

Adirondack Winery has an impressive lineup of over 40 wine varieties. We’ve proudly or shamefully sampled and purchased every single one. It’s no surprise we’re members of their Case Club, which comes with a variety of perks for those who purchase at least 12 bottles a year. For us, that’s easy. During each visit, we usually leave with a case in hand, and we keep going by adding three more bottles to our collection every month.

We are rapidly running out of room for wine. In our living room, we have a wine rack with about a dozen bottles. In the dining room, the legs of our dinner table have slots for 12 more bottles. Since we are gifting a bunch of bottles, we have at least a case of bottles waiting to be wrapped. 

Maybe you noticed that I had an ad for wine.com on my blog. It didn't work. No one clicked it. Not even once so I took it down. The link provided in the post is informational only, I don't receive anything from ADK for promoting them. 

The bottles are shipped in excellent packaging, a type of form-fitted cardboard. They use FedEx so the wine can be directed to a secondary drop-off point like Walgreens. In NY you need to show ID for wine deliveries. 

This growing collection has led to my latest project: designing a wine cellar. Kitty has officially put me in charge. To that end, Kitty selected a special Christmas gift that will be used to make this happen. I can't wait to start showing that off next year. 

But you know what I really want? 

Toys. Models. Buildings. Spaceships. 

I missed Mecha Monday this week, but I did make two posts this week to make up for it. If you like to order wine or know of a winery, you might be able to pick up some of these bottle-form containers. 

If you cut them apart with a pair of scissors and slap some paint on them, they start to look like buildings. This one looks a bit like a hanger or bunker to me. They have that old adobe Star Wars look, like Mos Eisley. 

I realized I don't have any grass or sand, so I will need to pick some up to texture the bottom edge. 

Depending on your paint job, you can deck them out for many different scales and themes. The slab-like arches can be painted to look like garage doors or regular man-sized doors depending on need. I have to say the Commando looks massive and threatening next to this thing. 

Since my last post was about Star Wars, I hope to do a campaign using a lot of Star Fighters. My pick for these are either Bandai 1:144 scale models from my local comic shop or small metal models from Studio Bergstrom. I have purchased a few ships from Studio Bergstrom and I suspect I will amass a lot in the future because I like models as much as wine. 

The three or four dozen ships I already have are going to be the focus of a lot of Miniature Mondays. I will be mixing that up with Mecha Monday, because a good mech is like good wine. 

Let's get ready to paint some #mecha

 I do love a good Locust sculpt, but I have a few more figures queued up for painting. 

Usually, I do a light color as the base, but you can see I used black on the Mechs in the back rank. I've never tried that before. The Battlemaster and the Commando will be dark green, with red and white details, along with a bit of silver and gunmetal. 

The jars of dice are my next laser project. I'll be cutting some 3 mm thick lids for them. The next generation will have laser-etched glass, but I need to buy a rotating stand for that. 

A not so #miniaturemonday post - Figures with Flair - January 18th, 2017

I missed #miniaturemonday, but I do have some figures to show off. Please excuse the blur as I haven't had time to get out the nice camera.

First, two D&D figures.

This rogue is one of my favorites. He is based off of Jubal in the Thieves World series of books. He has a bit of grey hair and a multi-colored outfit. He holds a dark colored staff.

I wish I could remember the manufacturer of this figure. This figure is pretty old, and the base shows signs of age. I will likely rebase this figure and give him a new coat of gloss coat.

I especially liked doing the mismatched green and red. for his sleeves. It's a hint of flair for an otherwise normal rogue.

From about the same time period, I have a simple bard with lute. He was my character in several AD&D adventures.

When my friends and I played AD&D, we rotated turns as DM and had a shared world. It was rather interesting as your "main" would become an NPC. One of our rules was to have NPC acquire wealth and experience, but never any magical items.

As a result of this rule, we had many game breaking characters and magic items. The main issue was not power creep as you would expect, but a combination of unique magic items and the courtesy of returning favors. The end result was a bunch of characters with very non-standard gear in large amounts as six DM's doling out goodies was a little too much.

The last item is a cool "unseen" mecha from Battletech. As you can see, he has taken a lot of damage. Before painting this figure, I took a Dremel to the nose and wing. I then washed a propane torch over the entire figure to give it a bubbled and softened look, as if it had walked through fire.

The figure rippled a little too much under the torch, but I still liked the effect.

I would imagine that the pilot was lucky to be alive as the cockpit was very nearly holed. I like figures with character that hint at a little background and story.

#MechaMonday

I saw some posts for #MiniatureMonday and decided to share a few of my own. Obviously, I like mecha.