Nah, all good…! Reason there was no post last week was, it was the annual ‘boys come down from Auckland weekend’, otherwise known as the 15mm gaming ’Panzershreck’. This year it was Team Yankee, proposed by the mighty city of Dunedin… (If you know, YOU KNOW…😜) So I dragged out what I had and took a look… I was paired with the renowned ‘Meta Gamer’ Damien Reid, and together we knew we would be a competitive force, easily placing in the top three, and most likely given our skills, winning the event outright…
Reid and I getting smashed by a combo of Canuck’s and Frenchies from Ian and Phil. We lost, but a fun time was had by all!!
JOKES!! 😂 For those that know us, you know we’d be lucky not to get the spoon…! So, what did we take? A motley mix of Polish T55 and T72, and my Ukrainian list of 19 T64s, 3 BMP2, and 4 each of SA13 and ZSU23/4.
We had a mixed weekend, one 8-1 win, but mostly losses or draws. It was enough to put us just into the top ten… But the main point of PzS is meeting old mates and having some laughs, and in that regard, we were number 1 🥳 So good to see all my mates from around the motu, loves to you all 🙏 💟
Once the boys had left on Monday and Sarah and I had cleared up the bomb site that was our whare…😉 I cracked into the usual mahi. You’ll remember that I have been trying to mould the TOWs I needed and had not had much luck with the Blue Stuff, so I invested in some of this:
Made a mould from LEGO and stuffed 3 BF TOW into it. Then I applied some Vaseline to the mould to stop the halves sticking together and made the top of the mould. I used Grey Milliput to fill the moulds and the results are not too bad… They are not perfect, and if you look closely you can tell what they are, but I am happy with them as they are at least my own efforts 🤩
Pic below shows the OG BF TOW at the back, and my effort at the front:
The other thing I did was made some bases for the Trucks. The BF ones are rigid enough to be used free-standing, but the 3D ones are just a wee bit delicate. So, to bring everything together I have decided to base everything. This will not only add strength but also allow me to build a coherent theme for all the minis. Stage one was making the base mix, I used a mix of PVA, Rapid Fill, and two grades of model railway ballets. Mix that all up and slop it down on some medium BF bases and you are GtG!
Hopefully next week I can finish these, paint etc, then look at getting at least one PL of trucks mounted!
Data indicates that more of you are keen on the yarns than the minis, so here is this weeks ‘Letter from the Front’ 😉
The first half had kicked off, and we had entered Iraq. Mortar strikes and other arty fire were a daily, if not hourly occurrence and by now they were so frequent, we didn’t even bother getting into the sand trench. It wouldn’t have done any good anyway as it was not revetted and would most likely have just collapsed on us… 😂
So, things are going on, and I am doing some stuff when the RSM comes over to me. “Hey Bob, what’s happening?” He asks in a ‘there is more to follow’ type of way…“Hey Sir, just checking on my CAMs and what not, what’s up?” I replied.
“Well…..” LONG pause, like long enough for me to wonder if he’s finally slipped into that coma… “Umm… I need you to drive me up to (Insert name of town I can’t remember), and I need to go right now”
“OK” says I, “what’s going on over there…?”
“Ummm… I tell you when we get going…”
So with that, I packed away what I was doing, sorted the truck out, and picked him up at his tent.
We were about 5 MIKES into the trip when he told me what the hoo-hah was. He’d left his S10 at this town we were headed to, and he OBVIOUSLY needed it back ASAP. You know, with the constant threat of CHEM and BIO weapons, and with him being the RSM, it would have been a bad look if we got an actual CBRN attack, and he was the only joker running around without a face-welly on 😂
As you can imagine, I REALLY, REALLY struggled with not just laughing as loud as I could and calling him a Fcukwit…😜 BUT, he was still the RSM, so I had to play it somewhat cool…
En-route to the town-with-no-name, we passed through another dusty poo-bowl of a town. This had been cleared by Coalition forces a few days previously, so was relatively safe. As I was driving into the town, we came into a cross-roads. As I recall the defining feature was a large mural of Sad-Man Hussein that had been defaced and graffitied by the locals now we were here. As I slowed to admire the handiwork and obvious fresh wet marks that were splashed all over it… I saw two kids, one maybe 8-10, the other 12-15.
Now, Taff (RSM) and I both knew that we were not supposed to give out lollies to local kids. We were not meant to interact with the locals at all, unless we were shooting them or repairing them after we had shot them…
But these two kids looked so forlorn and sad, I looked at Taff, and slowed the truck to a halt. In the same mindset, we both reached into our daysacks and pulled out a bag of lollies each, can’t remember the brand or type. I then drove towards the kids, and threw out the two bags of lollies. Both kids picked up the bags and the joy on their faces was a sight to behold.
The smaller of the two then ripped into his bag with gusto, stuffing a handful of (snakes I think) into his wee mouth. As he started to enjoy the sugar-rush, the older kids demeanour change rapidly… I could almost see the gears in his head turn as the plan formulated in his brain.
With a flash, he stuffed his bag of lollies into a pocket, and in a simultaneous move that would have made an elite gymnast proud, punched the little kid square in the face…
Immediately the small guy dropped his bag of lollies, spilling some of them onto the ground as he held his nose which was now streaming with blood from the assault. He then ran away as the bigger kid swooped up the spilt bag of lollies, and took to his heels in the other direction. He was like the Iraqi version of Iron Mike Tyson mixed with Zola Budd…
Taff and I took one look at each other, and almost at the same time we said, “Well, we wont be doing that again.” We drove the rest of the way in silence as we tried to process the event we had just witnessed, and perhaps more tellingly, had just CAUSED…
We were just trying to do what we thought was the ‘right thing’, but clearly the BDE S2 knew more than we did when it came to handling locals… 😔
We eventually got to the town-with-no-name, and yup, you guessed it, the RSMs S10 was NOWHERE to be found…😝 He was looking high and looking low. He was looking harder than Gollum after the One Ring…! I told him not to panic, I had a plan…
We obviously couldn’t just rock up to the QM, who, being a former RSM himself, would have just laughed…! And he might not have had a spare Rezzy in his size anyway…
So, I told Taff I would source him a US respirator, and he could put that in a spare S10 haversack. Unless we got an actual CBRN attack, no one would know, and if we did get such an attack, the US one would still work 😉
SO, for the rest of the deployment, he rolled around with a US respirator, praying that he never had to use it… Fun times…
And no, before you ask, I don’t have any pics of this event…
Right, that’s all for this week, al always, thanks for reading this far, I appreciate all of your kind thoughts and comments. Till next time, Stay Frosty 🫡
Thanks for the hospitality and laughs, always a great time mate.
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