This piece, by sculptor Edward Allington, is entitled 'One Unforgiving Moment', which perhaps indicates that the smaller vases result from the breakage of the larger, but for some reason exist as miniaturised replicas; fractals rather than fragments.
Elsewhere in his work Allington differentiates between factory based mass production and large scale craft workshops in which those involved have the opportunity to display pride in their work. Viewing it as a modeller and wargamer it may not be surprising that it made me think of an historical original being reproduced both in miniature and in great number.
Anyway, mention of fractals reminds me of my favourite mathematical joke:
Q: What does the B in Benoit B. Mandelbrot stand for?
A: Benoit B. Mandelbrot
"Windmill or no windmill, he said, life would go on as it had always gone on - that is, badly."
- George Orwell
James' new windmill put in an appearance for this week's game, but despite what Orwell wrote in 'Animal Farm' things definitely got better. Orwell's mill represented the industrialisation of the Soviet Union, whereas James' represents Up 1 sometimes and Down 1 on other occasions, which perhaps explains the difference. Or more likely it was the tweaks made to the skirmish rules regarding how far in front of the formed body they could be. In either event it was a very enjoyable first half (or possibly third) of the game. I've got much more morale and significantly outnumber the French in the centre, but am probably going to quite quickly lose the town of San Honore. The rules are getting close to being finished I think. I am a bit confused about how skirmishers get pushed back, but perhaps that's just me.
Elsewhere, heat has returned to the Casa Epictetus after nine days. This may come as a disappointment to some of the ladies of West and North Yorkshire, but frankly I need a rest. A bit of warmth is just the right environment for some painting so I was glad to receive my recent order from Newline Designs. If you recall I had originally bought two chariots and two packs of crew only to discover that each pack of crew contained sufficient for two chariots. Naturally I therefore bought two more chariots. To my surprise each of the new arrivals has a crew in the pack already, leaving me, as before, with two extra crews. This one could run and run.
I have been to see Catfish Keith, a man who I know I have often mentioned here before. Suffice it to say that he was as good as ever. Let's hear him playing some Blind Willie Johnson:
Both Catfish Keith and Dave Speight, the support act, referenced Barbecue Bob Hicks and his brother Laughing Charley Lincoln, two somewhat more obscure contemporaries of Johnson (and, before anyone asks, I have no idea why they have different surnames). Barbecue Bob wrote 'Motherless Child', covered by Eric Clapton amongst others and not to be confused with 'Motherless Children' written by Johnson and of course also covered by Clapton. Here's the first:
Dave Speight, an accomplished country blues performer himself, was the support for The Stumble last weekend as well (pretty much identical songs and patter in fact). Preston's finest blues band are excellent live and definitely worth seeing should you get the chance:
The Stumble, like many blues bands (the Rolling Stones, Canned Heat, Dr Feelgood, Double Trouble etc. etc. etc.) take their name from someone else's song, in this case a Freddie King instrumental. Here's Peter Green playing with John Mayall's Bluesbreakers:
The laser cutter isn't working properly and my boiler isn't working at all. The former is possibly because of floating in the the y-axis belt tensioners, or perhaps because the head acceleration is set too high for vector cutting. The latter may be because the pressure sensor has failed or alternatively because there is a leak. It increasingly seems as if Nietzsche was correct and there are no absolute truths.
So, instead let's talk pub rock again. I've only just heard that Larry Wallis died in September. Although he was at one point a member of Motorhead, I always think of him in the context of the Live Stiffs tour. He was Wreckless Eric's producer, Dr. Feelgood recorded at least one of his songs, and on the original studio version of the following number he was backed by the rhythm section of Eddie and the Hot Rods. Here's 'Police Car' from the album of the Stiffs tour:
And let's have another obscure but brilliant track from a live album of the time 'Live at the Hope and Anchor'. This is Phil Rambow with 'Underground Romance':
Fun fact: Rambow co-wrote 'There's a Guy Works Down the Chip Shop Swears He's Elvis' with Kirsty MacColl. Here's a different take on that song from the Tex Pistols featuring Rambow:
That track also features Martin Belmont on guitar. Belmont is, of course, a pub rock stalwart and was in the original Rumour. I am hoping to see Graham Parker (sadly without the Rumour) next week. I've twice had tickets to see Parker in recent years and failed for various reasons to get to the gigs. Let's keep our fingers crossed.
I am once again going to write about wargaming in order to avoid dwelling on the fact that my boiler has chosen mid-November as the appropriate time to break down.We finished the battle of Campo Veja last night, and it ended in a victory for not me. Things swung backwards and forwards - always the sign of a fun game - and there were several occasions when I was literally just on the verge of winning, and yet I didn't. Peter managed to save a number of match points and then served out for the win. If James writes it up then you'll get more detail; if not then you won't. We are getting to understand the tactics to employ with the rules as they stand and will presumably either break them at some point or decide that they'll do as they are.
I took my piece of laser cut wall to show the chaps and despite managing to snap a bit of it off en route the resultant conversations were most helpful. Having thought it over I am going to make a couple of changes to facilitate assembly. First I shall increase the depth of the side pieces and line up construction from the back edge rather than the front. Secondly I shall make the crenellations symmetrical along sections (at least on those of length 10 cm and multiples) to avoid the risk of unwanted chirality occurring if I don't pay proper attention when gluing the things together. I have also clarified the scope a bit in my mind following some discussion about the appropriate height of the wall sections. I think I have always intended, but not necessarily articulated, that these are town walls. What I need to do is also make walls for a citadel/castle, which would obviously be somewhat taller.
Just for completeness I will mention that there has been a fair amount of figure painting. As well as a somewhat random unit of Prussian Napoleonic infantry I have finished a number of early imperial Romans (24 eastern archers, 6 Spanish slingers) and two Celtic chariots. Next up are some auxiliary infantry. With the exception of the Roman light infantry these are more aimed at having bigger units to fill the squares when playing To the Strongest! than they are at fielding more units. The problem, which you have no doubt already thought of, is that is that bigger Roman units will inevitably require larger Celtic warbands. It's a treadmill.
"You know, I have one simple request! And that is to have sharks with frickin' laser beams attached to their heads." - Dr. Evil
When Ian Fleming wrote 'Goldfinger' he had the villain try to kill Bond with a circular saw, because that was the highest level of technology they had back then in the dark ages. In 1964 the makers of the film wanted to appear more modern and so replaced the saw with an industrial metal-cutting laser beam; it seemed as much of a fantasy at the time as the Aston Martin with the ejector seat and the machine guns behind the headlights. That is of course because it really was fantasy; such things did not actually exist. Even someone as imaginative as my eight year old self would not have dreamed that I would one day be able to twist a knob and turn the power of a laser beam up to 11, but lo, it has come to pass. Slightly disappointingly, it's done by entering a number on to a screen rather than yanking a lever, and to be precise I didn't so much increase the energy as slow down the speed at which the beam travelled over the surface. Still, and as you would expect, I did wear a dinner jacket and bow tie.
It's been about three weeks since I first mentioned the laser cutter, so why the delay? And what have I actually done with it? Well, at first there was obviously the impact of my operatic tour to North Wales, and since then I have been concentrating on the design phase. That is a euphemism for 'I have been struggling with the software'. As regular readers will appreciate, I am of a frugal nature and so have been using a free CAD programme which I found online, with all the concomitant problems. In addition the control software for the machine itself is both old and clunky which hasn't helped. However, and after a couple of false starts, I have now produced the following:
As a proof of concept I am very happy with it. I just need to finalise the dimensions, design all the complicated bits like corners and towers, and buy some better glue, following which the walls of Constantinople - and everywhere else because I am only going to make one set - will be ready for the games table.
"This November there seems nothing to say" - Anne Sexton
Our playtesting of Napoleonic rules - specifically Peninsular Napoleonic rules - continues. They are providing entertaining games that are fun to play, which is probably the most important thing. Whether they reflect what actually happened is impossible to tell, but things are turning out noticeably different from the way they do with the Seven Years War rules, which I am going to take as a good sign. In the current game the British have one command which is late to arrive. As French commander I have thrown everything forward (to be more precise I was fortunate enough to draw the morale cards which enabled me to start further forwards) with the hope of winning before the reinforcements turn up. I would offer odds of about 2 to 1 against me at the moment. Coming back to the rules, certain elements have proved sufficiently popular that they may well be retrofitted to previous rules developed in the legendary wargames room. Cue lots more playtesting.
I have got round to opening my recent order from Newline Designs to find that I have bought twice as many chariot crews as are needed for the number of chariots that I purchased. There is only one solution: I shall buy even more chariots.
Finally, I haven't been mentioning boardgames very much recently because I haven't been playing them very much. I have however managed a second game of Age of Steam, a mere eighteen months on from the first and can confirm my original opinion that it's a good 'un.
Hearing Be Bop Deluxe the other day set me thinking about pub rock. A post on the subject from a few weeks ago currently has the honour of having the fewest viewers of any post in all the years I've been doing this, so it's clearly a subject of no interest to anyone other than me. What better reason to write some more about it? Or indeed what better reason to ask a rhetorical question?
So, let's have something from the unrivalled masters of the genre, Dr Feelgood:
I have always regretted never having seen this classic line up: Wilko Johnson, Lee Brilleaux, John B. Sparks and The Big Figure. I was therefore somewhat surprised when, at a university reunion last year, someone claimed that not only had we seen them (at Huddersfield Poly apparently), but that I had written a review of the gig for the student newspaper. Funny thing, memory.
I have been to Llandudno, which turned out to be a very pleasant place, although it would have been even better if the temperature had been ten degrees higher. I had never been before and had no idea that it was a purpose built resort in the manner of Cancun or Pattaya, albeit on a more human scale than the former and less sleazy than the latter. The promenade is particularly impressive, kept free of tack and with all the low rise Victorian hotels painted in pastel colours. I saw a spectacular fireworks display from the promenade one evening. The reason it was held a few days earlier than in the rest of the country was that they set it up on the beach and the date is therefore determined by the times of the tide.
It was colder and gloomier than this when I was there
In an attempt to shoehorn in something vaguely wargaming related can I point out that the Great Orme, seen rising behind the town in the photo, is home to the flock of goats from the Royal Welch Fusiliers select their regimental mascot. More directly connected to military history is the magnificent Conwy castle:
The town of Conwy, which has virtually all its medieval walls intact, is very nice as well, with plenty of coffee shops to duck into when visitors lose feeling in their extremities. It also boasts Great Britain's smallest house:
As I was in full tourist mode I paid my quid and went in. I can confirm that it is indeed very small. I wanted to know whether the claim that it is GB's smallest house meant that there is a smaller one in Northern Ireland, but the otherwise charming Welsh lady in the picture affected to have no interest in one of the most contentious current constitutional issues and said that she didn't know.
I may in due course explain exactly what took me to North Wales, but for now let me relate one thing that happened last week which touches on this previous post about people dying in theatres. I was in the Venue Cymru and as curtain up approached I was eyeing the vacant seat next to me with a view to putting my coat over it if no one arrived to claim it. The lady sitting on the other side of it leaned over to me and said "It's OK, she's not coming. I've just been to her funeral."
Henry Liddell, father of Alice, had a holiday home on the West Shore at Llandudno and was possibly, depending on whom you believe, visited there by Charles Lutwidge Dodgson. In any event the town is littered with statues of characters from his books. In one of those coincidences that I like even if no one else does, on the day of my return I went to see June Tabor and the Oysterband at Leeds Town Hall and for their first encore they did a cover of Jefferson Airplane's 'White Rabbit'. Astonishingly Grace Slick was 80 last Wednesday, so here's the original as performed at Woodstock:
