Still alive after this very long silence and some things coming up

Yeah, I am still alive.  Work, health issues, and the loss of some friends in the last few years are still keeping me from having a worth while social life for gaming, let alone the motivation to be the hobby.  I am not going to lie, I don't know if I will have many more entries on this blog in the future, but I hope to try to get some games in this year or at least get some painting done.  

I will say that I do have at least one, possible more blog entries depending if I decide to break them up instead of having one long entry, that I will be showing up in the near future that will be actually be about painted miniatures. (!!!!)  I had some figures that I had Fernando Painting Service worked on back in 2019.  Due to COVID and my loss of wanting to do any miniature gaming for the last three years, I never open the box with the painted miniature.  Just recently, I finally opened the box and I got some pictures (bad quality because I don't have good lighting) of the figures.  I will explain what they are for and what I hope to use them for in these upcoming entries.  So, if there is anyone still out there reading this, hopefully, I will get this turned around again.

The news of my death have been mistaken

I am still alive and still hardly have a social life, which really prevents me from having anything much to say about hobbies and fun stuff.  I still buy way too much gaming junk only to have it sit and collect dust.  But, I have really started to drive forward with getting back into the hobby.   

How serious am I, well, a few Saturdays ago, I had a trial run of the Osprey’s Silver Bayonet with two friends, Glen and Craig.  Since all of the figures are unpainted and we were using proxies for the monsters, I didn’t take any pictures as evidence that it really did happen.  This is the first miniatures game that I played in since 2018, or possibly 2017 (?).  I like the mechanics of the system, so I will probably be doing some more in the future.  

But that is not all!  Saturday, I played in a game of Fistful of TOWS with Ravi, Pat, and Steve.  Ravi was running it as a trial run to see how the system works.  I guess it was okay, but I still haven’t heard of a good modern battalion size rules system out there yet as they either focus on the tech available during the ‘80s or only skirmish vs insurgents.  It is something seriously lacking in hobby.  Anyways, the scenario was a reinforced Russian Rifle battalion in BMPs, supported a half strength T-72 battalion, an engineer company, and a SP battalion, plus other support elements, including a recon company and drones vs a Ukrainian leg infantry battalion with Javelins and Stingers, plus a tank company.  I played the Russian left flank with a recon platoon, a BMP company, the engineer company, a SPAA battery, a SP-ATGM company, and the artillery battalion.  Steve pushed the rest.  I barely lost anything, but I was using caution and over watch.  In the end, it was pretty much a tie with us seizing one of the two objectives, but Steve’s force was wrecked and Pat’s Ukrainians were pretty much wiped out too.  We probably could have taken the second objective with what I still had, but we couldn’t expect to hold against a counter-attack if one would occur, so we stopped the advance.  Pictures below are from this game.

Opening turn with my Russians the closest to the river

My recon platoon engaging leg infantry on the other side of the river and routing them

Several turns in to the game.  I am preparing to cross the river.  The smoke in the woods towards the bottom of the picture was a ATGM firing and missing my recon platoon.

Hostile tank in the woods finally knocked out my recon platoon, but was chased off by my BMP's ATGMs.

Almost at the end of the game.  My engineer company (the five vehicles near the village - the white paper is an artillery barrage from my SP battalion) would get to the village, dismount in good order and seize the village.

Speaking of posting on this blog, I am really going to try to post once a month.  I am hoping to be mostly what I am working on, but I am trying just get use to posting things again and get into a habit of doing it. 

Still around, still not gaming much at all

Well, I am still alive.  There are personal issues in my life, mainly work.  I have a relative with a serious health issue, I am working a second shift, I have no clue how long my current project is supposed to last (I was originally told 1 to 4 weeks, and it is now going on 8 weeks), etc, etc.  

I am still buying gaming junk and hoping to at be involved in gaming regularly again.  Then last two weeks was probably the most I gamed in miniatures in almost a year.  I played in a couple of 1-to-1 games with a local gamer, Glenn.  The previous Saturday we played three quick games of 'Chainmail', and finished those in about 2 hours!  Last Saturday we played one game of 'In Her Majesty's Name' and finished it about an hour and a half.  I won three out of the four games, so I have not dried up completely!

I am trying to get some stuff sent off to a painting service, but for various reasons I am putting it off...not due to lack of money, just motivation (I think).  I got so much unpainted stuff, I just don't know what to do to get done first.  I am going to attempt to start painting again maybe next week.  I need to get up early enough to prep and prime the miniatures before I go to work for my second shift project because I can't see very well to prime the figures with spray paint outside in the dark when I get home after work!  I am going to try to do some simple uniforms at first because I have not painted in years, literary!  My plan is to paint up some figures for Neil Thomas', "One Hour Wargames" or for Osprey's, "Dragon Rampant", first because the number of figures needed should be low.  I am going to do some 10mm figures in simple uniforms just to try to relearn everything about painting again.  I figure while 10mm has fine details, there will be less details than 15mm to 28mm figures and in a mass, the mistakes will not be as obvious.  Well, that is the plan anyways.  

Also, I need to start planning my road trip for the year.  I was thinking of heading up to Minnesota & Wisconsin to chase Dillinger's gangs hideouts, etc.  But, I am also looking at heading Arizona & New Mexico to chase the Old West like Billy the Kid.  

Be seeing you,

Sapper

This not much to post

Well, the title says it all.  I am still around and not doing much of anything.  I am still reading for the most part, but not as much as before.  To date, I finished reading 32 books for the year and listen to another 26 audio-books.  Needless to say, the bulk of the books were non-fiction, 46 of them total.  

I joined GoodReads (https://www.goodreads.com/) a while back (mid or late 2016) to start keeping track of what books I have read, or listen to, over time.  I also use it to keep track of how many books I have read each year.  As I started keeping track of what books I read on this blog back in 2014, I was able to back date them as well.  The only bad thing is that for my 'pages read' count, I can't separate my actual reading vs. my audio books without dating when I listened to them.  It really does mean much, but I like to see some times how many pages I read over a period of time.  Example is that currently it is showing that I read 13,635 pages for the year, but I only read 7,324 pages and the rest were from my audio-books.

I was also able to go back and marked "read" for all of the books that I could remember reading over all of my years.  I am shocked that I have read 693 books over my life.  I know that there is at least one book that I read which is not included in that number as I can't remember the title, which is okay since it was horrible (I still remember that).  I am sure that there maybe a few others that I have forgotten over time too.  Also, I was shocked to see about 38% of the books I read over time were fiction.  That is a higher percentage than what I thought it would be.  But looking back, I did read a lot of fiction in my pre-teens and teen years, mostly for school.  I have also listen to a lot of fiction audio-books because of the voice acting as I love radio plays and these are close to that.   

If anyone else is on GoodReads and wants to look me up to see what I have been reading, I will be under "Joe Collins" with my dapper Gentoo penguin avatar.  Just let me know that you are asking for a "Friends" request in my comments section below so I know who is sending it. If I don't, I will not "Friend" you on GoodReads.  Sorry, I am a little bit protective.

Be seeing you

Sapper

Still Alive!

I am still around, but mostly I am hanging out on Facebook now.  I still not doing much in the area of gaming, so you are not missing anything anyways.  I have been in two or three games since I ran my RCW game, which were put on by my friend Steve, but I didn't take any pictures, so that is why I never posted anything about them.  Well, that and I am reading a lot (over 50 books this year already!)   I hate to say that I have not looked at anyone else blog for probably over two years.  I feel bad about that, but that is just because of my focus on reading my books and not gaming in general.

I spent two or three months of town on a job in Kansas City area and took two weeks of vacation which I just got back from.  Soon, I will be leaving to work in northwestern Georgia for another three months.  So, my social life is going back to the back burner again.  

On my vacation, I spent ten days on a road trip driving 3595 miles through seven states; Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, and Oklahoma.  Mostly I was visiting Civil War sites, but I also visited several sites related to Bonnie and Clyde.  I took 1970 pictures (yea, digital!).  Probably half of them are doubles that I got to delete as I normally take extras of something to get a good shot.  I will try to post some stuff up soon, but I will be leaving for Georgia soon.  

I am going to try to be a bit more active on this blog again soon.

Cheers,
Sapper

Castro and a new miniature project

Well, I hope everyone in the US had a good Thanksgiving.  I had to work on Friday and Sat. and since I am salary, I got no additional pay for working on days that I would normally have off.  8(

Anyway, I still have not yet started listening to my current audio book selection, The League. With Fidel Castro finally dying, I am very tempted to instead start listening to the audio book, One Minute to Midnight: Kennedy, Khrushchev, and Castro at the Brink of Nuclear War, by Michael Dobbs.  I was actually planning to listen to that book and read 15 Minutes: General Curtis LeMay and the Countdown to Nuclear Annihilation, by L. Douglas Keeney, and The Fires of October: The Planned US Invasion of Cuba During the Missile Crisis of 1962, by Blaine Pardoe, and finally, Blue Moon over Cuba: Aerial Reconnaissance during the Cuban Missile Crisis, by William Eckers, Michael Dobbs, and Kennith Jack.  I was thinking of rounding up the lot with a book on the overall US nuclear deterrent called, To Kill Nations: American Strategy in the Air-Atomic Age and the Rise of Mutually Assured Destruction, by Edward Kaplan.  But again with the death of Castro in the news and the talk of the Cuban Missile Crisis again, makes me think that I might step up my time line on reading on that topic.  It is also got me possibly itching on pulling out my 1/300 Pentomic army to be worked on so I can start nuking the Russians.  Or at least play some games of "Toe-to-Toe Nu'klr Combat with the Rooskies" by Victory Point Games.

If you don't remember, back in August of 2013, I was part of the NSDMG game at Gen Con based on the Cuban Missile Crisis.  (blog entry here) I was in the session as the Cuban's and I was the Curtis LeMay equal for the Cubans and came really close to getting rid of Fidel so we could get the war started with the Americans.  

So anyways, what is the new miniature project?  I bought a painted 10mm Russo-Turkish War project for about 60% of the cost that it would take me to buy the miniatures and get them painted.  I got the first of the two boxes.  They are nicely painted, but I am going to re-mount them to a different base size.  I plan to use them with the Neil Thomas' One Hour Wargames, or Neil Thomas' Wargaming the 19th Century Europe, or with Rick Priestley's Black Powder rules.  Basically I have almost everything for a Russian Infantry Division (12 battalions) and a Turkish Independent Rifle Brigade (8 battalions) plus each have their artillery batteries.  I don't have any pictures yet as I am waiting for the bases to show up so I and remount them first.  It is a large project, but oddly I will only need one 4L Really Useful Box with a tray and one 1.75L Really Useful Box to store the whole project.  So it really is not that large for storage.  

Be seeing you 

Sapper
 

New miniatures painted by Fernando

As I mention in my previous entry, I was not able to photograph them outside with natural sunlight, so they appear darker then they are in person.  So let start our journey on what I got painted by Fernando on this last batch.  Also a reminder that by clicking on the picture, there should be a bigger version of it.
  
First up is some more figures for the Russian Civil War

Above is the second half of the Siberian Rifles formation.  This will now give me four units of ten for them.

These two are more for a Pulpy RCW scenario or other games needing Soviet spies, but they are my two Cheka agents, Natasha & Boris...and yes, I have a moose and squirrel that will be in my next batch of miniatures to be painted.

These next two units are for both the Interventionist Allies in the RCW and also for War Plan Crimson

First is some more Canadians.  I needed them to increase the units to be ten man units and some extra Lewis guns teams.

Now is another force of US infantry.  This will give me eight 10-figure units for War Plan Crimson since they will be the attackers.  There is a lot of BARs in this group, but they will replace some of the rifles in the RCW intervention force so in the Crimson games each 10 figure unit will have a BAR.

Next up is a figures for War Plan Crimson and an interwar Cold War skirmish with the Soviets called Ice Station Lima, which is Tiger Miniatures tip of their hat to the novel and movie, "Ice Station Zebra".

First is are heroes of Archaeologists & Scientists.  I actually like the figure on the far right as he is holding a Spanish Conquistador's helmet!  What is that doing all the way up in the Arctic, is a mystery!

Now is a unit of troopers to protect our heroes.  Half are wearing fur coats and the others are wearing skin coats.  

Next is a machine gun team to help protect the heroes' discovery site. 

Well, we have to get the mysterious dingus back to civilization!  What better means for transportation than a reindeer (or caribou if you insist) drawn sled? 

Of course, we have to have the bad guys to try to stop the heroes from just sledding off into the sunset with the dingus!

Next up is more Tiger Miniatures goodness that can be used for War Plan Crimson, Ice Station Lima, or for its only mini-project, Death Hunt.  This is another Tiger Miniatures wink to another movie, "Death Hunt", which is a highly fictional account of the famous pursuit of a mad trapper in the Yukon in 1931-32 by the name of Albert Johnson.  It really is an amazing criminal and survival adventure which you should read up on, even if just the Wiki article.

The three guys in white are the three heroes from the movie, Death Hunt.  Unfortunately, the one on the right should actually be a black American instead of white.  I am going to fix that later.  To the right of them are four Canadian Mounties in winter gear and finally, the mad trapper himself, Albert Johnson.

In the movie, Albert Johnson, played by Charles Bronson, was actually not a bad guy.  Not only was he being pursued by the Mounties, lead by the actor Lee Marvin, but also being pursued by the other trappers that he had a run in with at the beginning of the movie.  Well, these guys are them!  This could make for an interest three game of survival with one player being Albert Johnson, another being the Mounties, the third being the trappers.

This now leads into more figures that are tied into War Plan Crimson, Ice Station Lima, Death Hunt, and now, the Yukon Perils!  Actually the two sets of figures above will also work for the Yukon Perils games too.

Of course we should start off with the good guys of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police lead by SGT Preston and his loyal dog, Yukon King.
 

Next are the trouble makers for SGT Preston's toopers in the line of mad trappers!
 

Now are some treeline toughs that might be trouble or just some rugged individuals. 
 

Some more rugged individuals for the Mounties to deal with or protect. 
 

Yeah, these are Polar Explorers, but could easily be in the Yukon.  Why would explorers be so heavily armed is a good question for the the Mounties to ask! 
 

Being really the only representation of the Canadian government in the Yukon, the Mounties must also deal with checking up on the Inuits and make sure they are not making any trouble. 
 

If they are not diligent in their duties, the Mounties may have to deal with an Inuit rebellion! 
 

Finally, someone that is non-threatening and will probably be needed to be saved by the Mounties at some time during their time in the Yukon.  But what will they need to be saved from?

Why from a polar bear, of course!  But could there be something more dangerous in the Yukon?

Hmm, well a couple of angry Sasquatches would be worst than a polar bear...but could there be something else?

 A family of displaced Yetis!


Now for a moment of Zen...
Be seeing you,
Sapper 

Review of Fernando Enterprises Miniature Painting Service's packing

Hello,

I know that I spoke of Fernando's Painting Service before, but I never showed pictures of how they pack the painted miniatures for the return shipping.  So I decided to take some pictures of the unpacking of my latest order that I got back earlier but didn't have time to open until today.  I am quite happy with how well protected they were packaged.

I also took pictures of the painted figures which I was not able to do outside for natural light, so the pictures I took are really not that good.  Maybe next weekend, I can get outside with them and get better pictures.  I am going to put them in a separate entry later tonight or tomorrow.

So lets look at the how Fernando's packing with comments under the pictures...

So I didn't quite took a picture of the big outer box, but as you can see above after the outer box is opened and there is a layer of bubble wrap and packing peanuts.  It is a nice heavy cardboard type for box. 

Under that layer of packaging were three more heavy cardboard boxes with the miniatures packed inside them.

Inside each of the smaller boxes are the painted figures individually wrapped in foam.  The box is packed so the figures can not bounce around.  In each box is a list of the miniatures with the ID number on it so you can open them in order to be put in their regular storage.  In this box was two figures that were broken during shipping to Fernando and they were returned so I can do something with them if I want. 

Here is an individual figure wrapped in the foam.  In this picture, I didn't get the cardboard backing on the opposite side that gives a stiffener to the foam so to protect the figures weapons.  I also want to point out how they folded the end of the tape over to give you a tab to grab to pull the tape off...nice!

Here you see the figure and the amount of foam used to protect the paint job, plus the cardboard stiffer.

Not all of the figures that I have done individually based, as in case of this machine gun team.  In most of these cases, they place them in a even in a smaller box for protection.

As you can see, they pack the small box so nothing can move about during shipping!

Now you can see how much space that they filled in around the figures to fill in that smaller box!

I plan to get another batch of Russian Civil War figures off to be painted in a month or so.  Cheers to Fernando!

Be seeing you,
Sapper

Closer to getting my last batch of figures being painted back

So, I think I mentioned that I had a problem with Fernando Painting Services in regarding my RCW US infantry in this current batch of figures to be painted, so I sent one of my previous figures back to be used as a sample.  Well, due to customs, etc. they finally got it after five weeks since I mailed it.  Everything is done, except my US infantry and they are now working on them.  I should be see my figures early next month, I suspect.  So, I will hopefully have a game in October with the figures.  

The next batch of figures will be more RCW figures, the Czech Legion, mounted Cossacks, and some White Russian shock troops for the Kornilov Shock Division (I know that they served in the Southern Front and not Siberia or North Russia, but they have pretty uniforms).  I still have to count everything up, but I think I still have some more more that I can put in this batch but I still have to figure out what.

Finally, I am almost 70% the way through "Asian Odyssey" by Alioshin (see to the left or in the tab for 2016's books).  It is a very enjoyable read, not only about his military career, but most of the book so far is more about survival in the wilderness and interactions with Mongolians nomads and how they lived.  There are several humorous incidents that shows how screwed up things where in Russia during the Civil War, which are very similar to other accounts that I have read in other books.  My favorite is once he disguised as an Austro-Hungrian ex-POW traveling east towards China to help spread the word of the Revolution and help free the peasants from the yoke of wealthy, so he might sneak through the Reds until he could get to the White Russian settlements in north China.  One day he got work in a town by unknowingly knocking on the door of the head of the local district's commissar's house.  As he could not escape right away, he settled into his new job as the clerk for records of marriages and death as he could read and write.  Later on, he was asked if he knew anything of the legal system by the head commissar.  When he answered that he did not, he was immediately made into the district's civil judge since he was not already corrupted by doing it the old Tsarist way!

Cheers,

Sapper

Great music!

I don't think that ever really talked about my taste in music before, but I think I might have posted some Mr B, the Gentleman Rhymer videos or mention Professor Elemental before.  Anyways, I have a very esoteric taste in music.   I use to be very main stream in my youth with Country & Western and Classic Rock.  But also in my youth, I had a great love for the 1930s-40s swing and folk music.  It would not out of line for me listening to Glenn Miller or the Andrews Sisters while still in high school.  So, when the mid-late 1990s swing revival came about, I was pretty happy.  But it was short lived and is pretty much gone save for a few bands nowhere near me and no new albums.

But today I discovered that there is a new band out there that is very active, putting out albums and videos, called the Scott Bradlee's Postmodern Jukebox. It looks like do original songs as well as doing current songs to various period pieces.  I am posting a few YouTube videos below for you to check out.  I love the music, the voices, and the quality of the filming.  They are well worth the time and I prefer these versions over the originals hands down.  Now, I have to go and buy some albums and start following them for future releases.

Cheers,

Sapper

Black Hole Sun - Vintage Soundgarden Cover ft. Haley Reinhart

No Diggity - Vintage Jessica Rabbit- Style Blackstreet Cover ft. Ariana Savalas (Telly Savalas' daughter)

I Will Survive - Vintage '40s Jazz / Latin Ballroom Style Cover ft. Sara Niemietz

Dancing in the Dark - Retro '50s Style Bruce Springsteen Cover ft. Von Smith

Welcome To The Jungle - Vintage Orchestral Guns 'n' Roses Cover ft. Daniela Andrade (Hey, Axle...not only is this version is better but she is not inciting a riot...FU!  From, St. Louis)

Gangsta's Paradise - Vintage 1920's Al Capone Style Coolio Cover ft. Robyn Adele Anderson 

 

...It needs rules for armored trains and zombies!

So, Saturday night I played several board games with a few friends.  One game we played was "Ticket to Ride".  This was the first time I ever played it. It is an interesting game about building railroad lines.  I took the black train pieces and started off coming out of New Orleans with my zombie rail gangs! Brou-ha-ha!  Unfortunately, the game doesn't have any rules for armored trains with cannons so I could shoot competitors...sigh...

Anyway, I won hands down with a total score of 131 pts, John with 100, Jules with 95, and Mike with 82. I really lucked out with my cards on what routes I was required to have, which also allowed me to get the longest train too - 41 out of 45 pieces available, as 2 pieces had to connect Atlanta to my line and I was not able to get the last two out in time before the game ended, otherwise Boston would have fallen to my Black Train of Death!. I am curious if anyone else ever seen seen a game result like this.

So the picture is the end of the game with my long black train of death almost surrounding the US! I should have been a train baron.

Cheers,
Sapper

Challenge accepted!

First, I must train the squirrels in my backyard how to identify which die is a d6, d10, and a d20!

I think I will have to see this...

Either this is going to be a kick butt movie or it is really, really, really going to suck.  Right now, I am stoked by the trailer with "Action" Jackson ranting about how man is the king and not some 150 foot ape!  I am looking forward to "Action" Jackson going mano-a-mano with King Kong.  My bet is on Jackson!  Plus I am super excited that the move is taking place in the 1970s.

Kong: Skull Island

Short Update

In the comments in my last entry, I was asked about my 15mm Congo Crisis project and I will do a future entry hopefully next week about what figures I am going to use and etc. after I see if the paint is going to stick to my m/42 APC from Shapeways.  I did the chemical baths and let them dry off and spray painted them today.  I am waiting for that to dry and am going to try to see if the paint is adhering to the FUD material.  If so, I am going to try to paint up one and include it with the post on the 15mm Congo project.

Besides that, I had votes to continue reading about the Russian Civil War, which was what I was leaning to anyways, but there are some many "Oh, shiny!" topics that I want to read.  Actually, I could have read about Roy Chapman Andrews as part of the RCW as he worked to support the US Military Intelligence Division of gathering information on Mongolia & China during the last years of the RCW, and also visited Siberia around 1919 as an officer of the US Navy Intelligence....hmmm, US Navy dinosaur hunter in Siberia with frozen woolly mammoths...just thinking out loud here.

Anyways, so I am continue my reading on the Russian Civil War about the 'Mad' Baron von Ungern-Sternberg.  Extremely interesting character to say the least.  I plan to read two period biographies about him and the author who served with him after my current book.  One by his Chief of Intelligence, Ferdynand Antoni Ossendowski (an extremely interesting character in his own right too!), called Men, Beasts, and Gods.  The second one will be by a Major that served in one of his units, Dmitri Alioshin, called Asian Odyssey.

I got to go, but I will end on a quote by Baron von Ungern-Sternberg about how interesting this subject is going to be to read.

Cheers,

Sapper

"My name is surrounded with such hate and fear that no one can judge what is true and what is false, what is history, and what is myth."

Shapeways goodies! And I need to pick a new book to read!

So, I got my Shapeways' 15mm m/42 armored personal carriers for the Swedish UN troops for the 1960s Congo Crisis project.  Very nice little models, even though they are very expensive little buggers.  I love the hand rails around the vehicle too!  But I can see them being broken with slightly rough handling.  I guess I am going to have to act like a nun with a wooden ruler if I see any gamers getting a rowdy around them.  

Below are some pictures of the model prior to painting.  The pictures were done before the bath to clean the wax residue off that the Frost Ultra Detail material comes in.  From what I read on different forums/websites for the cleaning, I am going to do a soapy water bath first, followed by a mixed water and Goo Gone (US), then a soapy water bath again, then a mixed water and Simple Green (US) bath, and followed again with a soapy water bath and a final clean water bath.  I just did them and I am waiting for them to dry out and see if the wax is gone.

Also in most of the pictures is a base of 15mm Peter Pig's modern African militia with bolt action rifles (the old out-of-print version) from their AK47 line.  The figures are mounted on a Litko's Flames of War (FoW) medium size base (2”/ 50mm wide by 1¼”/ 32mm deep) for size relations.  The figures were painted by Fernando Enterprises painting services as part of my original order to see how their services were before committing big time.  They were painted in the Showcase quality.  I didn't have them do basing or flocking as I was still debating on if I was going to mounted them individually or in groups.  I will be basing them in groups on FoW size bases, but not with the rounded edges as I will be putting a Minibit's die frame on one corner and identification tag along the back edge.

So the next thing is what books am I going to read next?  Right now I am at a crux in deciding what I what to read next as I just have too much choices and I want to read too stuff.  Whatever I decided to read next, the following book will be on the same topic as I tend to like reading two or three books on the same topic in a row.  So you can help by chiming in on a vote for which topic would be the best for me to start next.  I plan to finally pic something by next Saturday.  Below are the topics in no specific order:

1) Congo Crisis of 1960s (for obvious reasons)
2) Russian Civil War (going back to it and staying topical with the audio book that I am listening to)
3) US Banana Wars of the first half of the 1900's (my next 28mm project that I want to start on next year)
4) The Mexican Revolution and Pershing's Expedition (it ties into the 28mm Banana Wars project)
5) US Interwar Crime (I can't get enough of reading about the crime waves of the 1920s and 1930s)
6) Forgotten military actions from the US history (Specifically on the King Philip's War and the US Navy's Anti-Slavery Squadron off of Africa pre-American Civil War)
7) Explorers and Expeditions (Roy Chapman Andrews and Ann Axtell Morris most likely, possibly H.M. Stanley or various Polar expeditions) 

Cheers,

Joe

Wisdom tooth and New England Outline

OK, first with the really bad news, I have an wisdom tooth infection right now and I am in a lot of pain!  I spoke to my dentist at his emergency phone number and got a prescription of antibiotics, but they are not lasting their full length of time and I just took another waiting for the pain to subside some so I can get some sleep (couldn't sleep at all yesterday.)  I will not be able to see him until Tuesday and I might have to miss work today if I can't sleep again.  I am definitely having both of my wisdom teeth pulled as soon as possible after this!  

Anyways, I was typing up my New England trip outline for myself to get the pictures in order, but since I can't sleep because of my tooth right now, I might as well post it here with a few pics for now.  Below is a listing of the locations I visited during my New England trip.  For an idea on how much ground that I really covered, I had a rental car that I picked up in New York City and in sixteen days drove over 4000 miles (6400 km), including walking an average of five miles (8 km) every day.  

My companion for sixteen days with the adeptly name, Jeep Patriot

Now for the other bad news shoe to drop...I discovered that I lost one of my camera’s memory cards, so I lost about 1/3 of my pictures from my trip…sigh.  

I have some general notes also behind some of the locations for significance or general information.

NY: 
NYC Spent most of my day with a college friend of mine who lives in Manhattan, so the locations for NYC was visited with him
NYC Stanton Island Ferry and took photos of Ellis Island & Statue of Liberty
NYC Wall Street - The Bull Statue, Federal Hall National Memorial, and dined at Fraunce’s Tavern

 NYC Village – Visited the Slaughter Lamb Tavern but took no pictures
Sleepy Hollow - Missing most of my pictures, but visited the Headless Horseman Bridge, Old Dutch Church, and Washington Irving’s grave
Stony Point AWI Battlefield - Missing most of my pictures
Fort William Henry F&I Battlefield - Missing all of my pictures
Saratoga AWI Battlefield - Missing all of my pictures
Fort Ticonderoga F&IW & AWI Battlefield

CT:
Groton US Submarine Museum & the USS Nautilus

Hartford State Capitol
Hartford Old State House
Hartford State History Museum
Hartford Soldiers Memorial

RI:
Providence H.P. Lovecraft’s tour of College Hill (many of the buildings that mentioned in his stories) and his gravesite

 Newport Old Stone Mill & Touro Park

VT:
Bennington AWI Memorial - Missing all of my pictures
Townshend Post Office - From HP Lovecraft’s story, “Whisperer in the Darkness”
Townshend Cover Bridge - Missing all of my pictures
Brattleboro Railroad Station - From HP Lovecraft’s story, “Whisperer in the Darkness”
Brattleboro Cover Bridge - Missing all of my pictures
Brattleboro Dark Mountain – From HP Lovecraft’s story, “Whisperer in the Darkness”
St Albans – Site of Confederate raid during the US Civil War

 Sheldon – No pictures due to not being able to safely get to the road side markers, but site of a Confederate raid during the US Civil War

MA:
Whately Schoolhouse, Post Office, & Town Hall – Possible location of HP Lovecraft’s Dunwich, from the story “The Dunwich Horror”
Stockbridge/Great Barrington: Arlo Guthrie’s Alice’s Restaurant Tour and a speculated location of the scene of the crime!
Fall River Battleship Cove - Missing all of my pictures
Fall River Historical Society Museum – No pictures allowed, but site of many Lizzie Borden artifacts
Fall River Lizzie Borden’s Bed & Breakfast
Provincetown Pilgrim Monument / Museum & Pilgrim’s First Landing spot - Missing almost all of my pictures
Cape Cod – Missing all of my pictures
Salem Shipyards
Salem House of the Seven Gables & Nathaniel Hawthorne’s house
Salem National Guard Armory
Salem The Witch House
Salem Charter Street Old Burial Ground & the Pickman’s House and the white house which was inspired in HP Lovecraft’s story, “The Unnamable” and Nathaniel Hawthorne’s story “Dr Grimshawe”
Salem Bewitched Monument
Salem Witch Trial’s Monument
Salem Clue House – the house used in the US version of Clue
Salem Yellow House – From HP Lovecraft’s story, “The Thing at the Door”,
Salem Night Tour

 Salem St Paul’s
Salem Town Hall – Used in the movie, “Hocus Pocus”
Salem Witch Museum
Danvers Witch Trials Monument
Danvers Rebecca Nurse Home – No pictures allowed
Rowley Town Hall – From HP Lovecraft’s story, “The Shadow Over Innmouth”
Ispwich Town Hall – From HP Lovecraft’s story, “The Shadow Over Innmouth”
Lexington & Concord Minute Man Park and Lexington Battle Green

 Boston Bunker Hill Monument
Boston USS Constitution
Glouscester American Legion Hall – From HP Lovecraft’s story, “The Shadow Over Innmouth”
Haverhill Bedford University – From HP Lovecraft’s vision for what Miskatonic University would look like

ME:
Fort McClary

NH:
North Salem American Stonehenge – The circle of stones that HP Lovecraft vision in his story, “The Dunwich Horror”

Canada:
Eccles Hill – Location of the 1870 Fenian Raid
Battle of the Windmill Battlefield
Fort Wellington
Ridgeway Conference & Tour of the battlefield – A literary society conference for the 150th anniversary for the Battle of Ridgeway, including many noted speakers

Derrick Warfield & the Young Wolfe Tones Concert – Part of the Ridgeway conference
Ridgeway 150th Ceremonies 

Be seeing you
Sapper