- I will start this week by giving brief mention to this extremely annoying forum topic. Big props
to all who posted on it that Mac and PC were different animals. I have a Mac on my lap and a
PC on my desk and neither one has been more uppity then the other. My Ipod on the other
hand, now that is a different story. The last time I took it in to have it serviced the guy smiled
at me and explained the following, “Well it is pretty old, and the hard drive isn't uploading. I
can do one thing for ya though; I can drop it on the floor that helps sometimes.” I was equal
parts and amused and pissed. I was amused because the tech was telling me to drop it on
the floor. I was pissed because the tech was telling me to drop it on the floor.
This three day weekend saw me traversing the greater D.C. metro area as, unbeknownst to
me, there were, in fact a million things that my fiancé needed that had to be purchased over
the last three days. This whirlwind through three states, well I guess two states and a
district, and countless hours on trains has made me think that maybe, just maybe all that
stuff in a season of 24 could happen in one day. Fortunately this was all made bearable by
having finally, after almost three years encouragement from my nearest and dearest, picked
up The Diamond Throne, first book in the Elenium. I will not go into how cool this book is
here, or how Sparhawk has replaced Isamu as the biggest bad ass in the world, ever (After
Bruce Lee of course, but Bruce Lee and Sparhawk would never fight because it would blow
up the world.) What I will say is that it reminded me how much like I reading about knights.
One of the huge appeals of the George R.R. Martin stuff is that there are all these kick ass
knights running around. It is much the same kind of deal in The Diamond Throne and I was
inspired to create an army in its honor.
As I am kinda slow, my first notion was that I should create an Empire cav army based off
the four orders in the book. I would have warrior priests to lead it to represent the
Ecclesiarchy. Then I was like, “Actually Sparhawk and company are kinda like Paladins,” ok
not really but it fits as well as empire knights, I will just make it a Bret list since they have the
cooler horses anyway. I was jerked from my thoughts as I was being drug by the arm into
yet another shopping mall. I was able to return to my thoughts on this giant red chair in the
Crate and Barrel. I thought about how I didn't really like either of those armies but I would
have to suck it up. Then I started thinking about a display board for the army and how it
would be cool to make it look like they were meeting at a chapterhouse.
Like lightning it hit me, and the upscale Crate and Barrel in Clarendon Virginia was
suddenly filled with my astounded declaration of, “Holy fucking shit they are Space Marines!”
I was far too proud of my ability to finally grasp the obvious to notice the disapproving looks
of the people in the living room section. All the orders basically follow the same thing with
slight variances, Index Astartes, and they are devoted to their own order and have safe
houses and shit. Give them bolters baby and they are Space Marines. I like Space Marines
even though I pretty much see GW as a necessary evil. I was all rip roaring ready to make a
Pandion chapter of marines and have Brother Captain Sparhawk leading the charge.
Finally I got home and, even though I was robotically assembling something that we got at
IKEA, my mind was racing with possibility. I don’t know if you have ever truly thought about
Space Marines, like what they would sound like on the battlefield, what a Whirlwind would
look like when it launches its payload, the smell of thousands of shells being ejected
through a fucking bolter, but it can be pretty exciting. Anyway after a great deal of thought and
swearing at modular furniture I was finally dismissed to go do my “dork stuff”.
Make a long story short I dug out a new vet sarge I had purchased, I am always buying
Space marines, and primed him. Then as I started to paint I figured I may as well paint him
up like a Dark Angel, which happens nearly every time I begin painting a marine. I have like
20 painted Dark Angel tac marines w/o a sarge. He looked alright, all said and done, and
now the impossible huge squad of Dark Angels has a sarge. After e-mailing Momma some
pics, which I will be asking him to include, I sat back and found myself feeling a little guilty.
See, the past week has seen me painting on some Behemoth Orcs. I really like these
minis, and this line, and I really enjoyed painting them, in the beginning. If you know me and
my aesthetic, it tends towards clean lines and paint jobs on minis. I still prize that Scott guy
from WSU marching band as one of the finest painters for Confrontation. The studio paint
job on these orcs was like the cleanest “dirty” I had ever seen. As I began painting these
orcs I was at first amused with the amount of crap heaped on these guys’ backs. I
remember saying, “Oh cool he has a drum!” Followed by, “Baby lookit, he has a rat on his
shoulder!” But as time and paint went on, I began to grow less amused with sausages,
shiny bits, frogs, and a fucking pelican ( A no shit pelican on one of their backs) and got
tired.
It occurs to me that more often then not Rackham is like visual art to me. I like the Mona
Lisa and the dot painter guy, Seurat or what the fuck ever, but I don’t want to paint either of
those pictures. Nor do I seek to emulate their style. So often this is the case with
Rackham's studio painters. I would love to play with the studio Behemoth orcs, but I can’t
and don’t want to paint to paint them. If I could buy a print, i.e. have them paint them for me, I
could get into it, who couldn't?. But it isn't worth the time, and frustration for me to try and do
it myself. I will stick to Samurai gobos. Ya they have weird shit all over them too, but they are
little so it all balances out. Sadly I will continue to buy Behemoth orcs because I still feel an
incessant need to own minis that I think look cool. Buying minis with no intention of painting
them is an asshole thing to do, it is a short coming in me that I have come to accept.
I dunno, perhaps I am just rationalizing being a slack ass. Either way something got
painted, and I suppose that is what is really important. Well I am off to hide in the corner of
my desk trying to finish The Diamond Throne so I can start on the Ruby Knight. Only thing
cooler than reading about Sparhawk, is getting paid to do it.
