Out of the cold but still winter in '79

Free Taff Mobile Commando

Thought I'd share some good news from work as it helps to pay for the hobby. My principal project has been validated and signed off as a success by the Project Board. Phew! Built from the ground up, yourHR is a pay and personnel portal offering employee self service and online pay initially, but with plans to be truly transformational.

The culmination of two years standing behind my vision, five months of intense development, three months rollout and pilot. Tackling issues on a daily basis, of which the technical were the easiest to overcome. I'm delighted, proud, and not a little relieved after putting so much of myself into this project. In part because  it gave me a real focus for returning to work after my neurological episode last year. In part because I believed in what I was trying to accomplish. The pay-off for me is that it's given me my confidence back and has proved to my worst critic, myself, that I can do this stuff.

The 'Valley Boyos'

No respite for the wicked or chance for a breather yet. It doesn't just stop of course. I'm testing the next module due for rollout in January, whilst we are building two others and designing yet another. And I have to juggle this with all the reports that are generated by the end of a pilot and planning for the challenges ahead.

All that to say that I've not had the energy left to write creatively when I got home this week and probably not for another week to come. The upside is that I spent a couple of nights ratifying my Winter of '79 figures collection, which will allow me to get more done. I made that bold step to say to myself that just because I have a figure doesn't mean it has to be painted. Some will go into reserve, some syphoned off for Maff whilst the remainder of the also rans will be relegated to eBay.

Well, not quite all the also rans. I've been busy converting figures too. Once I was able to say to myself, right, these figures are keepers, some of the left overs became conversion fodder, losing heads and weapons to fill gaps, ring the changes or give that additional Winter of '79 character to other minis. It is strangely therapeutic lopping heads off and during the course of the day at work I find myself looking forward to doing more conversions when I get home.

 S&S Models Workbench!

click for larger picture

Another bit of good news this week is seeing what's coming from Shaun at S&S Models in the New Year. I have to laugh as only a week or so ago I was thinking that I was more or less at the end of laying out cash on Winter of '79 and now I have to build a bigger vehicle park! I mean, how can I resist that Mark I Ferret or those Scorpion/Scimitar CVR(T). You just can't have enough Scimitars in my book. Though I do have a soft spot for the Scorpion too. At last there's a mean looking FFR Land Rover in 20mm and I know that Maff will get that open back as a Taff gun wagon. Really looking forward to all of these. You can see more photos on Shaun's photobucket gallery here.

The Cold War will be big next year.

Cheers
Mark