Operation Clear Out

Every now and again I come across that something that reminds me of how old I am and how far I have come. When it happens I always have a little bit of a smile on my face. It is now time to get rid of some of the stuff that I am never going to use again.

Perhaps I am beginning to think I might have a slight hoarding problem. Not a massive one but maybe enough that I need to have a clear out. So I have been doing this for the last few weeks. It has been hard for some of it and maybe not so hard for others. This was perhaps not so hard but it did make me think back.

Some of what I have is stuff that belonged to my mum and dad but the majority is mine. Some good memories and some not so good. One of the things I found was a box of terrain. It is all stuff that has been sat in a box for at least fifteen years. As I probably wouldn't use it now, my skills have moved on a bit, I don't really play the game I made it for anymore, I thought it was time to get rid.

The first to go are some hedges and stone walls. I am pretty sure that this was the first actual wargame terrain I ever made. This dates it to about 1983 or maybe 1984. When I realised that I had a bit of a shock. It last came out of a box in anger  in the last millenium. On top of that the hedging is starting to disintegrate. It did get a lot of use at one point and way back when it was pretty good compared to what my mates were using. Still time to go.

A fair bit later I got into playing Command Decision. Whilst initially it was all 1/300 World War 2 I got into my own Spanish Civil War game which was in 15mm. I built a load of entrenchments for it (the thing on the right). The wooden walls are actually an imprint of a plastic railway fence cut to the right size. The green flocked bases were barbed wire sections which I think I made with fuse wire and later replaced it with the wire often used for barbed wire. It has been a long time since I used flock and Basetex for basing stuff and I can see why.

Having come on a long way and having long since seen it's prime it is time to go. I am a little sad to see it go but the time has come.