The Big 1000

Never would I have thought that, with my goldfishlike attention span, when I put down my first words on this blog on the 28th of february 2010 that it would endure to this point.

The 1000th post on my little corner of the internet!

Now, 4.5 years later, this blog has a nice up and about 150 followers, nears the 200.000 views mark, and occassionally pops up near the top of a page during a google search.

Thanks all!

What started out as a small asset to use club reports back then, as we where in a Pulp craze for a while and Andy suggested to also start blogging, has endured over all these years, though slowly but steadily the blog, and by extention my intrests and personality, went through a series of transitions.

The Beginning

At first, I talked about wargames.  This was MY hobby, I loved it and spend every free minute painting up miniatures.  However, at that time the regular gaming group started to fall apart as we all got older, priorities changed, and after the umpteenth failed gamesystem or campaign, having painted up obscure miniature number 17543 I threw in the towel.
I was tired of painting figures all night long, only to end with them trying to recouperate a small portion of their value, now even painted, through the second hand market as the game went out and the models had no use any longer.

During that time, I had also rekindled my Magic: the Gathering game, and what was intended as only a time filler at the club, turned out to playing competitively and this meant the actual killing stroke for the wargame hobby.

I tried twice over those years to get `back into it`, usually after a Crisis show, but it has all ended up with my two nephews `inheriting` all my figures and paints when they started showing intrest in the hobby.  The Next Generation so to say...

But to this day, my Salute and Crisis reports are amongst the most viewed posts of the blog still.

The Time Intensive One

A large event that occured during the lifetime so far of this blog, was the Playstation Challenge, an epic duel of many game hours between myself and Andy.  The setup was simple, which `team` (aka, household) could manage to score the most Playstation Network Points (aka Trophies) over the course of exactly one year or 365 days.

Because in the meantime, I had gotten together steadily with my on/off relation, and the kid.  Aka the GF and the Smurf.  So they where my team, while Andy had his wife and two sons to help wipe away all opposition.

The challenge was harder then might be expected, as I had volunteered to do all the paperwork.  This involved checking each and every day what the scores of the day before where and adding them to an oversight page that resided for the duration of that event on this blog.  Then around the end of every month, an inbetween scorecard would be posted.

This turned out to be much and much more work then I had expected, and was even tiresome at times, but I pulled through (and won...).

But during, and due to the Playstation Challenge, something happened

The end of the Dark Ages

I bought the Lego The Lord of the Rings game, and it came with a small polybag promo of Elrond.  I kept the figure instead of tossing it on eBay or the likes, just because I loved the movies and adore the books, and it got a display somewhere on a shelf next to my computer.  Strike 1.

A few months later, I was in the local toy store and saw the Arrival of Gandalf set.  Nothing fancy, costing 12 euros or so, and thought that was a nice model to put alongside Elrond, so I bought it, and kept looking at some more of the Lord of the Rings Lego.  And took along one of their free catalogues.  Strike 2.

Then the Smurf started shifting from PlayMobil to Lego, and by accident we found out of a Lego event 5 minutes from our door.  So we wen`t to have a look at what turned out to be BeLUG`s Brick Mania Antwerp event (and the final time in the smaller venue).  I saw all those gorgeous builds, and got hooked again, at first getting sets to build only.  I discovered Eurobricks and the Guilds of Historica, signed up and felt the want to start building again myself.  Strike three and out where the Dark Ages.

Now, I must confess, even though the Dark Ages lasted in my case exactly 20 years, but I never heard of that term back then.  Those are things you `learn` as you start looking further more into the hobby of Lego.

The Lego Era

And that brings the blog to it`s current form, focussing on Lego instead of on miniature soldiers as it`s mainliner.  But just as it was with wargaming, I`m doing this with a passion.  The added benefit is that you can build in the confines of your living room without having to have someone over to `play`, which is invaluable in a relationship.

Where I was dreaming about army lists a few years ago, now I`m scribbling down ideas for MoCs and instead of what army to buy now, it has become a want list of (classic) Lego sets.  Though it takes just as much display space for the build models, at least you can tear them down after a while and re-use the parts.

But Also

Apart from Lego, I do spend time of course reading and watching, and playing video games when I can.  But like with my MMOs, the Playstation suffers from busy agendas, just as magic will again go to the backburner for at least the coming 5 months due to other obligations and time management.  I will try to pick up a tournament or so left or right, but let`s just say I`m glad I already have enough points for the WMCQs of 2015 in the pocket.

Exploring New Horizons

Where will the future take this blog to?  I have no idea, because wouldn`t it be dead boring if we knew in front all that would happen?  What I can say though, is that my bricks are here to stay, I will keep reviewing books and movies as I manage to see them, my love for F1 remains and more of the geeky stuff...

Up to the next 1000!!!


Special Thanks Go To:

Andy, for introducing me to this platform.

The now defunct Far Side of the Galaxy: there where definilty some great times and campaigns, but we just had run our course at the end.

The TSA (Tin Soldiers of Antwerp) gaming club: for 17 years, you have been my home on the weekends.

The GF and The Smurf: for keeping up and sticking out with this goofball.

Mom and Dad, for safekeeping my Lego bricks in huge boxes in the garage for over 20 years.  Okay, you thought that would all go to the nephews or grandchildren, not return to it`s original owner, but heck, you can`t have it all exactly hehe.

And of course, all of you out there, that visit this page at times!