Grants Grimsby Wargames Blog

Please Sponsor Me for the Humber Bridge Half Marathon 2011

2011-06-14T20:04:00.001+01:00

On 26th June 2011 I will be running, well, the aim is to run it…..The Humber Bridge Half Marathon. The Charity I will be raising money for is Cancer Research UK.

Dont know about you but I have known of and have actually known some people who have had cancer and its terrible effects. I will be thinking of them when I run this half marathon, which is also my first half marathon. Currently in training which is what I’m always doing, running at least 3 or 4 times a week.

As you can see in the photo below anyone seeing me training will see me in my Cancer Research UK vest.

On the day of the Half Marathon some fancy dress will be worn by me mainly a blue wig and blue tutu….

You can sponsor me online at this address: http://www.runningsponsorme.org/jasonneilson. Other members of the athletics club of which I am also a member, Cleethorpes Athletics Club, will also be running in the event.

Viking FM on 96.9 FM will be covering the event and photos of both the Fun Run and Half Marathon will be appearing on their website afterwards.

You can also donate through either the widget below or on the sidebar:

Many Thanks for any donations you may give.

Doctor Who Series 6 so far

2011-06-11T16:56:00.000+01:00

Really Enjoyed this series of Doctor Who so far. "The Doctor's Wife" has to be one of my favourite episodes and the beginning of the series with the new baddies, The Silence, was interesting, particularly when a certain character is killed early on. Been quite suspenful and looking forward to it returning in the Autumn with the 2nd part of the series.

It's nice that we finally know who River Song really is. Mind you, the answer had been building up for the episodes before that.

Coming Back to Life

2011-03-13T17:00:00.000Z

Sorry its been a little quite here for a while folks. Been preoccupied with other things including my financial situation which resulted in my broadband being suspended due to non payment of bill on 28th February and am now presently existing on hardship payments from the dole which is £39.25 a week at the moment, so it is possible to feed myself and my cat at least. After doing some calculations with what I had I found it was possible to buy myself a Pay as You go Vodafone USB Modem, a dongle, to get myself back on the net. It actually works really well. Paying off any of my bills may take several months due to my circumstances but am sure something can be sorted out.

Anyway, as you may have guessed from the title of this post, I’m “Coming Back to Life” again…Very soon this blog and all my other blogs/websites will burst into life as some planning is required to achieve my aims with those sites on top of my other plans for this year. It is also my intention to run the 2012 London Marathon but whether it will be possible to take part remains to be seen.

Films based on a true story... but aren't really | Movies Blog - Yahoo! Movies

2011-02-05T14:40:00.000Z

Had a really good chuckle at this. Much of this is stuff we wargamers knew all along. Particularly read the parts about U-571 and Braveheart. Shame there was no mention of the movie 300, a great movie I like based on the battle of Thermopylae......

Films based on a true story... but aren't really | Movies Blog - Yahoo! Movies: "- Sent using Google Toolbar"

FW: Your 2010 year in blogging [grimsbywargames.wordpress.com]

2011-01-26T17:48:00.003Z

Team WordPress.com + Stats Helper Monkeys
January 2nd, 2011, 10:11am

Your 2010 year in blogging

Happy New Year from WordPress.com! To kick off the year, we'd like to share with you data on how your blog has been doing. Here's a high level summary of your overall blog health:

Wow

Blog-Health-o-Meter™

We think you did great!

Crunchy numbers

A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 8,000 times in 2010. That's about 19 full 747s.
In 2010, you wrote 19 new posts, not bad for the first year! You uploaded 89 pictures, taking up a total of 17mb. That's about 2 pictures per week.
Your busiest day of the year was March 22nd with 409 views. The most popular post that day was Galleries.

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were gywargames.co.uk, grantsgrimsbygames.blogspot.com, digg.com, facebook.com, and slashingtongue.com.
Some visitors came searching, mostly for grimsby wargames society, rapid fire rules, grimsby wargames club, grimsby wargames, and wargaming.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010. You can see all of the year's most-viewed posts and pages in your Site Stats.

Galleries

About

My visit to Triples 2007March 2010

Location

Great Grimsby Gaming Group

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See you in 2011!

If you liked what you saw in this summary and want to know more about how your blog is doing, you can always visit your Site Stats, where our helper-monkeys are working day and night to provide you with pages and pages of detail on how your blog is doing.
If you have any feedback on this email, please click here for a very short survey (in English). We would love to hear from you.
Thanks for flying with WordPress.com in 2010.
We look forward to serving you again in 2011! Happy New Year!

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Express yourself. Start a blog.

Belated Happy New Year!: No Surrender, No Retreat

2011-01-25T00:06:00.001Z

A very late Happy New Year to you all and wish you to have lots of fun in your gaming this year.

The picture left is a clipping from my local free paper the “Grimsby Post” dated 6th January 2011 which shows a photo of me dressed in a Santa Suit for the New Years Day 10K (6.2 miles) run at Cleethorpes. I completed the run in 1 hour 4 minutes and 17 secs. Thought it would be fun to do in a Santa Suit. It was but extremely hot. Read the full results of the Cleethorpes New Years Day 10K here

In the past year apart from taking up running 3 times a week and participating in Fun Runs, which also put me in the Telegraph, I joined one of the local Athletics Clubs.

After 8 years and 7 months from January 2002 to the end of July 2010 – quite a long time – my website ceased becoming known as the Grimsby Wargames Society Official Website. During that period the Grimsby Wargames Society Official Website which promoted the club, club premises and its members, with all its hosting and other associated costs, personally cost me a lot of money. At the end of July 2010 club member Malcolm Johnston’s website became known as the Grimsby Wargames Society Official Website.

There have been some items in the news recently on issues close to my heart that have partly inspired me to do some things I have always wanted to do. This year I have therefore decided to go after those things and other issues that have been bothering me for quite some time. I have been just been holding out for years and can do so no longer. The strategic withdrawal is over. No Surrender, No Retreat.

The only running I intend to be doing this year is in more Fun Runs and in some competitive running such as cross country runs and intend to do at least 1 half marathon before the end of the year. Fun Runs and Marathon's, half or full, would of course be for charity.

On a lighter note if you’re going to wear something on your head this year, let it be a Stetson. Stetsons are cool!

The video below is one of my favourite band’s tracks: “This is War” by 30 Seconds to Mars….

PC Update

2011-01-17T12:54:00.001Z

Last week I was able to get hold of a PC off a friend. Around the start of the weekend I formatted it and began reinstalling Windows and all my other programs. At present the vast majority of the programs that I wish to use on the PC are installed, especially the desktop blogging software.

For over a year now the desktop blogging software I have been using to create my posts has been Windows Live Writer (see left), which is free to download. It works with both Wordpress and Blogger amongst many other blog providers. Windows Live Writer can also work well with blog pages (except Blogger). Posts can also be scheduled for future publishing. To date I have used this software for Wordpress and Blogger only.

Windows Live Writer is one piece of software I would rather not do without. Makes life so much easier.

Picasa is used to correct contrast, lighting and colour in all my photos so that they look their best especially the wargames ones.

The Flickr Uploader is used to upload my photos in bulk to Flickr.

Using the Flickr4Writer plugin, I can then insert my photos into my blog posts though this is mainly done with Blogger.

So I am back up and running again with a fully functional PC though the threat of having my internet suspended is ever present. That too will be sorted within the next 8 weeks. It was those things, especially the PC playing up, that caused me a lot of problems at the end of last year and particularly between April and July 2010 that meant my websites were neglected. All the data including photos from last year are sadly out of reach till I am able to access the data on the other hard drive.

Good News! Whilst experiencing these problems in December 2010, I also took some photos with my main digital camera at the Grimsby Wargames Society so apart from the photos taken with my Nokia there is a month’s worth of Wargames Photos safely stored away on my camera to be posted to this blog. They will be posted within the next 2 weeks or earlier. Now they are the REAL photos……

Snaptu: Nazi fury at Hitler the paw-raising dog

2011-01-07T17:19:00.001Z

German ministries considered prosecuting dog's Finnish owner or ruining his business for insulting Hitler, wartime records reveal

Germany's Nazi government was so angry about a dog trained to imitate Hitler that it started an obsessive campaign…

Click here to read the full story

--
This email was sent to you from Snaptu mobile application.

Steve Walker RIP

2011-01-04T23:32:00.002Z

Today I learned the sad news that Steve Walker, a long standing member of the Grimsby Wargames Society, had died of Cancer last night after fighting bravely against it ever since he had learned it had returned in August 2010 last year. In the following months Steve lived life to the full doing many things he always wanted to do including driving a tank over a car! Wargaming was one of his passions as well as painting wargames figures and blogging about it and anything else that interested him including the BBC Series Ashes to Ashes set in the 80's starring Philip Glenister as DCI Gene Hunt, a series we both liked. Steve was also one of the many Grimsby players who helped playtest the original Rapid Fire! rules. He liked WW2, AK47 and many other periods. Recently Steve had allowed me to take photos of some of his figures. You can see them here: grantsgrimsbygames.blogspot.com/2010/11/steve-walkers-15mm-flames-of-war.html. The best place to see his photos,
his well painted figures and to read his thoughts and ideas is to read his Panzerfauste Painting blog at http://panzerfaustepainting.blogspot.com. I always found Steve to be a friendly, helpful person and it was always good to see him down the club and privileged to know him not just by having him on my Facebook friend list. He will be missed by myself and by the Grimsby Wargames Society. My thoughts and condolences go to his family at this difficult time.

Pirates at Grimsby 17th December 2010

2011-01-03T18:51:00.000Z

On the 17th December 2010 a Pirates game was once again held at the Grimsby Wargames Society. The ships belonged to Andy Hamilton, Mal Taylor and Mike Barnatt

Hope You Had a Nice Christmas

2010-12-25T23:02:00.000Z

A Belated Merry Christmas to you all! Hope you have enjoyed your Christmas Day and not overdosed on mince pies or Christmas Pud. I spent much of the day recovering from the dinner and many drinks I had at The Cricketers yesterday with friends which left me more than a little inebriated. The Doctor Who Christmas Special this year was excellent and so christmassy. If you missed it by accident then you should be able to catch it on the iplayer. Another great thing about this year was the fact that there was snow on the ground in the UK for the first time in a long time. The photo was taken by me during one of the many snow showers we had in Grimsby yesterday. Merry Christmas!

Germans v British WW2

2010-12-20T18:04:00.000Z

Last monday Dave Tuck played a game of WW2 desert with his godson James using the Blitzkrieg Commander rules. The Germans won and they were commanded by James

My Hard Drive last week

2010-12-15T04:42:00.003Z

My hard drive last friday night till early monday night. Posts will be done this way next time my hard drive stops working. Photos will be uploaded to twitpic first then the html code copied and edited. That code is then emailed to the blog!

My PC Has Had a Hard Disk Failure

2010-12-12T01:19:00.001Z

On friday night the hard drive on my PC decided to stop working and been unable to fix it since though I havent given up. As a result I can only access the net from my phone till my PC is sorted. I had hoped to update both my wargames blogs this weekend including photos of recent games at the club but unable to access anything on my computer. Hope to get things sorted soon. There's never a sonic screwdriver when you want one!

Wargames 1st November 2010

2010-11-29T18:19:00.001Z

On the 1st November 2010 the club’s ACW Campaign began though I will save those details for another post. After both sides in the campaign had discussed and decided their first moves, separately of course, a little game of ACW was put on using the Black Powder rules for those interested.

Mark Alcock and Paul Robinson with his son James were playing a WW1 game between Mark’s Germans and Paul’s “Doughboy’s”

Some of Paul Robinson’s “Doughboy’s” with their Field Guns.

Some of Mark’s Germans in Soft Cover. These were painted by Joe Dunn, a club member and professional figure painter.

Paul and Mark were playtesting some WW1 rules they were developing based on a discussion they had several months back. The result was that the Germans won, but not by much. It was hardly an overwhelming victory.

In this game which was intended for all those interested, was just to bring us up to speed with the Black Powder rules which the club is using in the ACW Campaign. Playing in this game were myself, Mal Taylor, Tony Walmsley (Union side) with Andy Hamilton and Jason Whitfield (Confederates).

I was manning the left flank which was under attack from Andy’s Reb’s whilst Mal Taylor attacked the Confederate forces in the middle. Tony was the right flank.

Unable to hold the right flank, as I ended up having to withdraw all my forces, with the centre and left collapsing, the Union side unfortunately lost.

Before the game ended Andy’s Reb Cavalry had entered the battlefield and were heading for Mal’s men. Good fun game. Thanks to Dave Tuck for his refereeing and use of his figures.

Steve Walker’s 15mm Flames of War figures

2010-11-01T12:59:00.001Z

As promised on my previous post, here are my photo’s of Steve Walker’s 15mm Flames of War figures and vehicles, all German, plus his 28mm Romans.

Steve’s own photos can be found on his blog posts: 15mm Fow dak and 8th Army and had photo session at grimsby club last night.

Steve’s 28mm Romans

Panzer 4’s

Armoured car plus commanders. Notice the map laid out on the table

Mortar Crews.

I produced 13 photos in all from this little photoshoot. They can all be found on Flickr here

And Then There Were Three

2010-10-25T02:56:00.001+01:00

Three what? you may ask. 3 games last monday at the Grimsby Wargames Society.

As you can see left, there was an English Civil War game between Mark Temperton and Mark Alcock. I suspect that Mark won…..

Mike Barnatt, Ron Skeet, James, Dave Tuck and Steve Mercer playing a game of WW2 Russians v Germans using the Blitzkrieg Commander rules.

Andy Hamilton (left) and Mal Taylor playing a game of Pirates.

Mal Taylor’s Pirate Ship. Mal shivered Andy’s timbers because he got the treasure me hearties!

Steve Walker was also there on another table as he had brought his 15mm WW2 Germans and Romans along for Malc Johnston to do a photoshoot for the new “Official” club website at http://grimsbywargamessociety.webs.com

Malc unfortunately could not make it that night. Steve however didnt mind myeslf taking some photos of his figures. His photos will be my next post……

Blog Action Day 2010: Water

2010-10-15T11:23:00.001+01:00

(Photo left by Steven Chisholm).

To be honest when first thinking about this topic for Blog Action Day I was a little stumped. Stumped until I started looking more into the issue of water.

It was then it became clear to me that, like most people, I was taking the water I drank on a regular basis for granted.

Another surprising fact leapt out the web pages about water I was viewing….The amount of water available to the human race for consumption is very limited.

And this is why we take the water we drink and use for washing etc for granted:

(Photo left by Greenpeace International)

Pollution causes death and disease and renders water undrinkable. It destroys wildlife and habitation.

The photo is from the recent Hungary toxic sludge disaster in which the sludge not only killed people but did damage to property, the ground soil and local rivers. It reached the Danube and all life in the Marcal river, which feeds the famous Danube river, is said to have been wiped out.

(Photo left by Carl Lacasse)

Almost a billion people on this planet do not have access to clean drinking water. In some nations such as Africa, women may have to walk for miles to obtain any water and even then it may not be drinkable.

In July 2010 the United Nations declared access to clean water and sanitation a Human Right. Those people who are not getting both of those are therefore being denied their human rights.

(Photo by Leone Fabre)

Lack of water, sanitation and hygiene leads to diseases.

Diarrhoea and worm infestations follow as a lack of these basics we take for granted.

For those unfortunate to live in such unhygienic conditions, illness can result in death.

Bottled Water causes a terrible amount of waste mainly due to the amount of plastic left over after the water has been drunk.

Most plastic water bottles cannot be recycled and end up as litter. I actually recycle plastic bottles, some from bottled water, being a drinker of bottled water myself. No more drinking of bottled water for me.

It’d be easier to drink tap water…and less waste would result…

In many countries water is hard to come by and clean water is even scarcer. Appreciate the water you have by not wasting it! Follow this link for some water saving tips.

If you are interested in reading more about water including droughts and flooding, you should read the Guardian’s Newspaper Environmental Section which includes stories and information on the subject.

Blog Action Day on October 15th 2010

2010-10-12T12:56:00.002+01:00

Hey,
I wanted to let you know about an important online event I'm taking part in on October 15th, called Blog Action Day. Each year bloggers from more than 100 countries come together and blog about a single important issue, and this year's topic is clean water. The event includes thousands of blogs - including the White House blog and The Official Google Blog - and they're looking for as many blogs to participate as possible, regardless of their size and focus.
I hope you'll think about joining me for this event. If you want more information, check out the Blog Action Day site at http://blogactionday.change.org/.
Hope to see your post on the 15th!

GWS on Grimsby Telegraph Website

2010-09-30T10:30:00.001+01:00

Last Tuesday morning, the 21st September 2010, I emailed some photos I took at the Grimsby Wargames Society to my local paper The Grimsby Telegraph. To date none of them have yet been published in the paper but however have been put on display with other reader’s photos on the Grimsby Telegraph website (see left). It was mainly to see if this approach would work whilst at the same time hoping to raise the club’s profile. After all, someone might see a photo of some games at the club and try to track us down on google.

These 2 photos from a recent Rapid Fire! game will probably be on the website for many weeks as they will move along slowly on the slideshow the more other photos are added to it.

I therefore encourage other Grimsby Wargames Society members to send their wargames photos, with a caption, to the Grimsby Telegraph. For the details on how to do this read the Grimsby Telegraph: Your Pictures page. Those members who do wish to send some photos: Do not resize them! Send them at the original size they were downloaded from your camera.

It is my intention to keep on sending some pics of games at the club every few weeks to the Grimsby Telegraph and we’ll see what happens.

Rapid Fire! game 20th September 2010

2010-09-27T02:23:00.001+01:00

Andy Hamilton and Mal Taylor played a Rapid Fire! game. All the figures and vehicles in this game were owned by Mal Taylor who also set the scenario.

The scenario was that the Germans had to keep the road open so that their troops could withdraw down that route. In this game Andy was the Germans. To begin with Andy had a few companies of Germans.

Mal then sent in his paratroopers using those famous gliders of his. Mal’s gliders have been in the Rapid Fire! books as well as having been to many a wargames show such as the shows at Bovington Tank Museum.

As you can see 4 of Mal’s Gliders were in use in this game. Things were not going well for Andy, however, he was allowed reinforcements……

In the form of Panzer Grenadiers which appeared at the top of the road (nearest the wall) before dismounting them to attack the bridge.

Andy was determined to retake the Bridge….

Andy also had some Recce units come on shortly after the Panzer Grenadiers.

Sadly, as time was getting on, I did not see the final result of the game though it was highly unlikely that Andy won. He certainly put up quite a fight in order to try to achieve his objective.

The Gliders were not the only aircraft in this game. There was the Dakota Bomber (see left) and a Typhoon also in use.

Click on the thumbnails below to see a few more photos of this game.

Cavalry Encounter 20th September 2010

2010-09-26T15:47:00.001+01:00

Mike Barnatt and Tony Waumsley had a 7 years War game using Tony’s 15mm figures. Tony was French whilst Mike was the Prussians.

They were in fact playing a Scenario called Cavalry Encounter from a recent issue of Battlegames.

In this the French had to enter from one side of the table (bottom right in the photo) whilst the Prussians had to enter from the other end. The French had to keep the road clear so that they could move their forces through.
Unfortunately as the French did not achieve their objective they lost the game. There was lots of rallying and plenty of melees but ultimately the Prussian forces stopped them.

At the same time John Ogden, Paul Robinson of the Grimsby Wargaming blog and Mark Alcock were having an extremely lengthy discussion on WW1 rules. I was hoping they would get their figures out and play a game but they were so engrossed in the discussion it never happened. To hand they had the rulesets To the Last Man, Through the Mud and the Blood and Schwerpunkt, which our own WW1 club rules are loosely based upon.

The 2nd South Carolina String Band

2010-09-20T15:30:00.000+01:00

Following a link shared on Facebook by a friend I discovered the 2nd South Carolina String Band. After listening to their sound and music, I actually thought they weren’t bad at all. In addition having an interest in the American Civil War, listening to the 2nd South Carolina String Band was a bit like going back in time. The 2nd South Carolina String Band plays on American Civil War instruments, the songs they played and more importantly, the way the musicians would have played them at that time in history.

A few of their songs are below. The first song was actually sang at the 145th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg, in a field not far away from the battlefield itself. The 2nd song was sang exactly a year later in roughly the same location.

If you like these guys they have their own website. For a preview of their site click on the screenshot on the left. Their website address is http://civilwarband.com/

New Terrain being built at Grimsby

2010-09-20T15:00:00.000+01:00

Over the past few months at the Grimsby Wargames Society, Andy Hamilton and Mal Taylor have been building our new terrain boards.

It is my understanding that there will be around 26 pieces of new terrain although the types of terrain and the period they are designed for has yet to be decided.

Having watched both Andy and Mal create the WW1 Trench boards, I will be looking forward to their eventual finish.

The photo above is of Mal Taylor using a gluegun to glue some grass/shrubbery and stones etc onto an unpainted terrain board. It was taken on 13th September 2010.

As you can see from the photo on the left, the next stage will be to apply a dark brown “wash” to the board.

The Other Partizan 2010: Heated Exchange

2010-09-19T21:09:00.001+01:00

In this Heated Exchange Scenario, presented by Paul Darnell of Touching History at http://touchinghistory.blogspot.com, the town of Olite is being held by Sharpe’s 95th rifles and a small horde of Spanish Guerillas who are defending the bridge.

For this demo game Paul Darnell was ably supported by Ed (in the blue checked shirt), who is also another blogger. His blogger profile is here. His other blogs can be found here: http://modelmacedonianarmy.blogspot.com/ http://blackpowdergaming.blogspot.com/ and http://modelromanarmy.blogspot.com/.

Ed’s own report of the demo game he helped put on with Paul Darnell can be found at his Black Powder gaming blog here.

Personally I really liked the terrain and was quite impressed with the actual figures. The Buildings were really nice too. More information on the scenario can be found on The Touching History blog post Watch out the Spanish are about. Click here to read Paul Darnell’s Partizan report of the demo game. In the past I have been aware of The Touching History site and their games but perhaps not given them the attention they deserved. In future I will do.

Below are some of my photos from the Touching History game: