Corporations can help.....if they want to.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23377190

Hey! Wait a minute. I want a google phone number!

So what?

A man of consequence from England, circa 1585










A man of consequence, United States, circa 2008






A man of consequence in Eastern Africa.


Unless you want to actually make an argument, we are done here.... (And trust me, you don't want to go there.)

And another one gone....

Radcon has come and gone yet again, and much fun was had by all. HOTT GotS went well, and looked good, but I only took one photo as I was having too much fun and forgot:

During a lull, Rick Ingram and I took out a couple of biplanes and Rick's Richthofen shot the ... out of my Rickenbacker, reversing history.

My big event was Stones River and I took a panorama of the table at setup:


Lots of experienced gamers involved, Phil and Terry gave poor McCook to Joe who had helped playtest at War Eagles and Bryan, (a new guy) and Terry's buddy Kayle had the Confederates.

McCook got buried in the first turns by a flood of gray, unhampered this time by bad command die rolls.

Terry tried something I've thought should have been tried before and continued Crittendon's assault across the river and was in a fair way to annihilating Breckenridge when the Recrimination phase ensued (we ran out of time). But with McCook annihilated without extracting much in the way of casualties from Hardee, I have to wonder how well Thomas (in a much more open field than Chickamauga) could have stood against Hardee AND Polk with no help available but the Union Cavalry....

We had a lot of newbs for the HOTT Tournament, so it was more like open gaming than tournament, but Hunter looks like a likely recruit for starting an army of his own, and another player whose name I don't remember signed up on the HOTT list and is looking for a copy of the rule book.... Good signs. I have posted many pictures of the armies before and the only new one available was Andrew's insect army which still has not seen the elephant, so I didn't go find the camera for the event.

Laura asked me to take on Gaming Chair for next year, apparently for lack of stupidity on the part of other available parties, so I have an official position on the concom again. I foresee hate and discontent, and then another successful con....

Now.

Caucus

Well, we caucused at Kennewick High School yesterday. I made Jennifer go along to cancel my indifference, since Edwards is out. Of the eleven people caucusing, it started with 6 for Obama, 4 for Clinton and Kucinich die hard. The Kucinich die hard was persuaded to the Obama camp and the delegates broke 3 for Obama and 1 for Clinton. I was elected one of the Obama delegates and the Clintonistas are sending Jennifer (she says "How'd that happen?"), so now we will go to the legislative district caucus and cancel each other again! Edwards for somebody's vice president!

Kimberlyn went along as ground guide, she has written her on post on the subject on her blog.

Andrew's Bug Army

Regular readers may recall that I promised Andrew I would build an army for Sparky, his Aerial Hero, to command. Herewith are the bugs....

The front rank is a Scorpion (Blade), a giant spider (Shooter), a giant ant (Behemoth) and another giant spider (Shooter). The second rank is four spider Hordes and the rear rank is the aerial contingent, two flyers flanking Sparky.

Andrew woke up and followed the army like a moth to a flame....

A picture worth a thousand words....

Air War

There will be Wings of War at RadCon! The reprint of the planes arrived at Infinite Frontiers this month. (Finally!) I picked up enough planes to have a good furball and there are more if anybody likes the game. Since they didn't get here in time to schedule the game, we'll just fly them over HOTTGotS. It won't hurt the spirit of the event. ;o)

Wings of War is the simplest aerial game ever, but it is complex in it's simplicity. It takes about 30 seconds to learn the rules, five minutes to get the hang of flying and you can play for as long as your interest lasts and get better at outguessing your opponent, or get creamed if you are too predictable. This is GREAT Fun! Drop by the gaming room and take a plane out for a spin....

The miniatures are painted in the personal schemes of famous aces. Here is the Hun Formation in closeup, the infamous Red Baron (Curse you!), Ernst Udet, second only to Richthofen in that garish Albatross D.Va and Arthur Rahn (6 victories) in the lead, 'cause you have to have a victim on point.....

The Horse Race

Josh Michael at Talking Points Memo:

It's about delegates. It's dead even. You've got two well-funded candidates who've demonstrated an ability to power back from defeats. And neither is going anywhere.

Whatever the mass media wants to put in the headlines or the campaigns want to say for themselves, that's the fact, jack. It (The Dem nomination) ain't over 'til it's over.

HOTT GotS Ready to Go

The armies for HOTT GotS are done, completa, fin... On the right are the Old Glory figures as Lee the Magician and Grant the Cleric. The Union army has some available alternatives, you can choose from generic infantry as Spear with some Zouaves or Western troops in Hardee hats rather than kepis, and a stand of black troops as Warband, any six stands out of the available nine.... Hidden behind the Zouaves is Berdan's Sharpshooters as Sneakers, giving you an option of two artillery or one artillery and the Sharpshooters. The Cavalry on the left are either one stand of Riders or one stand of Knights if you use the stand with GA Custer on it....

The Confederate army doesn't have any options, seven stands of AK-47 armed infantry as Blades; one stand of artillery; one Lurker (Mosby's Partisan Rangers on the left in the photo) to make the AP come out at 24; one stand of Knights with JEB Stuart in command and Lee as the Magician....

Now all I need is to come up with something for a stronghold....