If It Weren't for Rainstorms, There Wouldn't Be Rainbows... on Fire

I would say my past week was turned up to 11, but that is my normal week. After a great weekend, my car decided to make some ridiculous noises coming home Tuesday night. Luckily I was meeting my wife and kids to do grocery shopping, so I had a ride back to the house. My friendly mechanically inclined neighbor and I drove back to the parking lot in sleet and ice to give the engine everything but an absolute death certificate.

After days of borrowing vehicles, sharing rides, and being homebound, the situation isn’t much better, but the light at the end of the tunnel is less likely to be an oncoming train.

Upon towing the car to my neighbor’s father-in-law’s garage, he found a tiny piece of one of the spark plugs had sheared off and landed inside one of the pistons. At last report, they were still trying to fish the tiny piece of metal through a tiny hole with a tiny magnet on a string. If they were unsuccessful today, they start to take it apart to remove it and check for damage. If there is significant damage, I need to contact Harry’s U-Pull-It for an engine.

Thank God the tax return decided to hit Wedesday morning at 8am. Regardless, I’ll still be making it to Cold Wars next weekend. My days and budget are all dependent, of course, on the status of car. I’m compiling multiple shopping list scenarios so I can start Samoa and not drain the bank account. If my wife is already making DisneyWorld/cruise plans for 2014, I can still dream that I still have a hobby.

I know Jim Stanton is ready and raring to run the mega-game with his 551 gnomes.  Throw in a few units from me, a half dozen from "the Canadians," and at least 10 players coming in with their own units, and we'll have over 1,000 figures covering three giant tables.  Should be glorious fun.

This weekend I NEED to get through my closet in the house and reassemble my gnome forces, touch up any paint jobs, especially the hats on the British Marines, paint up some low-impact Legions of Steel minis to relax, and finalized my CW shopping lists.  My buddy Steve and our friend Jeff plan on continuing the guy's weekend tradition, so if all is well I have some Friday night crash space.

And although I'm behind on my Cthulhu Actual Play reports, Jugular Josh managed to play with us and wrote up his own little version of the affair. I won’t admit to laughing out loud and blushing at the same time while reading his post.