I Am Packing My Bags!

I have been bagging Minden inventory over the past couple of weeks, almost nonstop, so it seems. I am happy to say that most of the "bagging and packaging" of figures is largely completed. Now all that is left is to tidy up some loose ends such as printing and laminated my QRC charts for my rules and updating my catalog handouts.

The pictures below illustrate some of the packing and organized chaos that has taken over the Man Cave. Saturday evening I completed the tear down of the Zorndorf terrain and packed it up into boxes. The trees alone take up five boxes. The foam insulation boards are seated under my game mat in order to create contours.

All of the Minden inventory is getting bagged and transferred to traveling bins
to use at the SYW Association  Convention next week.

This year I am not bringing the rolling plastic drawers (6 drawers stacked atop each other) that normally hold my bagged stock, instead, replacing them with flat sweater boxes that I can lay out on the dealer table -- this actually reduces the footprint of the stock containers and also makes it easier for customers to inspect and look at the figures that they are hopefully interested in purchasing. I will take pictures of my dealer booth after it is set up so that you can see what the final product looks like.

My Russian army is packed away in three storage bins, ready to travel to South Bend.

The Definition of Insanity is...

Last night I did an experimental packing of my car/vehicle to see how much space it had - none actually - in the hope that I would not have to rent a commercial van. Alas, no. The combination of carrying dealer stock and terrain items for my wargame proved to be too much for my van. So it's off to Hertz or Enterprise car rental today to book a vehicle for the weekend. The alternative is to severely cut back on either my stock or downsize my game, but neither of those seem like viable options.

Going forward, I think that I have to choose a lane and stay in it: either be a dealer at the show or just be a game judge/host. Doing both is starting to wear me out. I am very tired right now, having worked on convention preparations almost non-stop since last September. Too much hobby ruins the hobby for me. I look forward to the convention, but I also look forward to it being over so that I can resume a more liesurely pace to my hobby activities.

Some Changes in the Future

After I return from the convention I plan on repainting the game room and maybe replacing the old worn carpet with something new. I'm thinking of a color scheme of cream-yellow with white woodwork trim. The light grey commerical carpet does a wonderful job of hiding the dirt that accumulates so I will probably use a similar type of carpet in the new upgrade. The Man Cave is in bad need of an upgrade, having served me well for these last 14 years. 

As I was moving tables around, thinking about how to get all of "the stuff" away from the walls and into the center of the room in preparation for the painters, I decided to reduce the size of my game table from 6ft x 15ft to 6ft x 12ft. The extra table space is nice, but I often don't use it or need it. Reducing the table size will open up the sitting area of the room where I can sit in a comfy old stuffed chair and ottoman while reading Duffy and sipping on a single malt Scotch and wearing comfortable slippers and a smoking jacket, etc. (more likely, Diet Coke and sweat pants and worn out running shoes, but that doesn't present an attractive picture now, does it?)