Twelve Worst Songs of Christmas

We are not amused.

It's that time of year again. Time to release der Alte Fritz's annual list of the twelve worst Christmas songs ever imaginable (at least to Fritz).

This year, we have a guest provider the dastardly dozen songs: my daughter Lelia Jane (better known as the world's reigning and undefeated champion of the Teddy Bear Wars).

The 2019 Guest List Judge

So without further ado, here is Lelia's list:


The Twelve Worst Christmas Songs - by Lelia Jane

1)  All I Want For Christmas Is You  - Mariah Carey

2)  Last Christmas (I Gave You My Love) - Wham!

3)  Dominick the Donkey

4)  I Want A Hippopotumus For Christmas

5)  Santa Baby - Eartha Kitt

6)  Have A Holly Jolly Christmas - Burl Ives

7)  Jingle Bell Rock - Bobby Helms

8)  Rocking Around the Christmas Tree - Brenda Lee

9)  Santa Baby (again) - Taylor Swift

10) Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer

11)  I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus - The Jackson Five

12)  Blue Christmas - Elvis


Some analysis by der Alte Fritz:

Some of these songs are on the "Worst" list because they are played over and over and over and over again on the radio. Others are just plain bad. None of them are caroling songs. Most of you younger boys and girls who follow my blog probably have no idea of what Christmas carols are or what carolers are. The first are only played on Christmas Eve and the second disappeared during my childhood, back in the Dark Ages. People used to gather at someone's house and go door to door singing Christmas carols.

Listening to "Have a Holly Jolly Christmas" 2000 times in one day will do this to you.

This year I have taken the sensible approach and refuse to play the 24-hour Christmas music station. As a result, I don't have to listen to the wailing of Mariah or the mind numbing lyrics of Have a Holly Jolly Christmas after hearing it for the two-thousandth time in one day.

You can compare Lelia Jane's list to my list from 2018:

Last Year's Dirty Dozen List


Der Alte Fritz and Family present the Dirty Dozen list of Christmas songs every year as a public service to our readers. Avoid listening to theses songs at all cost.

Litko Bases and a Dice Tower Too!

Litko dice tower

I ran out of my regular 2-inch square MDF bases that I use for my cavalry figures and my local FLGS did not have in stock. So what to do? I ordered what I needed from Litko Bases. For good measure, I also ordered a dice tower.

I could attach a house next to the tower and make a little vignette out of it.

My order arrived today, it only took about three days from order to deliver. Litko really does a good job on the delivery end of the business. Top notch customer service and great products make Litko hard to beat.

I want to paint and embellish the dice tower so that it looks like a building suitable for 18th Century warfare. I envision having four dice towers, one on each corner of my game table. The table rules would require that all dice be rolled in the dice tower or else the die roll does not count.

Searching for ideas on how to embellish the dice tower.
This one wouldn't work for obvious reasons.

Attaching a building to the other side of the tower might work

Not so good. It looks good but placing the add-on house next to the dice tray area
makes it hard to pick the dice out of the box.

Litko Figure Bases
I purchsed a 100-pack of 2-inch square bases to use for my cavalry units. I also needed some bases with a three inch frontage to use for small two stand cavalry units.

Two-inch square bases for my Russian Horse Grenadiers.

Three-inch frontage with a two-inch depth bases for my Gendarmerie de France cavalry.

Christmas Shopping at Target - For Terrain?

I went to the local Target Store today to buy some outdoor Christmas lights. Whilst there, I went rummaging through the Christmas ornaments section to see if I could find any potential wargame terrain items.

I found these galvanized steel towers, each with an American West style of wind mill. I won't need the windmills because these weren't used in Europe during the 18th Century. They would look nice in an 1800s farm or cowtown in the American West.

A pair of candleholders would make for a good town gate for a walled city.

The towers measure 5-inches from the base to the roof eaves, and 8-inches to the peak of the roof. The diameter of the can is 3.25 inches. The roof already has a tile pattern on it so I could just paint it without any embellishments. I don't think that I want to get too involved in geometry to try and tile the roof myself, but we shall see.

I will prime the metal black and either glue paper stone wall around the tower or slather it will Red Devil Pre-Mixed Spackle for wallboards, then paint a stucco color. I would imagine that the twin towers would be glued to a thin plywood base for starters. Then I can make a section of wall that attaches the two towers together at about the height of the second story of windows. The I could make a half round arch over the entrance.

Once the towers and gateway are made and based, then I could make sections of town walls that would abut the gateway section.

Russian Horse Grenadiers in Summer Waistcoats

Russian Horse Grenadiers in Waistcoats. The officers always wore their blue coats.

I finished painting a 12-figure squadron of the new Minden Russian Horse Grenadiers in Summer waistcoats. The regiment can be made using one pack of MRC-006 Horse Grenadier Command (officer, standard bearer and musician) and three packs of MRC-008 Horse Grenadiers in Waistcoats (3 per pack). If you are more interested in the rank and file wearing blue coats, then select MRC-007 Horse Grenadiers to fill out your unit.

The buff colored waistcoat with blue cuffs and collar is an attractive uniform and provides a nice contrast to the regular blue coats worn by the horse grenadiers and dragoons. During the Summer campaign season all of the cavalry shed their coats and fought wearing the sleeved waistcoat, even the cuirassiers.

The officers and musicians always wore their regular blue coats regardless of the season, I suppose to make them easier to see by the rank and file cavalrymen.

I ordered some 2-inch square bases from Litko and will have to wait until they arrive before I can attach the horse grenadiers to the bases, two horse per base, or a 1-inch frontage per horse.

So which regiment are these fellow? It doesn't matter, they can be any regiment because all horse grenadiers wore the same uniforms and there were no regimental distinctions.

The Wargamers' Annual 2020 Has Arrived

The new Wargamers' Annual 2020 by Charles S. Grant and a host of other wargamers .

My copy of the Wargamers' Annual 2020 ("Annual") arrived in the mail today. Charles S. Grant organizes and edits the Annual each year and it is published by Partizan Press. I am a regular contributor the Annuals so I get to have a brief moment of fame when one of my articles is published therein.

This year's Annual is a full-color 72-page publication with articles by 12 wargamers from around the world. While it is an eclectic collection of articles on various subjects, I am particularly pleased and honored to see that Minden Miniatures and Crann Tara Miniatures are prominently featured throughout the book:

Invasion 1744 (Part 2) by Graham Cummings. The article continues Graham's account of a  hypothetical French invasion of Britain during the War of Austrian Succession. As you can imagine, there are lots of lovely Crann Tara figures on display.

Let's Get...Small by Jim Purky. My article talks about skirmish level wargames for the Seven Year War in Europe. Again, what a coincidence, there are lots of pictures of Minden Miniatures throughout the article.

My Summer Painting Challenge Diary by Stokes Schwartz.  Stokes recounts his painting challenge to paint a large battalion of Minden Prussian grenadiers - the challenge being to finish all of the figures within one month.

The variety of articles covers historical eras such as Alexander the Great, the ECW, WW1 air battles, the Meiji Restoration in Japan, British Colonial Sudan adventures, the Spanish Civil War, Romans vs. Gauls, and how to build your own dice tray.

A quick perusal and thumb through of the book indicates that there are a lot quality, well-written pieces and I plan to employ my usual strategy of reading it cover to cover, starting with the very first article and working my way in exact page order until I reach the end. Thus my first read is Dale Smith's "Chaeronea 338BC" article. The game played out historically with the Macedonians defeating the Greeks, however, Alexander was not so great this day.

At the end of the book, there is more eye candy with the "Vignette Challenge" in which authors and/or readers submit the historical vignettes that they have painted and based. And finally, Charles mentions how walking historical battlefields contributes greatly to his understanding of the battle and he has issued a challenge for someone to write a piece about visiting a battlefield today.  Hmm, I just might take up that challenge for my article in the 2021 Annual.

Battle of Leuthen Day

Entrance to the Leuthen churchyard, defended by the Rot Wurzburg regiment

December 5th is the anniversary day of Frederick the Great's victory in the Battle of Leuthen, fought December 5, 1757. Leuthen was Frederick's signature battle, featuring the employment of the Prussian oblique order tactics, and is probably what established Frederick as one of the great captain-generals in history.

I have posted some of the pictures of the Leuthen church that I took in October 2016 when I visited the site during Christopher Duffy's guided tour.

You can see the relative height of the church walls by comparing it to the people.
That is Christopher Duffy in the center-right of the picture.

The signature round corner walls of the Leuthen church

Another view of the corner round walls

A street view of the village of Leuthen shows that it is relatively unchanged from how it would have appeared in the 18th Century (save for the asphalt road pavement and the power lines in the distance)

Relatively flat terrain around Leuthen made for easy maneuvering during the battle.

And now, some pictures of my wargame of Leuthen fought on December 5, 2016, featuring the Prussian attack on the left flank of the Reichs Army troops.

Prussian Guards brigade (left) rolling over the Wurtemburg troops.

Austrian artillery battery is about to be charged in the flank by the Prussian Black Hussars.

Prussian 12-pound Brummers advance and deploy on the Juden-berg
to provide close artillery support for the Prussian attack.

Action on the Austrian left flank. The Prussians have cleared the Reichs Army troops from Sagschutz and prepare to strike Austrian infantry in the flank.

Huge cavalry scrum near Sagschutz on the Austrian left flank.

Austrian infantry wheels left and forms a new battle line that faces the Prussian attack around Sagschutz

Austrians and Prussians engage in a firefight.

An overview of the battle of Leuthen on the Austrian left flank.

Every so often I recreate the Battle of Leuthen on the tabletop, and while I did not do so this year, my photo archive is well stocked with photos of Leuthen games.

Tiberius Canis

Ty is highly focused on the love of his life, Mrs. Fritz

We got the biopsy back on Tiberius ' ("Ty" for short) and he has hermangia, cancer of the blood vessels. And while the doctors removed all of the cancerous tumor several weeks ago, we were told that Ty has a particularly aggressive form of cancer and that tumors  can return at any time.

Ty is given 2 to 3 months to live in all likelihood. With some medicinal treatments his life could extend 6 to 12 months. So we are going to give that a try, but we are not going to do chemotherapy due to the side effects. We will bring Ty back to the vet on a monthly basis to monitor the cancer and to be able to make an informed decision as to when to put Ty down.

For now, Ty seems to be his happy old self. He has a good appetite again and he is raring to go on longer walks again, but the vet told us to start with short walks and let him build up to doing longer walks.

Ty's favorite sleeping position, on his back.

Ty always has to have a soft toy in his mouth.

This morning, I went to the post office to mail some Fife and Drum Miniatures orders, and I took Ty along with me. He was very well behaved inside the post office and everyone wanted to pet him. Golden Retrievers have that effect on people - everybody loves a Golden and they soon attract a lot of attention when you bring them somewhere.

I don't normally bring Ty with me when I'm doing errands, but this time I thought, "why not?"  I plan to take him with me more often as I do my errands in the coming months and spend as much time with him as possible.

Sale 20% Discount Extended One More Day to Tuesday Dec. 3rd

A couple of people were having problems with the shopping cart not adding items that are ordered. So I am extending the Black Friday Week Sale by one more day to Tuesday December 3, 2019 to accomodate anyone having a gremlin glitch. Enter coupon code LP1998 and then click "Apply" to get the 20% discount.

I think that the problem might be attempting to purchase Regimental Packs ("RP"s), which I have made unavailable during the Black Friday Week Sale, because RPs are already sold at a discount and it doesn't make sense to discount a product that is already sold at a discount. Once the sale is over I will turn the availability back on for the RPs. RPs are sold at discounts varying from 12% to 17% so you could order individual packs that would be the equivalent of an RP, but you would get a 20% discount instead of the lower RP discount.

I have done  a couple of test orders and everything seems to be working OK. If you are still having a problem with the shopping cart, then Plan B is to send me an email with your order and then I will send you an invoice via PayPal to complete your order.

My email address is:

altefritz1740@yahoo.com

Any email order received prior to 11:59PM Central Standard Time on Tuesday December 3, 2019 will be given the 20% discount.

cheers,

Jim