I have often walked down this street before

Another week dominated by Family Duty I'm afraid, where wargaming was relegated to a back seat.

I'm still waiting for those fine fellows at Ambush Alley Games to approve my joining the AA forums so I can ask for confirmation that we're now on the right track with the rules. Since I first applied to join the forum back in March and still hadn't received confirmation that my account had been activated, I registered anew on Monday. Usually these sorts of things only take a day or so, but four days later and I've still heard nothing, despite polite emails to the forum administrator.

The modern 15mm/20mm debate still rages on. I've dugout the figures I ordered from Rebel at the start of the year (plus a few from Peter Pig, QRF, The Scene and the Irregular Miniatures figures I already had). Together they make a decently sized lead mountain. Combined with my old 15mm SF figure collection, all of which need stripping, rebasing and repainting, they make a sizeable lead mountain range.

15mm = I already have loads

1/72 or 20mm = I have a small selection of figures (bought as pedestrians for Hot Wheels-scale autoduelling games)... BUT

15mm = I'm collecting solo

20mm= I have another gamer nearby in the same scale.

15mm = cheaper and easier to assemble wargaming vehicles vs plastic kits

20mm = even chaper die-cast toys for civilian vehicles and technicals (there are more 1/72 compatible Matchbox/Hot Wheels than 15mm compatible.) Also 00 scale model railway scenery and equipment. BUT likely to be missing key vehicle types, which would need to be bought as more expensive plastic kits.

Brain still hurting......

In happier news, on my one free day this week I visited Lark Hill Place at the Salford Museum. It's a reconstruction of a Victorian street that I had the vaguest memory of visiting when I was a small child. With no knowledge of where it was, and looking for a bit of Victoriana inspiration, I decided to try to find it for a revisit. After finding numerous similar streets dotted around the country, I managed to find it, located on the campus of my old Alma Mater no less. So on Wednesday I trotted down there.

The museum itself has four galleries and a library in addition to the Lark Hill exhibit. There's not much in the way of exposition available - you basically walk onto the street and it is what it is, with no signs or information about what you're looking at. The lighting on the street is also kept very low, giving the impression of a murky, gaslit night. This makes taking photographs very difficult, as the light is too low for modern digital camera's preview screens to pick anything up without the flash, so you're reduced to point & pray. I've enhanced the photo attached to this post considerably so you can see some of the detail in the scene.

Finally the buildings are all copies of buildings from around Salford and Manchester (or in some cases, the actual building frontages themselves, salvaged when the buildings were being demolished). Because they are from different areas, you have a wide disparity of building styles - the polished Georgian stone of an upper-class townhouse right next to the crude brickwork of a blacksmith's shop.

Though I did honestly find it a bit of a disappointment, I did pick up some useful tips, like the way the guttering was fixed to the walls and how narrow the pavements are. I was also happy to note that the pavement was raised slightly above the road. Nowhere near as high as a modern kerb, but noticeable nonetheless, which makes my plan of having building with pavements resting on top of a cobblestone base a perfectly acceptable one.

Plans for the weekend - start painting the VSF Fenians that I undercoated last week, make a decision on the 15mm/20mm modern question and put together a couple of forces for the Paradiso army & rebels for Force On Force.