As you will see, these are the Royal Horse Guards. The castings are Hinton Hunt OPC BN60 - as far as possible I've kept Eric's painting - I've repaired chips and freshened faded colours, and occasionally tweaked things to match the house style, but the spirit lives on. The splendid conversions for the officer and trumpeter are by Count Goya, to whom I offer most appreciative thanks.
My Napoleonic collection has been consciously confined to the Peninsular War for many years - in fact (to my subsequent regret), I have been known to pass over or get rid of items which did not fit with that narrow (though large) focus. Recently I have been working on a Bavarian Napoleonic army, so units for the Danube campaign came into scope, and now the arrival of some of Eric's old soldiers has brought the possibility of adding some specifically Waterloo-period units. Anyway, here's the first.
Eric's regiments were rather larger than mine, so I have spare figures left over. I hadn't meant to, but I now realise it would make sense to produce a unit of Life Guards to keep the RHG company. Goya has added further impetus to this idea by producing command conversions for them in advance, so I'll get on with the regiment. Sadly, I am one casting short - it is possible to convert and recarve and so on to get the extra man, but I thought I would brass it out and ask here: does anyone have a spare Hinton Hunt BN60, the British Household Cavalry trooper (charging)? I shall be delighted to do swaps, pay you actual money, wash your car, take your children for a walk - anything - name your price. I only need one.
Topic 2 - Waste Management
This crops up from time to time - not a rant, really. I read recently about a certain city in England where a primary schoolteacher contacted the local council last year, and said that her class of 7-year-olds were very fired up on the topic of saving the planet, and they were very keen to come along and see how the local authority deals with recycling and so on - would there be any chance of a class outing to the rubbish processing plant?.
She met a surprising amount of hesitancy, she thought - resistance to the idea, in fact. It turns out that the council are not actually doing any recycling at the moment. The residents clean and sort out their recyclable domestic waste, place it all carefully in separate dustbins, as instructed, but when the wagons take it away the whole bloody lot all goes into the same landfill site as the general waste. When she expressed a little disappointment, she got a lecture from the department head. Once they used to sift through it all and send it for suitable processing, then the problem became too large, they couldn't get the staff to do the work, so they started (apparently) sending containers full of plastic and glass waste to China. Then China stopped importing the stuff, so now landfill is the solution. She was told that they realised it wasn't an ideal situation, but proper recycling is not economically viable. They have a duty to the ratepayers to keep costs down etc etc.
OK - I can see there's a problem here, and I hesitate to rush to make worthy suggestions, but I did have some sympathy for the teacher's suggestion that the council's economic model might change a little if they were hit with a very large fine every time they did this. The ratepayers might even have something to say about it, too.
Just as well that environmental issues aren't important, really, isn't it?
The new unit of Royal Horse Guards looks dashing! How much fun it has been to see Mr. Knowles' collection get new life here and there with several wargamers around Bloglandia U.K. as it is dispersed and renewed. Very eager to see the Life Guards take shape too. With regard to the recycling, I suspect this is what's happening here in the U.S. (though I hope I am wrong). As you point out, recycling doesn't come cheap, and there is simply too much of the stuff. More than anyone wants, or can deal with at this point if we are brutally honest. Maybe the solution is to require everyone to dress in futristic and egalitarian uniforms of earthtone-olored pilled fleeces and those velcro closure Teva water sport sandals? Aren't both items made from recycled plastics? In my darker moments, and every time there is news about some possible nearby planet that might support life like our own, I have the sobering thought, "Great. So we can eventually colonize and/or turn that place into a huge landfill too, gradually killing another world."
ReplyDeleteHappy Saturday,
Stokes
Hi Stokes - I once read somewhere that the US Govt had turned down a proposal to dump nuclear waste into space - this was a long time ago...
DeleteYour horse guards are first class.
ReplyDeleteAs to the other issue it ably demonstrates the con job that is taking place everywhere and how we are being left to believe action is being taken. Our kids/grandkids are being sold down the river by politicians who only look 3-5 years down the line and aren't bothered about what happens later - not their problem!
Hi Graham - I believe this smoke and mirrors act over rubbish disposal is pretty widespread. I don't know about you, but our domestic waste these days is about 60% OTT plastic packaging from our groceries courtesy mostly of Tesco. Not necessary, a lot of it - if I buy an apple pie in a cardboard box, I don't really need to see it - I can imagine what an apple pie looks like, but the manufacturer/retailer insists on putting a plastic window in the box, so the box can't be recycled. I don't need my 6-pack of yogurts to be contained in an extra box with more adverts on. Somebody, somewhere, is making huge money out of making and selling plastic packaging - they may even be a contributor to party funds, who knows? There's a lot of lip service paid to this - if the local community councils really did have to pay huge fees/fines for dumping excess plastic, and if this cost were passed onto the residents/electors through local tax, we really would see shoppers refusing to buy items in inappropriate packaging, retailers actually doing something about shaping their marketing policy to defend the environment. If these buggers only care about money, the answer seems to be to hit them right where it hurts. This is probably getting a bit like a rant now....
DeleteBloody bottled water!
ReplyDeleteI have a refillable plastic Camel-bak water bottle - I take it everywhere, I sit with it when I'm painting or reading, even put it on my bedside table at night - haven't had bottled water for a while. I am lucky, I guess, in that our local water comes from a reservoir in the Lammermuir Hills.
DeleteGood man! I blame the EU encouraging us to adopt foreign ways. Tap water was good enough for us in the old days before we joined the Common Market. We didn’t have any of that environmental damage malarkey in those days.
DeleteThat's interesting - when I was a kid, I used very occasionally to drink a glass of water if I was specially thirsty, but this idea of forcing down 2.5 litres a day to keep healthy would have seemed crazy. Maybe we got more water in our food in those days?
DeleteNever mind, Tony, you're clearly doing your bit by recycling old Hinton Hunts. My compliments to Goya, by the way, for his terrific conversions. Is he soldering them?
ReplyDeleteI haven't got any BN 60s, but I shall look out for you!
All the best
WM
Belay that. I do have one! He's on his way to you Dear Chap.
DeleteYoung sir, you are indeed a hero. Ein echter Held, as we used to say in Europe. Thanks very much.
Delete'Couldn't get the staff...' Tripe. Wouldn't pay the staff enough to get them. Complete lack of political will. Politicians of every stamp are pretty much useless, by and large. The few that aren't have the dead weight of the utterly feckless bunch of crud that call themselves 'movers and shakers'. Not a lot of moving and shaking to see here.
ReplyDeleteNew Zealand has the same problem. A few years ago a recycling sorting place down Dunedin way was about to close down. That place employed Down Syndrome and other sorts of people who would not usually find employment, a worthy project.
Not economic, they said. I know the issue kicked up a popular ruckus at the time, but I don't recall the outcome. Without the public kicking up a row, the politicians would have let the thing sink.
They have a bally funny idea of economics and all.
I guess changes in the minimum wage, and the enforcement thereof, and reductions in the supply of young Eastern Europeans prepared to come to the UK and work hard to make some money - these have certainly made it harder for councils to paper over the cracks, but the whole idea of making citizens more responsible for handling and sorting their own rubbish is mostly to do with cutting down the number of employees on the Cleansing Dept wage-bill. Hypocrisy abounds.
DeleteThese economic changes are going to have a huge impact on the UK farming industry as well, I think. Why would these kids want to come to a festering country like this anyway?
Tony, your Horse Guards are a lovely addition and of course you must have the Life Guards alongside them. I had not realised that your recent acquisition included Napoleonics, what a bonus for you.
ReplyDeleteAs for recycling, that is disgraceful, heads should roll for that in the current political climate. Guess all the money was spent on bloody Brexit!
Hi Lee - yes, there's a lot to be getting on with!
DeleteWaste disposal - if heads roll, which bucket shall we put them in? General waste? Food waste?...
Oh, Tony, you are on fine form today! "Biohazard" bucket seems fitting.
DeleteJon - it's only laughing that keeps me from weeping.
DeleteGrand looking toy soldiers Tony...
ReplyDeleteAnd you also have your extra man.... :-)
As to waste disposal and recycling... when my parents were growing up and to an extent in the early sixties when I was but a lad ... there was the rag and bone man and sixpence deposit on a lemonade bottle... day to day recycling was the norm and more so in the 19th century... I don’t really understand why it’s become so difficult... other than laziness, greed or stupidity.
It’s interesting how shocked some countries were when China said... we don’t want your shit anymore...
Anyway... enough.... I could rant for my country on this subject.... ;-o
All the best. Aly