Hooptedoodle #170 - Donkey Award - Even the Scammers Are Crap

Phone rang at 9 o’clock this morning. It was almost like a long-lost friend had called. I had spoken briefly to this presence when I answered the phone at my mother’s house a year or two ago, but they’ve taken a long time to get round to me. Now they were calling – I felt almost honoured.

A gentleman from the Indian subcontinent asked for me by name – he was polite, though his English wasn’t very good. The number showed in the caller display

008045550164

He said that there was “a problem with the Windows” and if I was near my computer I must help him to fix it. It would just take a few minutes, and I had to do this.

I told him I knew who he was, and where he was, and what he was doing. I told him that the call was being recorded (untrue), and could he please give me his name, so that I could pass it to the police?

“Oh no,” he said, “no need to go to all that trouble – this is the Windows Support, this is what I told you already.”

I know what happens next – the caller gets the victim to fire up Windows, to run eventvwr, displaying a supposed pile of (spurious) error codes. Then he gets him to sign up to some fake extended guarantee, which will require a credit card payment, and then he persuades him to allow remote access to his computer, where they can implant any malware they wish, and through which they can (and will) delete key system files if the card details turn out to be invalid, often demanding immediate payment to undo the damage.

Monday mornings are a bit low on excitement here, but I was (frankly) disappointed that the young man was untroubled by being told that I knew he was a villain, and was quite prepared to carry on where we had left off. I got bored with him and hung up. I am surprised they keep this going – the scam is famous – it has been widely known as the Microsoft (sic) Scam since about 2007. Obviously it must still be making money for them, though I would have thought that a credit card transfer was traceable – mostly I am surprised that the scammers have not been arrested or dismembered.

So – action point for today – if it isn’t there already, put the number I noted above in your phone’s directory, with the name LOW LIFE SCUM against it, so you know not to speak to them if they ring you. I am vaguely interested in where they got my phone number and name, and how they know my BT account details, since my phones are ex-directory and BT’s records are supposed to be confidential. Not to worry, but bad people are not usually as limp as these guys – my brush with them wasn’t even entertaining.

Poor show all round.

Callan - any good? - any opinions?

Short and rather pathetic request for help...

I have been offered (at a very cheap price) two new, shrink-wrapped box sets of DVDs which between them cover series 1 and 2 of the old Callan TV show (in monochrome, including the original pilot programme A Magnum for Schneider) and series 3 and 4 (by which time the programmes were filmed in colour).

Apart from the legendary wargaming scenes (which I do not believe I have ever seen, even on YouTube), I feel that this is probably a worthwhile buy at the price anyway, as a piece of vintage TV.

Problem is that I probably saw maybe two of the original shows (they date from a period when I mostly didn't own a TV), and I have found on recent nostalgia trips that vintage TV was often embarrassingly poor. So I am torn - half of me says "Yeah! - Callan! - great", and the other half says "but what do I know about Callan? - I never saw it - I have no opinion".

Anyone out there a Callan fan? - would you recommend the series? (it is very cheap).

ECW Campaign - Big Finish - The Battle of Brockleymoor, 1644

To resume our tale of the English Civil War in North Lancashire and Cumbria in 1644…

Capt Groves' Royalist firelocks occupied the churchyard at Leaning St Mary's,
but did not delay the brigade of the Earl of Dunbar for long

After the Battle of High Cark, the King’s forces were contained in the town of Lowther and the fortress of Erneford, on the River Arith, in north Lonsdale. The victorious Army of Parliament went into one of its habitual phases of re-organising itself, with the result that very little effort was made to lay siege to either of these places, or even to seal them from the outside world, and in early May the Royalists marched out of their supposed prisons with breathtaking synchronisation, meeting no serious opposition at all, and headed north toward the Royalist town and castle of Penrith, where they were to be joined by a reinforcement sent from the garrison of Carlisle. It is evident that communication between Carlisle and the valley of Arith had been untroubled by the presence of the blockading troops. 

So complete was the surprise achieved by this move that it took a few days for the Parliament forces to set up a pursuit.

The reinforcement had not yet reached Penrith when they got there, so the King’s men continued northwards, eventually meeting up with a force commanded by the military governor of Carlisle, Lord Peterkin Maule, near the town of Lazonby, two days' march beyond Penrith. This additional column brought from Carlisle consisted of the regiments of foot of Col Thomas Ganesbrough, Col Hendrik Penny, Col Charles Martindale and Col George Crompton, the regiments of horse of Lord Maule and of Col Josiah Trimbull and a couple of serviceable guns from the Carlisle garrison.

The augmented army turned to confront the pursuing Parliament force and met them near the village of Plumpton, in Cumberland, at what has become known as the Battle of Brockleymoor, on 27^th May 1644.

[The size of the forces involved, together with my beta-test “Brigade Orders” activation rule, required a raid on the spares box to raise extra officers, who were temporarily mounted on coins for the occasion - my apologies for the Old School informality.]

At the head of the Allied army, Sir Henry Figge-Newton was conspicuous by his absence – he had travelled to London on private business, and so the overall command devolved to the capable (though unloved) Sir Nathaniel Aspinall, who kept the Covenant forces in distinct brigades but took the admirable step of placing the Scottish general, William Geddes, in command of all the Allied Foot.

The field is fairly open – one fordable stream flows into an odd, swampy sink-hole, which was a no-go area at this time of year. The hills occupied by the Royalist line are not high, though the slopes were slippery after a period of rain. I hope to give a rudimentary narrative through the picture captions. The general style of the terrain is moorland fells, lightly wooded.

 General view from behind the Royalist left - Darracott held a symmetrical
line, cavalry on each flank, while the Allies placed their main weight on
their left, with extra horse in support of the centre. The village of Plumpton
is the middle of the Royalist position

Col Frayne's Northumbrian troops in the Royalist right wing

View from behind the position of Sir Marmaduke Davies' reserve brigade,
towards Geddes' slow but sure advance

Royalist dragoons at the lead mine, on the extreme left flank, had a very quiet day

After some delays caused by problems with orders, Geddes' left flank is ready to attack

Aspinall's plan (his army is on the far side) was to attack with his stronger left,
then to advance his right if the Royalist army started to shift reserves to support
their own right, but the day was decided before that.

Darracott was determined to hold his cavalry back, but the dice determined
that Broadhurst, on the Royalist right, saw an opportunity to harrass the flank
of the Parliament attack

Broadhurst had greater numbers, and handled his troopers well enough, but
his men could not fight for toffee. These are not the sort of dice you need when
fighting cavalry

Yet again, the fate of the Royalist horse suddenly became critical to the outcome
- this picture shows a sort of high-water mark, as Broadhurst's men have pushed
back the advance, but themselves have taken a battering. [Red counters are losses,
other colours denote the brigading]

It took a while, but the infantry attack finally goes in - Sir Julius Mossley has the leading brigade

The Parliamentarian cavalry brigade of Sir Beardsley Heron became the
surprise heroes of the day - after wrecking Broadhurst's horse, they took
the Royalist position in flank and caused a general rout there. Here
they arrive at the end of the Royalist reserve position, exposing the shakier
second-line troops - the Trained Bands of Penrith and Lazonby had not expected
to be subjected to this sort of treatment, and simply melted away. Sir
Marmaduke Davies was badly wounded trying to rally the shreds of his brigade.

The Royalist line is not what it was; Aspinall's hawk-like gaze was watching
for any movement of the reserves, but none came in time to save Davies and Monkton

The collapse of Darracott's right and the loss of a couple of general officers
produced a violent swing in Victory Points at the end - 12 was enough to win the day...

And still there is no action at this end of the table - not much remains of Darracott's right, though

Big Wullie Geddes waving his hat in victory, celebrating the end of the Royalist
presence in Lonsdale. Darracott, still with a large army despite the carnage,
retired to Carlisle. Aspinall, aware that many of his men were a long way from home,
and plagued already with high rates of desertion, let the King's army go, and
fell back to Lancaster. The campaign was ended.

Orders of Battle - Brockleymoor, 27^th May 1644

[Units marked # were from the Carlisle garrison; those marked * were remnants of units, converged to give a formation of useful size]

Royalist Army (Sir John Darracott)  3200 horse, 11065 foot, 2 guns

Horse (Lord Sefton)

Bde of Sir Allard Jenkinson

Jenkinson’s RoH

Ld Sefton’s RoH

Ld Cressington’s RoH

Bde of Sir Roderick Broadhurst

            Clevedon’s* & Broadhurst’s* RoH

            Moorhouse’s* & Noden’s* RoH

            Maule’s# RoH

            Trimbull’s# RoH

Foot (Lord Maule)

Bde of Col Monkton

            Monkton’s RoF

            Galliard’s* & Rice’s* RoF

            Ganesbrough’s# RoF

Bde of Lord Ullet

            Ld Ullet’s RoF

            Maxwell’s RoF

            Parkfield’s RoF

Bde of Sir Marmaduke Davies

            Davies’* & Fulwood’s* RoF

            Penrith TB

            Lazonby TB

            Penny’s# RoF

Bde of Col Frayne

            De La Roche’s* & Frayne’s* RoF

            Wooding’s RoF

            Martindale’s# RoF

Bde of Col Charlton

            Charlton’s RoF

            Fintry’s*, Corfield’s* & Brogan’s*

            Crompton’s# RoF

Unattached

Dingle’s Dragoons

Groves’ Firelocks

2 med cannons

[Losses on the day were approximately 1200 horse, 3000 foot, and two of the brigade commanders – Sir Roderick Broadhurst and Sir Marmaduke Davies – were severely wounded. Broadhurst subsequently died of his wounds on 4^th June.]

Allied Parliamentarian & Covenant Army (Sir Nathaniel Aspinall)  4000 horse, 11350 foot, 3 guns

Horse (Lord Alwyn)

Bde of Col Allington

            Ld Sudley’s RoH

            Ld Eastham’s RoH

            Pitlochrie Horse

Bde of Sir Beardsley Heron

            Heron’s RoH

            Winstanley’s RoH

            Chetwynd’s RoH

Bde of Sir Rowland Barkhill

            South’s RoH

            Barkhill’s RoH

            Dundonald’s RoH

Foot (Gen William Geddes)

Bde of Sir Julius Mossley

            Buckland’s RoF

            Mossley’s RoF

Grafton’s RoF

Bde of Col Bryanston

            Bryanston’s RoF

            Hawkstone’s RoF

Bde of Lord Lambton

            Burdett’s RoF

            Ld Lambton’s RoF

            Nielson’s RoF

Bde of Col St Clair

            St Clair’s RoF

            Laird’s RoF

            Petrie’s RoF

Bde of Col Herdman

            Herdman’s RoF

            Yester’s RoF

            Sweeting’s RoF

Bde of the Earl of Dunbar

            Snodgrass’s RoF

            McKinnon’s RoF

            Earl of Dunbar’s RoF

Unattached

Ancaster’s Dragoons

2 med cannons

1 heavy cannon

[Allied losses were approx 700 horse, 800 foot.]

Hooptedoodle #169 – Weather Here, Wish You Were Beautiful

Loch Lomond - bonny, bonny banks etc - as featured in tourist brochures

We took a crafty, early Easter break, as soon as my son broke up from school, and thus managed to rent a holiday lodge at a fraction of the normal price, right on the shore of Loch Lomond. That’s where I’ve been this last week.

The lodge was brand new, and in fact was better than anything of the sort I have stayed in before, so that was very good, except that some of the advertised facilities hadn’t arrived yet. It was obvious that the site managers are working very hard to get ready for the full season, and there was a lot of work going on – laying tarmac, landscaping, all that – and a fair amount of noise. In fact, as we were based at Inveruglas, on the Western shore of the loch, it was a bit noisy generally, since the main road and the railway take up most of the land at the water’s edge, and there is a lot more traffic than you would think. We had intended to get some decent hillwalking in, but it rained fairly solidly for the whole time we were there, and the need to start off any outing by playing chicken along the nightmarish A82 proved a major disincentive.

We did manage one proper walk, and it was a short one, but pretty harrowing from the weather point of view – we walked up Glen Sloy to have a look at the hydroelectric dam, and it actually snowed while we were up there. We told jolly tales of Captain Scott’s lads, to amuse ourselves and take our minds off the cold.

Foy the Younger and Elder during the assault on Glen Sloy.
The hydroelectric dam in the background dates from 1946,
and apparently the resultant artificial Loch Sloy behind
it has drowned the traditional lands of the McFarlanes.
All disgruntled McFarlanes please form an orderly queue to
register complaints. This was April Fool's Day - the snow
appears to have stopped briefly at this point - we were
pretty much soaked through, though.

We drove to Inveraray on Tuesday, and visited the famous Jail (an interesting, if overpriced visit), and we had an absolutely splendid lunch in the George in Inveraray, which apparently was awarded the accolade Best Pub in Scotland in 2011, and is still pretty damn good now. Great traditional atmosphere, log fires, fantastic food – high spot of the holiday, I reckon.

Because of the weather we saw very little in the wildlife department, but yesterday while I was getting dressed I could just make out (through the murk) an enormous bird of prey sitting on the grass, not far from my window.  Since it had to be an eagle, at the very least, I rushed off in a state of high excitement to find my spectacles and my camera, and came back to find that it hadn’t flown away (as I had thought it would), since it was, in fact, a large stone.

Got home at lunchtime today, to find that Hermes (the courier – definitely not the deity) had left a parcel safely tucked behind a plant pot on my front doorstep. It had been there since 31^st March, sitting in a puddle, and the wrapping had gradually disintegrated. As luck would have it, it was my shipment of Spanish cavalry from Hagen, not a book I have been expecting from Spain, and the figures themselves were completely unharmed by their experience - another stroke of good fortune to cherish.

The cavalry are excellent – more will be heard of these once I have sorted out some plans for painting them. They will become the Dragoons of Pavia, plus 3 units of Line Cavalry that I can’t remember off the top of my head, but I have them written down somewhere.

Now we have to finish unpacking and put our boots somewhere to dry.

Oh yes - I seem to have wriggled past the 300K hits landmark, so thanks again to everyone who reads, or has read, this blog!

Late Edit: Taken by the Contesse - Inveraray Jail uses some effective techniques with
recorded voices and scenes set in the courtroom and the prisons depicting real events.
Your bloggist could not resist the temptation to join the other dummies in the public
gallery at a Victorian trial of a man who burned down a barn filled with animals.
He was found guilty, of course, as he was again 30 minutes later.

Hooptedoodle #168 - Donkey Award - World of Bins

Whatever the question was, this new chart is almost certainly the
answer - I promise to post a photo of our proud new row of bins
when the grey one arrives; we may cut down a few trees to make room

We live in a house built on a farm in a very rural area. In our kitchen there are three waste receptacles - to conform with the local council regulations. We have a plastic tub into which goes all recyclable waste paper, another to take recyclable plastic, metal and glass, and a bog-standard (large) flip-top bin to take everything else. That is the indoor bit of this industry; outside we have corresponding wheelie-type bins - a green bin for general waste, one with a red top for the plastics etc, and one with a blue top for the paper. Existing regime is that the green one is emptied every Thursday, and the other two are emptied (by a different truck) every second Thursday (I hope you're taking notes here).

A new development is that we have now been supplied with another bin (a brown one) to take all garden waste - prunings, dead leaves, grass cuttings and similar. The brown bin collections will start in April, we were told, so - as you can imagine - we have been waiting in a state of some excitement to see how this will work.

Well, it gets more complicated. It seems we will also be supplied with yet another bin (a grey one) which is for food waste, which will henceforth be banned from the green bin. This is a serious business, too - I expect to see officials with armbands checking the contents of our bins for compliance - they may even be required to taste the food waste, just to be sure. I hope so.

Since it would be unreasonable to expect householders to wander down the garden to the new grey bin every time they have a used tea-bag, we will also be supplied with a matching indoor (grey) food waste container so we don't run any risk of contaminating the household rubbish. We are lucky to have a decent-sized kitchen and a large garden, to house all this splendour, and our domestic arrangements allow us a bit of time to devote to the complexities of the new arrangements. For new arrangements is what we shall have. Our local authority - whom I have avoided naming, not that it matters - have decided that our bin collections will now all be fortnightly, and staggered in such a way that there is no easy way to remember what the blazes we are supposed to be leaving out in any particular week. Like me, you may have doubts about the overall improvement in our quality of life, despite the hefty municipal investment in PVC and our proud new row of bins.

At the top of this post is the new master schedule, which we shall have to keep in a prominent place, since I do not fancy our chances of ever memorizing it. Our lives will be pretty much driven by our waste management activities in future, which is probably how it should be. I shall say nothing at all about the double-whammy of ratepayers being saddled with both extra cost and extra hassle; my lips are sealed on the subject of just how much benefit to the environment and the state of the planet is likely - I need more information on the carbon footprint of the manufacture of plastic dustbins; it would be overly carping to observe here that as far as I can see the stuff that goes to the local landfill site still looks pretty much as it did some years ago, so I shall swerve that one as well.

I'm sure that armies of jobsworths all over the UK are already running such regimes - it is simply that we have joined this enlightened group rather late in the day. I'm also sure that someone will be delighted to tell me that it is all the fault of the Eurocrats in Brussels. If so, I have a message for you...

Bollocks.

Spanish Grenadiers - Who's for the Chop?

This is a plea for suggestions.

Not granaderos like this...

...but like this

I've been putting this off for a while. My boxes of 1809 Spaniards contain plentiful figures for 4 battalions of grenadiers - mostly nice Falcata chaps. I'm nervous about the painting of all the embroidered bags on the hats, but they should be spectacular when done, since your typical battalion would be the converged grenadiers of the regiments in a brigade, so mixed facings and even assorted uniforms are the order of the day. Splendid.

Fly in the ointment is that two of these planned grenadier battalions are actually to be grenadiers not of the Line but of Provinciales, and - as I now know - they wore a rather simpler form of headgear - smaller and without the fancy flamme. As far as I know, there is no suitable figure on the market. Hmmm.

Conversion time. The command figures aren't a problem - officers can wear bicorns or even the full grenadier busby (for flash), drummers similarly. For the actual granaderos I think that fitting the ubiquitous NapoleoN Miniatures Spanish line fusiliers with new heads should be a straightforward job - my immediate challenge is, which heads to use?

You ever see a hat like the one in the lower picture?

All suggestions for a suitable donor - any period, any nation - will be most welcome. I can, of course get busy grinding down all sorts of things, but the less grinding the better (to quote Descartes), and the more easily it can be repeated (as he may also have said). I've looked at various possibilities, including British Crimean guardsmen - I'd greatly prefer a metal head, and I'd prefer a full head rather than a hat graft.

Oh yes - the figures are 20mm (or 1/72). Any ideas?

New Napoleonic Spanish Cavalry - Size Comparison

At the request of Mr L Gunner, here's a quick comparison. My new Foy Figures men are made to 1/72, so are a tad larger than Hinton Hunt (which are not). As enthusiasts for plastic will testify, "1/72" is not an exact global standard either, but these fellows will all serve happily alongside each other in my army, so as far as I'm concerned they are near-enough compatible.

L to R: NapoleoN, Foy/Hagen, Hinton Hunt x 2, Falcata x 2

Hinton Hunt horses a bit shorter in the wheelbase, but that's normal

Links to the Hagen shop are in the previous post.