Share your &*@%$!!! Hobby Moments

[Hammers]

You were there that day, H. Fairly sure you were in the room, or at least nearby. It was that time we went to Kiel.

My abiding memory of that trip was having strawberries for breakfast. Never done that before or since. Felt so decadent, like I was the emperor Nero or someone. Maybe that's no big deal in some places, but for a little country mouse like me, well, people around here just don't have strawberries for breakfast. We're happy if we can get a lump of stale bread with some lard spread on it.

Oh. So...was the whole thing my fault? It wouldn't surprise me.

Still got the litography of a crack shot pah-THAAN you gave me that time on the wall of my hobby den.

[N.C.S.E]

Unlike Unlucky General I don't get angry at my chums dropping my figures or accidentally knocking spears out of their hands and such. They are toys for playing with and a little wear and tear is to be expected. I see running repairs as simply part of the process. I care more about my clumsy careless friends than my little metal guys, and unless they are doing it maliciously and wilfully (which they never have) then all such sins are quickly and easily forgiven.

However if I ever drop somone else's figure I am mortified.  I remember I was once admiring a giraffe painted by fellow LAFer Tellus and it suddenly somehow lept from my hand and hurtled toward the floor. But displaying the reactions of a young Jonty Rhodes I managed to snatch it from the air with my other hand. So glad I did, never would have forgiven myself otherwise.

I still sometimes shudder when I think about that giraffe, and what nearly happened to it.

I feel the same.

Had a good friend accidently drop and break off the figure and MG off one of my tanks. He was extremely apologetic but I honestly didn't mind a bit for the reasons you describe. If I minded them getting broken I wouldn't be playing with them.

Go back a few years and I still cringe at knocking off another guy's MG from his tanks with the most obvious bit of stupidity with a template getting hooked on the barrel.

[Bearwoodman]

To prove I learn from experience, much later on, in a share house I was squeezing away at a blocked bottle of Vallejo paint and, instead of cleaning the nozzle of the bottle I just kept absent mindedly squeezing away until the nozzle bit was pushed off and Deck Tan was sprayed over the miniature, table and curtains next to the window where I was painting...

Muzfish4 your tip comes too late for me. While reading this thread I can look down and see traces of vallejo game colour orange fire on my keyboard and monitor from when I did exactly the same thing.  It was quite an explosion that ensued and inevitably I did not find every blob and splatter until after it had dried.  I no longer attempt to paint at my work desk, and I keep a piece of wire handy for unlocking dropper bottles.

[Plynkes]

Oh. So...was the whole thing my fault? It wouldn't surprise me.

Much as I'd like to blame you, that would be a vile injustice. Though I suppose there is the possibility that I was distracted by your rugged Nordic manliness. That could make a fellow drop his giraffe.

[FreakyFenton]

Wow, that must have been weird.




My favourite one is that time I accidentally emasculated a Masai warrior with my craft knife.

Worry not, the story has a happy ending: I made him a new, bigger John Thomas out of green stuff.

The good old add-a-dicktomy.

Stories wise, I know of one from a relative. They had covered their wargames room's ceiling in hooks, meaning to hang planes from them. After having put up most of the planes and an unwise turn in the wrong direction, Stuka met Spitfire and Messerschmitt met Blenheim in a cacophany of crashing models. Apparently the hooks survived, the fishing wire and the planes however were partly broken or destroyed. Couldn't bear to go into the room after that for a good while, eventually repaired most of the models to a good standard though. Albeit, now stored in boxes, rather than on fishing wire.

[Shahbahraz]

Finished painting, rigging and basing some lovely Langton French ships, the last thing I had to do was paint blue on the nice lead foil flags I had attached to the rigging. Shake my VMC paint... squeeze. The end of the paint bottle came off. Blue paint all over all 4 of the ships and bases,

Oh, and i have caught the sharp knife every time. Sometimes in a knee, foot, or left hand. If you haven't bled for the hobby...

Also - leaking roof.. every single (100+) sabot MDF base on 500+ troops to be replaced.  Still, it's been good for Warbases

[N.C.S.E]

Also - leaking roof.. every single (100+) sabot MDF base on 500+ troops to be replaced.  Still, it's been good for Warbases

Plot twist: it was a slow week for Warbases so they went around to some of their best customers' houses in the dead of night to make their roofs leak in just the right spot to ruin their basing and force them to get more!   

[Patrice]

About 30 years ago I had quite a lot of 1/72 plastic Napoleonic miniatures (Um, in fact I still have them, although I don't use them any more) and I used to carry them in large cardboard boxes.

One evening as usual I went to the MJC (Maison des Jeunes et de la Culture) where we used to play miniatures or RPG, I parked my car and I took and carried the boxes. And when I went back to my car after the game there was some wind and suddenly all the boxes fell down and the soldiers where scattered all around on the ground.

I picked them up as well as I could, not a very big problem I must say (if it were my metal 28mm now it would be another thing!) but then I felt very unhappy.

What was worse: the following day I went back and I looked around and found a few hussars or whatever, who had spent the whole night alone waiting for my return. You feel guilty. 

[DintheDin]

What was worse: the following day I went back and I looked around and found a few hussars or whatever, who had spent the whole night alone waiting for my return. You feel guilty. 

Poor fellows! You are lucky you found them again!

A friend of mine, carrying 1/72 miniatures in shirt boxes stumbled on the metro escalators.
The boxes opened and everything was spilled on the moving stairs!
Imagine his frustration running up and down to collect them all, among dozens of people moving around!

[SBRPearce]

We were clearing overgrown plantings at my parents' house, in preparation to selling it after their passing years ago. As the ivy was rolled back in a mat, my brother and I kept finding small "green army men" who we had lost in the garden as young boys decades before. We had a Repo Depot where we were gathering all of these dirt-encrusted, dog-chewed grizzled veterans of forgotten childhood battles. When my nephew came over to observe the work on the house, he spotted the toy soldiers.

"Dad" he called to my brother "How are these guys?"

"The Lost Patrol" he replied laconically. He earned major Dad-points for his delivery - it was just like our late father!

[Unlucky General]

Notwithstanding exaggeration for effect, and not exactly what this thread is about ... I realised today that if I was forced to salvage any figures or models in the face of an impending disaster I think the answer would be none.

As an Australian and a resident (usually) of Canberra, we are threatened with bush-fires - big buggers. Actually the term bush-fire really doesn't convey the true nature of what Americans more accurately refer to as wild-fires. Anyway, if called upon to evacuate I admit that the only possessions I can think of to try and save are my wargaming figures/models - is that bad?

Anyway, I realised that I have just too many (I mean, a real lot) and wouldn't know what to chose. Whatever I was able to take could only ever be a real fraction without a trailer and a three hour pack. SO, I only today realised I'd walk away from all of it as a dead loss. I've had crazy dreams about such things.

I may have a problem.

[Muzfish4]

displaying the reactions of a young Jonty Rhodes I managed to snatch it from the air with my other hand.

Nice reference!

Muzfish4 your tip comes too late for me. While reading this thread I can look down and see traces of vallejo game colour orange fire on my keyboard and monitor from when I did exactly the same thing.  It was quite an explosion that ensued and inevitably I did not find every blob and splatter until after it had dried.  I no longer attempt to paint at my work desk, and I keep a piece of wire handy for unlocking dropper bottles.

Yeah, ever since that unfortunate incident I use fuse wire or paperclips to unblock the nozzles now but have recently invested in a set of Army Painter ball bearings which promise to do everything from reinvigorate ageing paint to cure gout.  We'll see how that works out as many of the paints I have are a decade old at least.

As I play a lot with the Little Fish (aged 8 and 10 respectively) dropped and accidentally broken miniatures are part and parcel of it. Going nuts over a breakage woudl just turn them off them hobby so I tend to just accept that sometimes things get broken when in use.

[Shahbahraz]

SNIP...
As an Australian and a resident (usually) of Canberra, we are threatened with bush-fires - big buggers. Actually the term bush-fire really doesn't convey the true nature of what Americans more accurately refer to as wild-fires. Anyway, if called upon to evacuate I admit that the only possessions I can think of to try and save are my wargaming figures/models - is that bad?

As a (former) resident of South Canberra, the 2003 bushfires went up the street that I moved into a year later from Narrabundah, and there are still plenty of gaps where trees used to be. In the case of 2003 or worse, there just wouldn't be time. It was apocalyptic. I still own the house there, and I dread the fire season each year, which is getting longer and longer. Grab passports and that's about it I reckon.

[Bravo Six]

This didn't happen to me, but was a tragic story I heard back in 2001. It could also be an urban legend, but tragic nonetheless.

Apparently a guy from the UK who was packing up his car to take his Nam collection to a game convention, when he accidentally left his box of model helicopters on the roof of his car, not knowing, and drove off. He realized what he'd done when he looked in his rear view mirror and saw them slide off the roof and crash onto the street. Only to witness the car behind him run the box over, dealing the final death blow.

[TheWeasel]

So you know the sound of a breaking heart?

It's the tinkling sound of your entire classic metal 40k imperial guard collection when your carry case opens in a game store parking lot at night.