And here's the indirect cause of all this - a 1:144 Grendizer (or Goldrake, as he is known here and in Italy). I am not usually a fanboy, but this is one exception, and I built this out of the box without any paint or weathering as a collectible.
The plant in the background has overgrown its pot and doesn't look that bad, actually!
I am looking at four Gundam series mechas for the game, rather than the pristine Grendizer/Goldrake, as they make better opponents for each other. They are also Bandai 1:144 snap together, beautifully engineered.
I obviously need scenery, and in this case it has to be scatter terrain as it might probably not be overly practical to glue it to the roof. So I went 'shopping', and found the following ingredients which I will combine in a
RECIPE :
one (1) Mazda hub cap, damaged
one (1) unidentified discarded device with a Renault logo
superglue
Take the hub cap and clean thoroughly under running water to remove grime.
Leave to dry well.
Take the unidentified gizmo and prize away the rubber half of it.
Check that the base fits EXACTLY over the central Mazda logo on the hub cap.
Saw off the tab at the top and file it neatly.
Abrade the lettering using abrasive paper of progressively finer grade to smoothen the surface.
Check fit again (I was lucky, the size was perfect!), and glue the gizmo to the hub cap.
Leave to dry.
Wash the hub cap, because you forgot to do it before you glues the gizmo.
Remove remaining traces of lettering from the gizmo which you missed.
This will be a badly damaged base, or operations hub.
Undercoat with ... that's the next installment, I need to see whether any of my colour sprays has survived the summer. It will not be white, as it would be too invisible on the roof. And the rather badly cut areas will be treated as massive laser damage and painted accordingly.
Meanwhile, on the Gundam front, I have started assembling the simplest (I think) model, a Zaku.