It’s been a long time since my last post. It’s not that I haven’t played games, or painted figures. We had a convention and lost a great game day. I’ve had some really great days and great games. But I think my writing go derailed when my friend David Sullivan died quietly on March 7th.

For those of you who didn’t know David, I can only say I’m sorry you didn’t know him. David was a wonderful man, an incredibly smart man who reveled in the knowledge of the arcane and off-beat. It informed many of his gaming interests. It made him a wonderful conversationalist. He was good friend, a lover of cats, and a good scotch. I deeply miss him.

I won’t carry on for too much longer, but David and I were good friends. We met the summer of 1991, right after the first Enfilade convention. We immediately became colleagues in a host of gaming projects. We did the Battle of Manila Bay with the old Houston’s ships 1/1000 scale models. We did Ironclads first in 1/1200, and when Toby Barrett launched his Thoroughbred 1/600 scale ships we transitioned to the larger scale and converted the hex-based games to no-hex miniatures. We used Crossfire to do a Tarawa game in the ’90’s. He dragged me into playing WRG 6th edition ancients in 28mm in the early 2000’s (I should have just said no.) We did Hue, and Aztecs. Our most successful game was the retreat from Concord. We did lots of stuff together, but we weren’t joined at the hip. David explored lots of projects on his home and self published a number of rules sets–Row Well and Live, for ancient naval rules, and Pike and Periwig for pike and shot in the age of Louis XIV.

David and Daveshoe and I were a thing together. We just loved each others’ company. I’ll never forget in 2018 we spent the two previous weekends prior to Enfilade together playtesting Concord, then we ate every meal together during the convention. To lose them both has been hard.

David also had incredible piles of stuff. Painted and unpainted figures. Beautiful terrain pieces. Lots of ship projects. Together with my friends, Eric, both Marks and Michael, we’ve been able to see that it all got a home. I, of course, took way more stuff than I should, and I’m hoping to re-home some of it. But I’ve hung on to a lot of bits I’m hoping to do something good with over time. There are Perry AWI figures, a bunch of Mexican War figures, Ancient ships, pre-Dreadnoughts for Germany, Japan and China, Aztecs. You name it. David had a little problem with figures. It’s been really challenging rehoming some of it and absorbing more than I should, but I’m doing my best.

Though I haven’t written much, I have been busy. My big Enfilade project was the Battle of Shrewsbury from 1403. It’s a battle of English vs. English from the Hundred Years War period, though it was really one of the acts of rebellion against Henry IV’s usurpation of the crown in 1399. We played a modified version of Lion Rampant. Very bloody and very fun.

A group of us have decided to do the Spanish Civil War in 28mm a in sort of skirmishy version. I am painting Republican militia, both the POUM socialist militia and the CNT anarchists. Empress Miniatures are just really nice for the period.

I’m also working on my figures from the Cuban Rebellion 1895-98. I’m making progress through my pile. I’m going to have a bunch of stuff for Daniel Mersey rules “The Men Who Would Be Kings”, but I’m also doing some singly mounted figures for One Hour Skirmish Wargames. Dopily, I’d also like to add more figure types, American bluejackets and American Marines. I have an idea for a scenario–the landing at Guanica at Puerto Rico. Hoping it’s an August game.

I’m also planning for a couple of opportunities to pull out my Aztecs in the next couple of weeks. We’ll be using David’s Quetzacoatl Rampant modification of Lion Rampant as rules. I’ll be sure to write it up and share some pictures from the game.

I apologize for my absence, but it’s honestly I’ve needed some time away. Hope all is well with each and every one of you.