Sunday 8 May 2011

Adler Tag - Summer 2010...

Another reason I decided to start this blog was because last year my small collection of finished models suffered a mortal blow!

With the kind of cunning only a cat can muster my neighbours otherwise lazy pet moggy managed to get into my home, either through a window or by tunnelling under the defence perimiter!

Once the invasion was complete said cat made a beeline for the bookshelf that doubles as my display shelves, not a lot of room for many models but as I'm a slow builder the space isn't an issue... I'm guessing the cat thought the models were defenceless prey, and thats just how he treated them!

The shelf of 1/48th scale RAF fighters looked like the results of Eagle Day (Adler-Tag, the Luftwaffe assault on the RAF, August 1940... You got Google, go and look it up for yourselves!), absolute carnage, all 6 models destroyed by claws and paws and sharp teeth, the only models that survived were some pre-painted Japanese sci-fi subjects and even they didn't go unscathed! I guess the manufacturers paint didn't taste so good!

One of my favourite models was this Tamiya 1/48th scale Spit Mk.I in Adolf 'Sailor' Malans markings at the height or the Battle-of-Britian...


...along with 4 other Spits, a Hurricane, a Typhoon, 2 Mosquitos and a Beaufighter... A resin figurine I had painted some years ago had been gnawed down to a stump and a couple of the smaller (mouse-sized?) military vehicles were in a very poor state!

By the time I got home from work the culprit had long since made his escape, all I had left to do was curse and swear as colourfully as I could while I swept the sorry remains into a black plastic bin-bag, all that work and time gone, at the paws of an indifferent furry beserker...

Now don't get me wrong, I'm a big cat person, I like cats, more than I like dogs, never been attacked by a cat, dogs have a pop at me quite regularly when I'm out on my bike!

Being such a lover of cats I felt this was a doubly low blow, I know the neighbours cat, I've petted and stroked it, fed it for a few days while my neighbour was away, I even know its name! But dammit if all that didn't amount to diddly-squat once kitty had my model collection in his sights!

I looked at the empty shelves all night... The empty shelves and the pile of 'in-progress' projects stacked under my workbench...

And after a while I took a deep breath and decided to treat the whole sorry episode as a bit of a palette-cleanser, like a good Chablis...

As pleased as I was with my small collection they had been built over a period of years, some of the older ones weren't as good as the more recent models I've built, over the years my skills have improved and I am far happier with the results of my efforts now than I was then.

Nope, no point crying over spilt milk, the stash is beckoning, there are models on my bench that deserve to be resurrected and built, its just a case of deciding what to deal with first, I'll let you know next time...

As for the cat, I was pleased to get a tiny radio-controlled indoor helicopter as a Xmas pressie this year, its taken some months to master it properly but now that I have I can assure you, the cat is beginning to learn the true meaning of 'blitzkrieg'...

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