We all start out our resolutions with gusto and enthusiasm, and then we hit a snag and give up. January was a slow month for me, but I was expecting it with the holidays and all. In February I had hoped to paint several batches of figures, especially since I had already started prepping and painting a platoon of figures with a real simple paint job before the month began. But, alas, ‘stuff’ happened. Sick family members, hospital visits, bad weather for priming, exhaustion. It all combined and I only finished the 26 man platoon.
Thankfully my goals for 2020 is not just to mindlessly paint figures like a robot and I made some progress in other areas. I managed to sell some of my lead pile on Ebay, not as much as I wanted though but enough to fund a purchase from Ground Zero Games without using ‘real’ money. I purchased some 25mm militia and civilian types to represent the colonists in my Tomorrows War campaign that I will be mostly solo playing.
I cleaned up the basement quite a bit and organized my gaming stuff. Terrain is easily accessible, not shoved into bins where they’ll get torn up over time. A semi-permanent area is cleared out for me to put folding tables out for not only gaming but for sorting out boxes for re-packing and to set up photo equipment for minis photography.
I’m quite a fan of these plastic tubs from Walmart…
On an unrelated to gaming subject I got quite a lot done at my storage area, filling half a dozen boxes of books up to donate to the local library’s book store. My now adult children used to read through books like it was the cure for cancer and I have hundreds of books that are never being re-read and I don’t want to move them again, so we’re sorting through them and donating the vast majority of them. We also need to throw out quite a bit of stuff that was moved years ago in a rush and doesn’t need to be kept. It’s been a long term project that is finally getting wrapped up. Next step is moving it into a smaller (and cheaper) storage unit to save some cash.
So how does this shortfall affect my attitude and goals? Well, it doesn’t really. Like I said, my goal is not to just paint minis. There’s a purpose to my painting and I made some progress on each of the aspects to my overall goal, not as much as I would like though. Will I freak out and promise to paint more in March? No. This is a marathon not a sprint. I usually get more done in the summer and early fall as I’m getting ready for or summer and fall convention games, so I know I will make up for the numbers later in the year. I am going to cheat a little and do some farm animals for scenery though, knock a dozen or so sheep and pigs out to pump those numbers up.
A number of people have suggested that I change my goal of 365 painted minis, one a day. I picked my goal of 350 based on some ‘back of the napkin’ math of what I painted in 2018, but upon reflection I didn’t want to set a goal that was easily tracked when I ‘fell behind’. If I knew I needed to paint 30 minis a month and I was behind by March I might obsess with it and give up the farther behind I got. But since my goal kinda matches the days of the month I don’t freak out when I only paint 26 guys in a month. It’s close, I know I paint more in the summer and early fall, I’m confident I’ll make it up. Maybe it’s just a cheap psychological trick but it allows me to be OK with my painting and other areas of progress.
My totals for painted minis at the end of February are 59 painted minis, two platoons of Ground Zero Games 25mm minis and two boxes of Battletech plastic minis. We have a monthly report over at The Miniatures Page called The Pledge where we report on our progress. Here’s a link: http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=525047
