The horrors of the dragon's hoard

Despite the fact that humanity, or, at the very least, most of it, has left its hunter-gatherer roots long ago, hobbyists, regardless of their area of expertise, have a tendency to acquire inordinate amounts of goods. Not being an exception to that, although being pretty much a lightweight when compared to some, today I intend to show you some of my workshop. While it is not a novel idea, and at least one person has actually posted a great pictorial on the subject recently – for details, you should visit Dante's Inferno and see for yourself – I suppose there is no hurt in allowing you to see just how much money a one can waste on equipment left unused. Perhaps now, having decided to do something worthwhile with my time, I will do away with dust on my shelves and, hopefully, put my hoard to good use.

First, I am quite sure you do recognize the introduction above, after all, it has been posted about fourteen days ago. While I have been telling myself that I should add new articles in a regular manner – indeed, my Google Calendar has been most unmerciful, pummeling me with reminders about three times a week – multiple real world problems have prevented me from doing so, most notably the fact, that I have been forced to oversee an unpleasant instance of home improvement. It was, I assure you, lots of fun when I have learned, that my gas pipes had ruptured sometimes in the past, and that I had been living with a veritable bomb under my bed. Still, what is done is done, as the man from Stratford on Avon had written, and thus, I can write my posts in peace.

As you can see, I have decided not to show you my entire workshop. It is understandable, since I do share it with my wife, whose desk stands right next to mine, and is, usually, an abomination in the eyes of any God one might worship. This, as I have already written in the earlier, sadly defunct, incarnation of this post, leads to my desk being a parking for cats, although with my return to active duty, so to speak, this might change fairly quickly. Still, having hinted at my wife's habits - she usually creates a small disaster area around herself when she, ahem, creates – I must, once again, admit that she is far more prolific and skilled in her chosen field than I am in mine. Advertising, advertising at its best. Still, returning to the picture at hand, as you can see, I am a follower of the Lord of Flat Packages himself, and thus got most of my furniture and equipment from Ikea. To this day, I have no idea, why have they decided to finish making their Jerker desks, but there are two of them in my workshop, and I'll be thrice damned, if I ever throw them away... well, the metal parts, at least. The wall in front of me is, as you can see, adorned with all manner of tools and consumables, amongst which you probably can see a whole basket of glues and putties, another one filled with sculpting material – lately augmented with four packs of Sculpey, courtesy of my wife's friend who had no use for it – and another holding Acrylicos Vallejo stone textures... and a huge supply of nail polishing blocks, which can be pretty useful, if not easily used up. The black pots, on the other hand, are filled with tools, from humble Excel brand scalpels to circle cutters, riffler files and all sorts of sculpting tools. To my shame, they are in pristine condition, just like my Proxxon Micromot rotary tool, and my brushes. I do hope to change that as soon as possible. Also, as you can see, I do tend to gather piles of books around – currently, there's a truckload of works on website coding and graphic design, as well as a small pile of reference sheets from 1:35 scale figure kits I intend to pilfer for good poses and, since they are my Achilles' heel, folds on the clothing. All in all, I tend to keep my desk in order, but I grow tired of it – lack of mess usually means lack of work. Just ask my better half!

Second, as you can see, these are probably the most prized of my possessions, namely, a single Excel scalpel – I use them religiously, despite the fact that every new blade has to drink some of my blood (honestly... every damn time) – jeweler's tools, namely a pair of side cutters from a very respectable German brand, and a Pakistani-made pliers packaged by Italeri, which are small enough to work on the wire used to make figure armatures, and a set of clay shapers, and not the small ones at that (since they are much easier to fish out of their pot. The last piece is a pair of scissors, and I have my wife - again with the advertising - to thank for them, since they are made by the company run by a renowned scrapbooking artist by the name of Tim Holtz, and, while they had cost me pretty penny, I haven't found anything better. Cutting 1.5 mm thick polystyrene sheets? Not a problem for those.

Third, in order to show you how disorganized I can truly get, I have decided to photograph my paints drawer. I am quite sure the people who run Acrylicos Vallejo, should they ever see this post, will put a price on my head. Alas, for now this must do, at least until I get enough stainless steel bearings to replicate the paint mixing skulls Reaper Miniatures use for their own paint bottles, and I think of some way to store paints without loosing to much space in my cabinet. Time will tell, whether I'll be successful.

There you have it, a hoard worthy of a dragon, not exactly one aged and wise though. Perhaps in one year's time I should make new photographs. Who knows, what will happen to all the things on my treasure trove.