Mission Accomplished... Barely

Well, it is done. Sunday February 24th, 2013, I finished a Disney 1/2 Marathon. No, the time was not a personal record. But the amazing thing was I was able to do it at all.

Lets reflect on how this almost did not happen.

1) When I went to register for the half, there was no space left. My wife was able to get her number and enter our son into a 200 meter run. (200 meters? Why do they keep foisting this metric stuff on us? *grumble*) So it did not look good for our heroes.

2) I was able to get a number through a charity - Ronald McDonald House Charities of Georgia. Great organization. I have known several families that have benefited from their care while there children were sick. They do fantastic work and most importantly, almost all of the money given to them, goes to the families that they are helping and not to pay staff. The problem was, I had to raise $500. Uh, I hate fund raising. Always feel awkward holding the hat out.

3) In the beginning of December, I managed to get a massive blister on the bottom of my right foot. This eliminated training runs for a month.

4) My wife came down with a kidney infection in January and we had a trip to the ER. My son ended up in the ER with a high fever the same week and the next day, I came down with the flu. This sidelined us again and prevented more training runs.

5) By mid February, I found out that I have awesome friends. Not only did I raise $500, I was able to raise $540. That was just incredible and I am very humbled and thankful for my friends who stepped up to help me out. THANK YOU! 5) The week before the race, we had a great training run. Then almost immediately, my wife came down with Bronchitis. The Thursday before the race, I come down with a bad head cold. The Friday we drive down to Disney, my son gets pink eye.

6) Sunday morning of the race, I got up at 3am to discover that my son loves to share. Yes, I had pink eye as well.

In spite of all of this, we made it to the race on time. We were in the next to last corral which did not bode well. I am a very slow runner. By mile 7, I learned that I was 2 minutes behind the pace and would be swept by mile 8 if I did not pick up the pace. I focused and began to run harder. I kept hearing conversations around me taking about a pace person and a balloon. Never saw that balloon. But I did finish several minutes ahead of the pace, somehow. I just could not get swept during this race. Somehow I felt that I would let folks down who had done so much to support me.

Anyway, I finished the race. My wife and I have our medals. And some hurting families are going to get some much needed relief because I have great friends. We are getting a chance to relax with the Big Mouse. Got to go to Disney Studios today and my 4 year old got to see his favorite TV star - Jake of Jake and the Neverland Pirates fame. The little guy is a little under the weather but we are all recovering. I can almost walk normal again too!

Thanks for the well wishes and support!

Updates

Things have been going rather slowly lately. I missed out on a game over the weekend that Mark hosted. That was disappointing.

In addition, I have gotten no painting done. I have four Briton levy troops that are 80% done. I also have a noble for a Pict force also in an 80% state.

What I did manage was to lay out a force of Saxon Foederati troops of about three groups of warriors. These should be an interesting mercenary force for Dux Britanarium.

I have barely done any work on my CSIR campaign. It still sits at what I think now is about 60% done. I did manage to write an article that I submitted to Battlegames that may end up in Wargames Illustrated. Just waiting on what Mr Hyde has to say.

Lastly, I started an article on running a multi-player campaign. It is a work in progress that I hope to finish shortly and use in my current campaign.

News from the Front - 500 AD

Wihtred's cheeks flushed red. The lashing his father was dealing him was well deserved. There is no doubt that mistakes were made. It started off so well but ended in disaster. His gaze never wavered from the bloated purple toes on his fathers gouty feet. It just seemed like you could poke them and watch them pop. It took some of the sting from his father's words. But what little distraction that offered was mitigated by the wound he suffered in the raid. It throbbed with his every heartbeat.

What brought his attention up from his father's feet was the sound of two new voices. The twins had arrived. They stood behind his father. The twins voices slid around the room as oily as the movement of Cearl's gigantic snake that he carried with him everywhere. Pybba spoke, "Your Majesty, while we did give you warning that young Wihtred was not seasoned enough for his command."

Your cheeks flush a deeper red at their words. Those two snakes have poisoned your father towards you for years. But their next words shocked you into looking up at Pybba. "We have consulted the gods and find that you were betrayed. Someone warned the britons of the young Aethling's raid and set up an ambush for him. There can be no other explanation. Their arrival was too perfectly timed. They were waiting for him. We believe that one of your rivals may have had a hand in this."

The realization chilled Wihtred's bones. Betrayed. That explains so much. He began to thing back through the fateful encounter.

They arrived unseen on the Saxon Shore. They were north of that fortification that the Briton's call Hadrian's Wall. Leading their ships up a small river they beached their boats and proceeded to the west in search of plunder. A large farmstead was reached after searching for a few miles. His men sacked the farm with no interruptions. There were able to secure some livestock but nothing else of real value. The farmers had fled before they arrived. At the time, Wihtred had felt it was good luck. Now it seemed to be the first sign of betrayal. As they headed back to their boats, he took his men another way to avoid a trap of someone waiting across his trail. They reached a small stream and spotted another farm. This one was devoid of any life. No livestock and no people.

He directed his men to cross the stream in column. The boys crossed first to check on things. The four men scampered across the stream and ran ahead of the force looking for trouble. Eormenred led a group of Geoguth (Warriors) into the stream next. Followed by himself and the Gedridht (hearthguard/elite) then Sigeberht and the rest of the Geoguth.

The stream became a bottleneck that slowed the Saxons.

While the bulk of the Saxons were still negotiating the stream, the Britons began to arrive.

Seeing the threat, the skirmishers fired several ineffectual arrows at the arriving force. The Britons rushed to the crest of a hill and formed a large shieldwall with nearly their entire force. I quickly moved my Gedridht into position and goaded them into inaction in hopes to get the rest of my force around the flank of the Britons and back to the ships. Things were still not out of hand yet when more Britons arrived.

As Sigeberht passed in front of the abandoned farm, a large force of crazed peasants attacked him from the rear. They were led by one of their priests who was nearly frothing at the mouth. The man looked positively crazed. Sigeberht drove them off but not without casualties. Five of his men lay dead from the frantic attack of the crazed priest. Another seven of the priest's followers lay slain as well. As they continued to press forward, they were attacked by more peasants throwing rocks. This claimed another of his men. They abandoned the livestock they were leading and ran to join Eormenred.

The attack of the peasants must have bolstered the courage of the Britons. From the far flank of their shieldwall, a group of levy broke rank and charged my men. They slammed into the right flank and caused significant casualties. Their levy fell back in time for a second group to come in. These too were driven back but not before inflicting more casualties. Now their shieldwall began to move forward.

The Britons launched one more attack and that is where I took my wound. Eight of my Gedridht lay dead around me. Most of our plunder was lost and I and four of my men ran for our lives. Fortunately, the Britons declined to pursue. Indeed they seemed relieved that we were leaving. I rejoined Sigeberht and Eormenred at the ships. The trip home was one of doom. But the words of Pybba and Cearl have heartened me. Betrayed! That makes sense. We were betrayed.

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This was the first game from our group of a Dux Britanarium campaign. I apologize for the poor photo quality but the lighting was poor and the hands were shaky. The game was great fun. Mistakes were made. The Briton's entered their entire force on the first turn rather than coming in as specified by the scenario. This did my troops in. It was a fun and fast played game.

I played the Saxons. Mark played the Mad Monk. And Doug played the Britons. For some reason he has declared his lord to be Prince Dwizzlewit.

Current Campaign Status

	Chris' Saxons	Dave's Britons Aethelfrith	Mad Monk	Mark's Picts	Brian's ???
StartingFunds	Thief's Horde	Tribune's Tribute	- 0 -	???	???
April, 500	Loss	Thief's Horde	Beggar's Bowl
May, 500	No Actions
June, 500	No Actions
July, 500	No Actions

A Slow Year

2013 has proven to be slow moving hobby wise. The good news is, it is starting to heat up. This weekend I have a game of Dux Britanarium coming up. I am thinking of experimenting with a 3 sided game. I will post again by Sunday with what happened.

Also I plan on painting up my new airplanes for Algernon. What I actually have accomplished was a couple of additional scenarios for my CSIR campaign. I also decided to submit an article to Battlegames. Hopefully, it will be accepted.

My intention is to paint up some more 15mm figures. I need to paint some 1) Reinforcements for Dux, 2) CSIR Italians, 3) AWI Loyalists, 4) WWII Russian Support troops and 5) Picts for Dux.

I need to get some more terrain going as well. For some reason each time I go to start, something gets in the way. Need to fix that.