The Grand Duchy of Stollen

Britain's 93rd Highlanders repelling Russian cavalry early in the Crimean War of 1854-56. I discovered scads of soldiers like these in a shop I visited in my dreams earlier this morning. Before I was awoken from my slumbers at 8:40am this fine Saturday morning by the charming little banshees of five and almost nine next door, who are permitted to squeal and shout at the top of their lungs whenever they play outside, I was in the midst of a delightful soldier dream. I have this dream about every 18-24 months, and it's fairly similar each time. I've mentioned these dreams here before. However, this go around, I remember distinctly finding boxes and boxes (LARGE boxes) of used HARD plastic 1/72 Crimean-era British infantry in some anonymous shop somewhere. Normal line infantry in the Albert shako, rifles, highlanders, the works! In red plastic no less. For example, I took the lid off one box labeled "British Officers and Musicians" to find enough of said red

Here's a shot of the old town square at the center of Riga, Latvia. . . an old Hanseatic town, featuring some of the delightful North German gothic architecture that you'll find in cities and towns scattered throughout the Baltic region from Bremen to Gdansk, Stockholm, Tallin, and Hamburg. I've used buildings like these as inspiration for the many I've made for my Stollenian and Zichenauer troops to contest. The last few weeks have seen painfully little time for wargaming related activities. Oh sure, a tiny bit of painting here, a tiny bit of gaming there, and some work on finishing a few buildings for the tabletop. But by and large, nothing of any real consequence sadly. We're almost a month into the fall term (Week Four starts tomorrow!!!), and the days just seem to fly by. All of the sudden, it's 10:45pm, and, to be honest, I just don't feel like sitting down to paint by that point in the evening. Much nicer to retire to bed with a book or magazin