What's on the workbench!

[NARSES2]

There's usually something going on over the bank holiday weekend in Greenwich down at the museum, I haven't been, it's free so I might have a walk around plenty of benches to sit if I start feeling tired and a good bus service.

Providing the weather's decent it's a nice stroll down there 

[McColm]

Tuesday 22nd August 2023 part 2

The pesky mosquitoes have been at it again,  I used the Jungle Formula but it says don't spray the face. Yes that's where I have been bitten. So I was browsing on Ebay and found a mosquito net that covers a single bed. It's free standing and can be used outdoors at a reasonable price.
You may have noticed that I'm reducing the size of my new builds,more ideas keep coming through my head. So 1/144 scale, I think that I can build my version of the de Havilland Comet AWACS using the Airfix kit. I know S+M Models used to do the conversion set but this is hard to find. Another build would be the Bristol Britannia AWACS with the Roden kit.

[McColm]

Friday 25th August 2023

Up and down the UK people are looking forward to the last bank holiday before the Christmas break. I think that I have found the campervan that's right for me, It's the Ford Transit Tourneo PHEV 2.5L petrol engine with 34 miles of electric range. Hybrids usually have the capability of recharging the battery whilst you are driving which is very convenient if like me. I've seen a lot of struggle with the recharging cables at the charging points.
That's another thing,  there's no mention of any EV being designed for people with disabilities.
I feel old already and I'm only 57 years young, I haven't got a clue to how long it will take me to recover and no one seems to have an answer. Yes there's days when I want to cram as much in as I can but my body won't let me. Over do it and it takes three days or more just to do the simplest things around the flat. I get to watch the world go by from my bedroom window.
I know that there's other Whifferters that are bedbound and worse off than I am so I don't really have that much to complain about, just making up for the four days I lost when I was in an induced coma.
Well that's the end of my rant, normal service will return.

[NARSES2]

Does you good to have a moan every now and then, as long as you don't dwell on it and resume normal service 

Remember there's always "Cousin Worsoff" 

[McColm]

Saturday 26th August 2023

If you have had the trots I can sympathise with you. The 'rumble in the jungle ' started just after 1am in the morning, blimey I didn't know that I had so much pooh inside me wanting to come out. It's the first time since being in hospital that I have slept if you can call it sleep in the nude.
Operation Clean up commenced at 7am.All my stamina that I gained during my Cardiac gym sessions seems to have drained away.
Loads of laundry to do and catching up on sleep, the worst is over, so it's water and dry food for the next two days.
The Close is alive with the sound of families getting together for Bank Holiday Monday, if anyone needs me I will be in bed.
Take care and stay safe.

[Pellson]

I feel old already and I'm only 57 years young, I haven't got a clue to how long it will take me to recover and no one seems to have an answer. Yes there's days when I want to cram as much in as I can but my body won't let me. Over do it and it takes three days or more just to do the simplest things around the flat. I get to watch the world go by from my bedroom window.

I feel old too. The body isn't what it was before the cancer treatments, that's for sure. But I'm alive, and that's a start.
I have bad days, worse days, and slightly better days, but rarely any fully good days anymore. Or it's just that I'm comparing to when I was thirty. Anyway - I'm trying to enjoy what I get. And accept that from time to tome, just sitting on the front stairs looking at the birds is a good day under the circumstances. Despite me bein younger than you.

Hang in there, Stephen. I'm not prepared to lose your wild ideas and even wilder builds just yet, OK?

[NARSES2]

But I'm alive, and that's a start.

Basically my attitude to life, that and the fact that it's almost certainly better than the alternative 

[McColm]

Friday 1st September 2023

I have an idea based on a concept model of the de Havilland Comet AWACS (4C) but I'm using the 1/144 Airfix Comet 4B along with the Boeing E-3A rotodome (spin top) and the radome from a 1/72 Academy Boeing C-97 as the stand.
This is an old kit curtsey of Bungle bought on his eBay site, free postage for whatifmodellers members. I'm not too sure if this applies to overseas members other than the UK.
Getting back to the build all of the parts fit after a rub down with a bit of sandpaper. I've somehow managed to miss out a window on the fuselage. The main parts are glued together with nose ballast. The stand for the rotodome is starting to take shape and I used a bit of plasticine to secure the rotodome to it. As I don't have any superglue I have left off the new Comet 4C wings, the fuselage for the 4C  was slightly longer than the 4B. Ironically the prototypes for the H.S. Nimrod MR.1 used the Comet 4C  airframes, for the production model they shortened the fuselage but kept the 4C wings until they ran out of the Comet 4C, then resorted to use the Comet 4B.
There used to be a de Havilland Comet AWACS 1/144 conversion set produced by S+M Models, which has the rotodome,  stand,  wing fuel tanks and aerials plus decals and I think the Grumman E-2 Hawkeye rotodome with stand.
 As a treat I had my first Fish and Chips from the local Chippy, blimey the price of cod these days! Fish and Chips used to be a cheap meal, yummy.
My illness has opened my mind to whacky builds,  that 1/72 Airfix BAC TSR.2 has changed and who in their right mind would stick the cockpit of an F-111 on the front of it, just happened to work otherwise I would have glued the front end back on! Then how was I to know that the rear of the Airfix F-35B would fit at the rear of the BAC TSR.2 without measuring it first. I have used the jet exhaust pipes from the Airfix YF-22 on the Sukhoi Su-47 Wild Buzzard ECR.2.
  My progress through the racing online game Asphalt 8 is going well and is strengthening my thumbs, although I don't recognise some of the A and S series. Why are the Jaguars so slow in comparison to the Cadillac?
Over the next few weeks it's PSR, good luck with your GB builds. Thanks for your kind words of encouragement 😊

[NARSES2]

As a treat I had my first Fish and Chips from the local Chippy, blimey the price of cod these days! Fish and Chips used to be a cheap meal, yummy.

Yup, and if you were really skint you just had sixpence worth of chips 

I'm not even sure where the nearest Chippy is nowadays. They've basically been priced out of the market. It's all burgers, pizzas, donners etc.

You've now got me thinking about the old Pie and Mash shop with liquor 

[McColm]

As a treat I had my first Fish and Chips from the local Chippy, blimey the price of cod these days! Fish and Chips used to be a cheap meal, yummy.

Yup, and if you were really skint you just had sixpence worth of chips 

I'm not even sure where the nearest Chippy is nowadays. They've basically been priced out of the market. It's all burgers, pizzas, donners etc.

You've now got me thinking about the old Pie and Mash shop with liquor 

Can't even get the grits anymore from the nights frying, that was a real treat back in the day.

[NARSES2]

Can't even get the grits anymore from the nights frying, that was a real treat back in the day.

Oh yes. 6d's worth (2 & a half P new money) of batter    A nice treat on the way home from an evening game at Selhurst.

[McColm]

Tuesday 5th September 2023

PSR has started on the 1/72 Sukhoi Electronic Buzzard ECR.2, it also has a new cockpit canopy that fits from the Airfix Lockheed YF-22. The 1/72 (Maritime Attack Reconnaissance Supersonic Harrier) Marsh Harrier FGRA.1 is also undergoing PSR. As for the 1/72 BAC Excalibur Experimental Project Aircraft aka EPA lots of gaps are starting to get filled in. The 1/72 Fairchild-Republic NAW-10B has been recommissioned and now has four drop fuel tanks,  a pair of anti-radar missiles three jamming pods plus a pair of EW sensors fitted on the twin tail fins.
 Work has stopped as the temperature is 28°C, running low on filler. Hopefully the Low Income Support Payment will be finalised and the date announced in the next few weeks or when Parliament returns from the summer holidays. So I can restock my supplies. Wilko is having a sale on, it's the nearest store to Woolworths over here in the UK without the music department.

[Beermonster58]

As a treat I had my first Fish and Chips from the local Chippy, blimey the price of cod these days! Fish and Chips used to be a cheap meal, yummy.

Yup, and if you were really skint you just had sixpence worth of chips 

I'm not even sure where the nearest Chippy is nowadays. They've basically been priced out of the market. It's all burgers, pizzas, donners etc.

You've now got me thinking about the old Pie and Mash shop with liquor 

My chippy is only 100 metres away!!   . £8.50 for a fish supper but, you get TWO big pieces of fish and, a small mountain of chips. One of those suppers feeds me AND my partner which makes excellent value! Pie & Mash! Lovely! Plenty good chippies locally. Seem to be doing quite well but, mine also does pizzas, kebabs etc! I have five chippies within 1 - 1.5km of where I live.

[McColm]

As a treat I had my first Fish and Chips from the local Chippy, blimey the price of cod these days! Fish and Chips used to be a cheap meal, yummy.

Yup, and if you were really skint you just had sixpence worth of chips 

I'm not even sure where the nearest Chippy is nowadays. They've basically been priced out of the market. It's all burgers, pizzas, donners etc.

You've now got me thinking about the old Pie and Mash shop with liquor 

My chippy is only 100 metres away!!   . £8.50 for a fish supper but, you get TWO big pieces of fish and, a small mountain of chips. One of those suppers feeds me AND my partner which makes excellent value! Pie & Mash! Lovely! Plenty good chippies locally. Seem to be doing quite well but, mine also does pizzas, kebabs etc! I have five chippies within 1 - 1.5km of where I live.

Mine is a bus stop away, up a hill. I can just about make it if I walk. The price of fish starts at £10, chips £3-5. I can get a set meal for one for the same price at my local Chinese restaurant.

[McColm]

Wednesday 6th September 2023

I'm not tech savvy and get annoyed with people who try and hack into my Facebook account, I have closed down my Instagram account and uploading photos to this site comes with a few problems as well. I didn't know that there's a timed period for uploading photos, occasionally they will get lost in the transfer or someone is trying to post a comment on one of my topics at the same time.
We are having a heatwave at the moment in the UK, should last into early next week. The nights are worse than the daytime. I will have to invest in a fan. There seems to be an invasion of spiders of all different sizes trying to get into my flat..I know it was left vacant because of the Covid 19 pandemic for three months during 2021. I'm slowly filling in the cracks and gaps left by the Council's decorators, I still have problems getting back up from kneeling down.
I plan to do some painting changing the white walls with something brighter.