Greg Shaw

Farage's excuse for breaching the MPs' Code of Conduct 17 times, failing to declare £380000 of income, was that he "doesn't do computers". How would he know what can and can't be done while working from home? I've done some of my finest work remotely logged in at my kitchen table.

Once worked somewhere where a bloke in desktop PC Support emailed all the men, after he'd been sitting in a cubicle in the gents and overheard someone else pee then leave without washing. Along the lines of "I have to touch your computer keyboards, don't be so skanky." Fair play. It's not the 1950s.

Addendum: for the avoidance of doubt - yes, I know that camouflage was not applied to the bottom of a tank hull! I was using these spare parts to practise the techniques.

That was my first go at a three-colour soft-edged camo pattern using an airbrush, too - so that's "work in progress", and I hope that the actual build will be even better.

Lucky I had the spare parts.

Now I've spent a week on this practice/experiment, I've totally lost momentum on the build! 4/4

1. Don't overwater the topcoat when chipping - it can lead to tide marks and bubbled paint.
2. A sewing needle held in a mini drill chuck is a great chipping tool.
3. Make the undercoat robust (primer levels of robust) and dark (the book I got my instructions from never mentioned these!)

3/

... does the topcoat remain chippable?

Turns out the answers are both "two or three days."

Of course, you could just do the whole lot in one go, as soon as each coat is touch-dry, but I wanted to know when I could put breaks in the process, and for how long.

I learned a few more things, too: 2/

Parts of the hull of a plastic model tank, with separate areas having slightly different paint jobs - straight boundaries show where masking tape was used to cover parts of the surface. Some areas have been given full camouflage paint jobs, then scratched to simulate real-life damage to paintwork.

The chipping fluid experiment is over, #HistScaleModels. I'm no longer a total n00b at this, and feel ready to work on an actual build now. I answered my main two questions:
1. How long after applying chipping fluid can I wait before applying the top coat?
2. How long after applying the topcoat...1/

The front half of a grey cat stretched out on a red blanket. The cat is looking towards the camera, and his front paws are demurely placed next to each other.

Happy #Caturday from Earl Cat and his amazing paws. #Cats #CatsOfBlueSky

I occasionally go into a 'Spoons to use the toilet, and/or sneakily slap anti-Brexit stickers on walls, tables and fruit machines. I always seem to forget to buy anything there, though. How absent minded of me.

Felon 47's been very meek towards NATO and EU nations since he was forced to back down over his Greenland scheme. I wonder if European governments collectively put the fear of Epstein revelations into him. I can't think what else would shut him up.

A man with long hair hanging down past his chest, and a short beard, wearing a black Darkthrone hoodie. He is standing in a room, in front of a window, through which can be seen the snow-covered branches of a tree.

A man with long hair hanging down to his chest and a short beard, wearing a black T shirt and playing a bass guitar.

I found some pics of me in March 2023, when I had properly long hair and looked metal as f*ck. Seems like a lifetime ago! My barber made me let him cut my hair to shoulder length later that year, as it was snapping under its own weight. That's middle age for you!

That f*cking rules. And to think that, when that classic was shown, Pink Floyd, instead of rising to the heights of Dschingis Khan, were just dicking around, putting the finishing touches to "The Wall". I bet they're jealous. I would be.

The Charities Commission is toothless, and was packed with Tories by previous PMs. They don't proactively investigate, either - they have to receive a complaint before they look into whether a charity is breaking its guidelines. It's not an effective watchdog for think tanks with charitable status.

Farage's movement couldn't survive without cheap crappy booze. Next, he'll promise to legalise and subsidise cheap crappy cocaine for all his street "protesters" with "legitimate concerns".

I was going to write a joke post along the lines of "Vegan andouillette, eh, wouldn't that be the most pointless thing ever, why would anyone bother to replicate a sausage that smells of faeces?" I thought I'd better check, first, and a web search revealed that vegan andouillette exists. Jeez.

A chunky tuxedo cat, sitting in a box which is only just wide enough to let him fit in it.

Lincoln, my fluffy potato-based cat with his fluffy potato-based brain, has a box. #Cats #Caturday #CatsOfBlueSky #Tuxedo

bsky.app/profile/zenm...

Tickets remaining for the four showings of "Melania" this weekend at a local cinema: 26, 26, 24, 26. Only a few more to sell before full house! Oh, it's a 26-seater auditorium.

Sausage Me in St Louis

Just where do Reform UK Ltd get all the money for all these legal cases they keep threatening? Lawyers don't come cheap.

I accept that the bits always get jiggled out of the labelled slots in their box. I use a micrometer screw gauge to measure the bits' diameters, searching for the one(s) I need, every time I drill. It's a pain in the arse.

Luckily, I had a spare hull in my stash, so I began again, with that.

2. I need a much darker undercoat on the non-Zimmerit areas. An undarkened red oxide colour doesn't look like weathered metal in the chipped areas, it just looks pink.

I haven't got as far as experimenting with timings, yet! 2/2

Plastic model tank kit hull, painted in a three colour camouflage scheme, with damage to the paintwork simulated by the technique called chipping.

The lid of a plastic takeaway carton, painted in a military camouflage style. The paint has flaked off badly, revealing the colourless plastic beneath.

Initial results from my experiments with chipping fluid, #HistScaleModels:
1. Plastic takeaway cartons are not an effective substrate for chipping fluid trials. The plastic is too smooth, so the primer doesn't "bite", so when you try to chip just the top coat, _all_ the paint comes off. 1/

Interesting article, but completely fails to mention that NonStop servers (now owned by Hewlett Packard Enterprise) are very much alive and well, still run by many banks and transaction switching businesses where unplanned outage is a no-no. I work on NonStops, and they're an absolute joy to use.

Just ordered mine. This will take my stash of unbuilt kits from 2 to 3, if I don't finish my current build by March (entirely possible - I am slow). Wooooooooooo!

Awesome! I've been looking for a decent 1/35 Matilda I for ages.

A grey cat in "loaf" pose, on the end of the back of a red sofa. His fluffy chest and face are lit from below, by a frosted lightbulb, while the rest of the room is dark; this gives an impression of cosiness.

Earl Cat being cute and magical. #Cats

Thank you. Could you advise on a third question, please? How long can I leave the chipping fluid, before applying the paint, and have it remain chippable? I have a chronic pain condition which forces me to down tools after an hour or so, for a day, so I'm looking for pause points in this process.

2. How long after the topcoat is applied does it remain "chippable"? (Internet suggests 3 days for acrylic paint).

Plastic takeaway cartons to the rescue once again. I needed some test beds, anyway, for learning to do camouflage using an airbrush, so this little trial is not much extra effort. 2/2

On a table are two plastic takeaway cartons and their lids, which have been painted in stripes of rusty red and creamy yellow.

OK, #HistScaleModels, the test beds are ready, undercoated in colours of oxide primer and Zimmerit (a rather fetching rhubarb and custard livery for a train). I'm going to experiment to find optimal timings for chipping fluid: 1. How soon after the chipping fluid is dry must the topcoat go on? 1/