Me Stylish?!?

Much to my surprise, I was nominated for a "Stylish Blogger Award".  Surprised, because A) I didn't even know such a  thing existed and B) because, I've been called lots of things during my days, and "stylish" has never been one of them.

As I said, I didn't know that such an award existed, so the first thing I set about doing is finding out what, exactly, the whole thing was about.  Here is what I found...there are rules (of course, why wouldn't there be?). 

To receive the award there are four steps to follow:

1. Send a thank you and a link to the nominating blog.
2. Share seven things about yourself.
3. Pass the word on to 10 or so other deserving blogs.
4. Let them know of your nominating them for the award.

Well, it all sounds easy enough, so I set about fulfilling the rules and criteria.  I found some things out along the way.
#1 - It's really hard to sound gracious, and not come off like a duff.  Sending thank yous for the nomination, I had this visual loop running through my head of me as a weepy eyed Sally Fields accepting the award...disturbing.
#2 - I am my favorite subject; it's hard, when pressed, though, coming up with 7 things people might find interesting about me.
#3 - I am relatively new to the whole blog-o-sphere thing; I am a sort of Luddite in that respect.  Rummaging around looking for 10 sites to nominate, though I've found there are a plethora of excellent sites out there, full of eye candy, creativity and gaming resources galore.

Now, On to "7 Things About Me" or "Things people didn't really care to know..."

1. I have been married 19 years; father of two; ages 18 and 14.  My son starts his path to becoming an Officer in the U.S. Army in 23 days (we are very proud of him) and my daughter, the aspiring musician, starts high school next year (we are proud of her, too; I guess)
2. I am a United States Marine Corps veteran and life time member of the VFW.
3. Despite being an IT professional for over 25 years, my idyllic lifestyle would be to chuck it all and live in a rustic cabin in the woods, sans 90% of the daily technology we live with.
4. My first gaming memory is sitting on the living room floor playing Avalon Hill's "Panzer Blitz" and "Panzer Leader" with my dad as a child.
5. I paint and scratch-build terrain more than I game; selling off most of what I produce.  It pays for my hobby as well as keeping my shelves free of clutter.This blog is intended to get me gaming more.
6. We have 2 cats (Honey and Hildebear), a female Blue Fronted Amazon Parrot named Caesar (don't ask), and 2 Dogs, a 195 Lbs Great Dane (Russel) and a 5 Lbs Mulschipoo (Gizmo).  There is some fear that when the are both in the back yard together Russell will poop and accidentally bury Gizmo...we are very watchful.
7. I am a Christian in faith and will do my best to try and not look like a hypocrite on my blog and through my daily life.  I am usually not very good at it, so I apologize in advance.

Finally, for this post, here are my nominations for the "Stylish Blogger Award".  I chose as much on content and intent as I did for the looks of it all.  In no certain order:

General Game Blogging
Bandit86 blog; fantastic scratch builder and converter, in all sorts of genres.
Tiny Solitary Soldiers; solo 15mm gamer goodness.
Tim's Miniature Wargaming Blog; the content, both quality and quantitiy says it all.
Industry Updates and WIPs
The Weekly One Five; home of the talented sculptors who brought us many of the 15mm figs that are on sale today.
2 Hour Blog; Two Hour Wrgames official blog. Ed is a dynamo in generating interest in the hobby.  Oh, to have that energy.
SciFi Gaming
Dropship Horizon; the starting place, IMO, for small scale SciFi miniature gaming on the web.
Zombie Gaming
Vampifan's World Of The Undead; no zombie gamer should miss this blog.
Brains and Guts; more zombie blogging goodness.  This guy is all over the place giving encouragement to people and being involved. He's the one that originally got me involved in this whole awards thingy, so blame him.
The Quick and The Zed; shambling through getting into zombie gaming.  He's another awards nomination culprit.
Obviously Zed; follow the Whiteface family as they negotiate the zombie apocalypse.


Now, if you'll excuse me, I am off to tell these people that they've been nominated as a "Stylish Blogger".

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For the record, I understand that this is all about building community and interest in the hobbies of miniature gaming and blogging.  So if you are a beardy old git, full of cynicism,no need to make any comments about it all...NYyyaaa! :-P