One giant leap

I have been geeking out recently about the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission. I have always been fascinated by space travel and exploration, and the work of these pioneers still moves me.

'Tough and competent'

-Gene Kranz

I treated myself to a Lego Lunar Module, which I built with the Skirt Swisher:

I've really enjoyed the BBC World Service podcast 13 Minutes to the moon. I can also highly recommend the documentary In the shadow of the moon, about the space race in general.

I've heard of the HBO series From the earth to the moon; is it any good? What about First Man?

Never change, Buzz. Never change.

Newcastle Brickfest 2016

Last weekend was Newcastle Brickfest. I went to the first one in 2014, and pictures can be seen here. This was at the same location, but had been spread over two days, with ticketed entrance times and a resulting decrease in crowd crush. There was a variety of Lego on display, as well as a few members of the 501st Legion, Southern Cross Garrison.

Large Angry Unikitty

Classic Space- still my favourite.

Let it snow!

Who ya gonna call?

Jinkies!

Dragons vs vikings

Cherry blossom tree

A local school

There were some cool X-Files vignettes:

Star Wars was again popular:

I really liked these Alice in Wonderland vignettes:

The Lego Group doesn't make military themed bits, but there are after-market weapons and helmets available to make dioramas like this one, or the war memorial in the town above:

It's a fun day, and proceeds go to a good cause. Yay, Lego!

On Lego

Earlier this year my long-dormant Lego interest was rekindled by the thoroughly enjoyable Lego Movie. I pulled things out of storage, found long-lost instructions on the internet, and indulged myself in building a few old sets. Ah, the nostalgia!

Today I got my geek on at Newcastle Brickfest. It was packed, and I had to fight off the kiddies to have a good look around.

Town Lego

Thieves on the bank roof about to get a mech surprise!

Can't make it to Blood Bowl tourney today...

Old West

Mediaeval

Fairy tales

Yarr!

Haunted house

Star Wars was very popular

So many colours compared to when I was young...

Lego Simpson and his donkey

Not-quite-kosher Lego Anzac

Now, older, wiser, looking back- damn, Lego is a great toy. After thirty years it still works and still charms, with no rust and minimal breakage despite years of hard play. There's no scale creep. I can build what I want, how I want, without needing to upgrade a game console or a ruleset or software or replace complex moving parts or batteries. I don't need to paint it or glue it, it's ready to go out of the box, and can make changes as I go. Something today works with something thirty-five years old- how often can you say that?

It gave me true childlike joy to reassemble some of my old sets. They haven't been kept unopened in their original packaging, or built and displayed on a dust-free shelf, but have rather been assembled and played with and reassembled countless times.

Thanks, Lego!