Last night I actually made some progress on my "To Do" list of miniatures painting.  In addition to base coating my two new SPUG commanders (they're now green with metalic guns, awaiting detail work like many of their brothers), I made much progress on my Berber Spearmen.

Now, my berbers all have brown spears with metalic tips, and 9 of the 16 are finished, shields and all.  The remaining 7 only need to have some cloaks and turbans colored and shaded, though I haven't decided what the best color scheme would be for them.  I'm favoring tans, blacks, whites and a little green for the ones I've done already, though a few of them have blue sashes, just to be different.  I'm keeping them a little darker to contrast with their Andalusian allies, who in my world at least like white or brightly colored clothing.

Now that they're actually getting away from so much white, and now that they're carrying their shields, they are definitely starting to look good!  I could finish them tonight, but....

Tomorrow, I'm DM'ing my first D&D game since the 80's.  I've played in a few games since that time, most enjoyably with my good friend and cohort Chuck DM'ing.  But this time, I'm running the show, and the audience is my wife, brother, sister in law, and oldest nephew.  While I'd LOVE to put my players into a cool Mesopotamian setting with a gritty, low-magic feel, I think that's the wrong choice for this crowd, so I'm sticking with the "standard" medieval D&D stuff.

As I've mentioned before, this is likely my only shot at doing this, so I'd like to get it right.  However, I'm also not practiced enough to really "ham it up" with lots of theatrics, so I'm going to play it pretty straight.  I have a simple introductory encounter for them (during their travels they need to take shelter in a cave, and that cave isn't as safe as it seems).  We only have 4 hours or so to play, and they'll be rolling up characters in that time as well, so we probably won't have time to do anything else.  But just in case we do, I have another scenario prepared that involves a mining town with something unpleasant living in the mine.

Tonight I need to study up both scenarios in detail so I'm prepared to DM them.  Given that two of my players have never played D&D, a third hasn't since I DM'ed for him last time, and the fourth likes to play but doesn't care for learning rules, I think we'll be lucky to get done with the first scenario in time.  If we have maybe an hour left after the first scenario, I'll give them some trouble along the road to the next town, and have them arrive in town at the end of the session.  Maybe the cliffhanger ending will convince them to come back for more.