Not Quite Retired Yet

 In November 2024 I was lucky enough to become old enough to draw my company pension. It was never going to be enough to retire on. That’ll never happen! So I took it all as cash. 

The wife was happy that I spend some of it to build a new, dry home for my toys. My wargames paraphernalia have had many homes over the years usually neither new nor dry. The latter has often been an issue. A flooded garage and a flooded basement having been the biggest disasters; some of my figures still bear the scars of water damage.

Welcome to the Guardroom!

Once upon a time, our new family home had a garage…

That would have just been another damp place to store my collections!

Bye bye to that old thing…

And bring in the garden room experts!

It’s a wooden construction, but it will be fully insulated.

It’s starting to take shape. 

Plastered inside and windows fitted.

The doors going in felt like a major milestone. Excitement from me at every sign of progress!

Pretty much finished on the outside, my little hideaway down the bottom of the garden :-)

The focus shifts to the inside. The floor goes down and decorating starts once the plaster has dried. 

Steps built. Fancy outside lights fitted. 

Decorating finished and fixtures and fittings start to go in. The priority is storage, but I’m a wargamer and every wargame space needs a table. The old WD desks will give me a 6x4 table. I’ve ample opportunity to play on larger wargames tables. This will be enough for small games at home and organising figures for painting, games or, use it or lose it, selling!

A charge point for the wife’s fancy new motor and insulated blinds. These will help keep the Warroom cool in Summer and warm in Winter. 

It’s looking great. The grass starts to recover from the building site mud. 

Approaching the end. Precious things return from the storage unit. No pets allowed! Any of my furry friends have to make do with sunbathing whilst I’m in the “man cave”. I don’t think the wife likes to venture in either. She makes horrified noises at the amount of “stuff”!

And there you have it. I have a dedicated, dry space to store my precious things and occasionally get them out and play with! Special thanks to Andy Easten. I finally have a use for the Guardroom plaque present from him. Special thanks also to Ken Hanning as his Perthshire War Room was the inspiration behind this build. As I can often say though, mine is smaller :-P

Cheers

Chris

WWG in Exile