This is a tough one.
It is with extremely heavy heart that I have to announce that The Cowabunga Journal will be going on indefinite hiatus effective immediately.
Life is a tough SOB, and even when you feel like it is going your way again, new things will pop up and make you lose faith in yesterday, today and tomorrow,
I need to focus all my energy, or what is left of it, in other directions, and therefore I cannot facilitate the running of these accounts and the associated page or painting challenges.
It has been my pleasure and privilege to connect with so many different and brilliant people around the globe and build a form of community through our painting. It will be sorely missed.
I am also honoured that so many has chosen to follow the progress on the various platforms I use. Luckily, there are more than enough people out there producing similar stuff, so you will not be left wanting.
I wish I had some silver lining to end this on, but I can only end on a note of hope. I hope the future will be better and that I can return to work on this once again. I hope the storms will pass and that the skies will eventually clear.
Take care dudes and dudettes!
Thank you
Dr. The Viking out…
#40k2ndAC #middlehammer #goblingreen #2nded40k #warhammerrenaissance #oldhammerwfb #2ndedition40k #oldhammerpainting #FallBrawlAC #oldhammerfantasy #WarhammerCommunity #c0wabunga
Cowabunga Journal 
Sorry to hear you are going.. liked probably was the right thing.
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Wishing you the best. Take care, Troy
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Hope everything works out for you, you had a huge impact in getting people engaged with the hobby. Anyone who can get people to actually models is a hero!
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As said on FaceBook–sorry to hear this, and I hope all is ok with you (or gets better soon). You have done a lot for the Middlehammer community but at the end of the day this is all just a fun hobby and sometimes other things have to come first. Hopefully we see the Journal back again in time, and for now, we’re wishing the best for you,
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All the best, wishing things turn around and we see more from you again.
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Noooooooo! :-O
You and your efforts will be very much missed, but as always it’s a case of priorities; I wish you every success with your personal situation, and I hope that you will be back again at some point. With thanks for all your efforts to date, kind regards, and the very best wishes to you! 🙂
(Major_Gilbear)
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Dr. The Viking,
I’m unsure what life has thrown at you, but having suffered a serious foot and ankle tendon injury at the hooves and sheer bulk of a horse back in late 2020, and post-surgical complications resulting in a chronic pain syndrome as well as a dvt (deep vein thrombosis aka blood clot) that we found at a stupidly large 75mm in length (20mm is a pretty big clot for reference) and then catching covid in August last year seeing it balloon out to a truly whopping 480mm down my leg (yeah almost half a metre, fun times) and degrading since down to ~360mm and stopping there (resulting in a permanent blood clot scar which random and intense pains in my leg aside, means I get to make such jokes as I am channelling my inner Ogre when my leg swells out to 3 or 4 times the size of my good leg) I can safely say from a place of experience that the most important thing when life throws crap at you after repeatedly kicking you in your jangly bits, that the most important thing is to find one or two people that, if not able to relate first hand, can at least talk and listen and be a positive force in your life as you work through each thing that is thrown at you. Prioritising what is important to you whilst you work through whatever is being smashed into you by life the universe and everything is a good place to begin, so whilst people who have been following or even participating in your challenges and blog may not necessarily know what is happening, many will be able to relate on some level and everyone understands that sometimes, life forces you to engage with only a fraction of what you’d like to and that is ok.
I sincerely hope everything works out for you and you can come back to the journal and the 2nd ed army challenges. I had been watching the latest one after discovering the previous one and drawing on inspiration to actually get some physical hobbying done with my ridiculously large rogue trader and 2nd edition tyrranid army I have been collecting since 2009. Hobby space has been an issue but so too all the physical and mental challenges of the past few years and I’m finally in a place where I was looking forwards to applying for and participating in your next 40k 2nd edition army challenge with my own Tyranids. There have been some superb Tyranid armies in your series’ but I have a collection that covers all of the models barring a few of the unreleased models with known extremely low quantities that are simply too expensive to justify. I was pleasantly surprised by the armorcast Dactylis in the last challenge, as they generally are fairly hard to track down compared to the other 3 armorcast tyranids (the near mythical Trygon does not count here, I’d borderline kill for that model haha) and whilst I do own 3 Dactylis myself, still, very nice to see. If life does get manageable again for you and you can throw your all back into the journal and your challenges, I’m here with a hand up to say I’ll take the plunge and paint up at the least a dominator if not one of my 2 protonids (I only ever thought I’d have one of these beauties, which I sourced back in 2010-2011ish after a solid year or so of tracking down almost 2 dozen protonids worldwide none of which were for sale but of which I was able to find out it was a severely limited release model as someone had purchased theirs from a FLGS in blister form here in Australia…it annoys me immensely that the stuff of legends has shifted it back to the unreleased category on their website…
Anyhow, best of luck beating whatever is against you currently, and if you ever do feel overwhelmed by it all, I’m positive that the groups you are part of in this hobby niche of ours, will happily stand up and give you a helping shove towards the emperor’s light (or whatever higher power you lean towards in the 41st millenium {the hive mind is all embracing, just saying!}).
Take care mate,
Luke (aka Auretious Taak/Ram Rock Ed First),
Sydney, Australia.
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