Jargo

When I get the chance and I'm alone I play with my lego cars. car chases and slow motion crashes. Sometimes I even make noises like screeching tyres or explosions. I swoosh areoplanes around my room. And I have some 'stunt' minifigs with loose legs who play the part of accident victims or drivers flying out of crashing cars. Play is essential to keeping an active mind. I'm almost 43 but I don't think I'll ever stop playing. If I do that I feel like I might as well book my funeral and just quit living.

That is very nice. You're dead cleverly. Seriously it's a sweet little build on the levers. on an open back build it might not have worked but in an enclosed build it's great. I need to design myself a signal box and will probably use this as inspiration.

No Lego Dr. Who. The BBC have signed a deal with toy manufacturer Character Options to produce Dr. Who construction toys. http://www.doctorwhotoys.net/characterbuilding.htm

Bulk basic bricks - PAB Unusual or older parts, odd colours, variety, fun experience, surprise bargains, voyage of discovery - BL

curse those rugrats getting a hospital before us big kids. I don't mind really. I'm building my own. I just hope when a City hospital does come LEGO don't use red again. Green is much more suitable. Red just seems a bit too grisly.

I like the idea of Greek mythology. Great heroes pitted against monsters seems like a very LEGO thing to do. Gods and monsters. Temples and monuments. ships and adventures. That I can see as sets. Huge armies I can't. There again I don't see why there couldn't be both Greek and Roman. If it fell into the Castle theme with forts and city walls and so on, it could simply be greek two years, Roman the next two.

It is addictive. I always start out with noble intentions, just a few pieces for a specificbuild then spot something cheap or something a bit hard to come by and before I know it I'm over budget and have visited ten stores and placed several orders. I often end up ordering things I already have enough of but have forgotten I've got. Though recently I've slowed down because of funds shortage and rising prices. buying by the piece and part is my preferred method though. LEGO p.a.b. is poor in variety of pieces so Bricklink is plastic heaven for me.

i really want this set. I have the smaller tow truck but it's kinda lame without a garage. Also, as much as I love orange I;m aiming to change it to lime. keeping orange for city sanitation vehicles. I chose lime as it's the best hi-viz colour. the sort of livery you'd spot easily in bad weather if you were stranded somewhere with a dead engine. If I mod this to have a roof I'll probably add a glass wall front. trans black to give the impression of dirt and grime build up from exhaust fumes.

Facade only for me. with maybe a little window dressing to give an impression of a busy interior. I don't have masses of bricks so economies and corner cutting is required. though if a building has a big glass front then I may add more detail. I'm not really a fan of cluttered and chaotic though. I like to keep things simple, clean and streamlined. less is more and all that.

Roald Dahl books. James and the giant peach, Fantastic Mr. Fox, The BFG, Charlie and the chocolate factory/The great glass elevator, Matilda, George's Marvellous Medicine, The Twits, The Witches, etc. Classic stories known the world over. Rich in fantasy and strong characters, good and bad. Stories parents will know and possibly have had read to them and then read to their children. I think it's great idea to use kids books as inspiration rather than lacklustre cartoons. Might encourage kids to read. Doubtful I know but if I was a parent I'd buy something based on a first class book before something based on vapid mind numbing tv shows.

Prison. Yes. I'd love one. Re-using the prisoner in orange overalls from the world city police station. Could be a great source of gnarly rough and tough looking face prints. As well as the cells it could also include a governors office and canteen. exercise yard and would have to have watchtowers and really imposing front gates. A prison is pretty much a fortress or modern castle. If the prison had a design based on a castle, as though the castle had been re-purposed at some point it would lend a sense of history to the cityscape it belonged to. I've often thought the Lego city could do with some castle wall ruins or 'leftover' towers incorporated into buildings along the lines of classic sets 1589 and 1592. Though obviously grey walls not yellow. I just think a bit of structural antiquity would add something to what is mostly a modern city by design. I can't think of many cities that don't have buildings of varying age and style. Modular sets have that element in a way but regular sets don't seem to.

Cool! Also looks a bit like Asterix the Gaul's dog Dogmatix. You'd only have to change the tips of the ears and tail to black for Dogmatix.

Trans black was always a brown hue. It's never actually been a black at all. The official Lego name for the colour was '111 trans brown'. So now it's gone from trans brown to, um - trans brown. To be honest it doesn't look any different to me.

Now that's how you build a bank. The simple clean lines of this are great. Losing the yellow hasn't hurt it at all. The original set yellow parts work because it's such a small bank and looks like the kind you'd find in a shapping mall, but this is definitely a main street bank. A clean modern look on a building that looks a lot older. Perfect.

The cost of paying banker's bonuses has increased. Hence the VAT rise to 20%.

looks like the ball and socket with a 2x2 base that was used on the star wars republic gunship as nose cannons. where the 4l trans rod is attached you can see the four indentations around the connection hole on the ball and you can just about see the slits on the side of the socket part. what makes it look different is that something obscures the base plate bit. that and the photo is skewed and has a big confidential watermark over it.

It's okay my post came across stronger than I intended it to be. Apologies from this end too.

How damn patronising. climb out of your ivory tower for a minute would you.

Dorky maybe. I dunno, looking at photos of people at Lego conventions it seems fairly evenly split between dorks and pretty cool fellows. I'd say if you know the part numbers of every brick and all the set numbers by heart then yes you're a dork. being gifted with building skillz or a genuine interest in the function of creativity through construction or 'play' is fairly cool. amassing ten thousand star wars clonetroopers and arranging them in ranks to try and impress people is definitely not cool.

What should have been the starting point of the marina is the boats. Like a new boat, longer than the fishing boat but shorter than the cargo ship. Luxury cruiser size. White hull and tan deck. Something a bit snazzy. Something good for the south of France or the Bahamas. Something with blacked out cabin windows and lots of bling. Any novice can build a marina around boats. They're only a few jetties a promenade and a club house. What is difficult is making small boat hulls stretch or large ones shrink. Lego don't have anything in the mid-size range. Nothing very sleek. nothing upmarket. Where's a rich city businessman to entertain his Italian and Russian 'business associates'? Where is a Movie star to relax? all the Lego boats and ships are a bit - working class. I'm only half serious here. A luxury cruiser yacht would be nice though. I like the fishing boat and speed boats, the cargo ship is ok and I don't mind the rubber dinghy in blue. I think the dock and marina are a let down as far as the 'buildings' go. I'd sooner just have the boats without the 'buildings'.

deep floating shelves and Ikea 'Ivar' shelf units. Usually only leave things on display until there's a patina of dust or a spider has left threads all over it. that's usually the indicator it's time to clean the parts and take it apart. Recently lost all my Ikea shelves to books of all things. finally sorted out a library downstairs so need to rethink how I'll display. Maybe more floating shelves. twelve inches deep is enough for 32x32 plates. and most of my creations fit one of those. really got no idea what I'll do if I want something bigger.

Area 51 has had a long time to work out how alien tech works.

I'm guessing you're a purist. I think as much as it's iconic at some point it's inevitable the horse will be given a more sculpted look. certainly the head. the body will probably just get rounder, slightly wider shoulders and flanks. I don't think the silhouette needs to change it's just too square from front view. the whole character of the horse disappears. Besides which, so many bootleggers are copying the horse mould now Lego may have to change the design just to stay ahead. I like the current horse. it's been a good friend for many years but it's old and tired and it's time it was put out to pasture before it gets lame.

I'd say it's more present day. or very near future. the earth force vehicles aren't that far off vehicles in current use by various military organisations. The blue colour scheme throws it off. If they'd been dark green or dark tan they wouldn't look so futuristic. I'm wondering now what planet the aliens are from. They fit the little green men from mars image but equally the old little green men from venus. Oh wait, men are from mars and women are from venus..... No that's something else entirely. Anyhoo, yes, retro aliens, modern earth defense.

I've been giving Asian Dub Foundation a lot of ear time lately. I'm a big fan of global/ethnic fusion music. Never really been into guitar bands or any of the more common genres. However, instruments from different cultures/parts of the world played in a way that blends with western musical phrasing is ear candy to me. I only discovered ADF recently. I listen to www.somafm.com groove salad channel a lot of the time and pick up on artists new to me, which is how I stumbled across them. so far they haven't released much but Monsoon malabar off the 3 cities album never fails to cheer me up. It's probably not the best track on the album, Egypt by air would probably fit more peoples idea of a decent chillout choon, but I likes what I likes.