Three Useful Things, and the Rule of Five

To start with, three useful everyday items (ish) that I find valuable in the hobby.

Clothes pegs; I tend to base my skirmish and role playing miniatures on clear bases now, and that usually means painting them unbased.  It is so much easier to remove the base before painting, especially if it is a non slota base, and less destructive to paintwork too.  I drill into the feet and glue in a couple of wire pins, which then come in useful for pinning to the new base, but of course make it hard to manage the miniature.  I tried bulldog clips, but they don't really stand up well. So, clothes pegs.  If the mini is top heavy, simply use two, one clipping the nose of the other.

Two of my Frostgrave minis waiting for the gloss varnish to dry.  The metal berserk needs two pegs to stop him toppling over.

Baking Parchment; This, or a similar product is great for protecting surfaces of course, but I find it most useful when I don't want something to stick.  I was recently gluing together some MDF ruins that came two sided.  Putting both pieces in a fold of baking parchment meant I could apply some weight to them while the glue dried without it sticking to anything with the inevitable leaking around the edges.

Hygroscopic granules;  What?  You will have seen these when you buy electronic equipment, or even new trainers.  They come in a little packet and are designed to absorb moisture.  Save them and put one in each figures box or other hobby container to absorb moisture, especially if, like me, you have to store some stuff in a cool environment.

Now, the Rule of Five.  I've come across this on several blogs,  most recently on  Too Much Lead.
Basically it states that if you have an army or similar and haven't used it in five years, you might as well sell it on.  I am in the process of thinning out my collection, and also looking through it for projects to finish, so I will start applying this rule (probably;).