What Was In Your Mailbox Today??

An APS sales circuit arrived recently. Picked up a couple of Aden Camp postmarks on India stamps.

Robert

A couple more

Now, stamp collecting is not my only hobby. Returning home from another hobby, late last evening, I found this cover in my mailbox. It contained an Ebay buy (Machins, again),

The basic international postage rate from the United Kingdom is a whopping £ 2.20. Even the first-class inland rate is £ 1.10. This cover was franked with only 93p in stamps. I cannot really see a trace of a third stamp.

The third stamp must have been one with a face value of at least £ 1.28 (no £ 1.27 stamp has ever been issued) and can only have been a Christmas or Machin stamp. There is not enough space for any other commemorative. If it was another commemorative, it must have fallen off the cover before it was sorted.

If there was no other stamp, I wonder what the sender was thinking. I, also, wonder what Royal Mail's revenue protection people were doing at the time this cover was sorted.



But I did get my item. The strip is the only source for the sideways-left printed 'rose-madder' 2 1/2p stamp (DG 25.12.2 / CC P26(1)) and 3p 'rose-red' (DG 30.12.2 / CC P32(1)). Part of the rolls were printed on paper that did not have the usual optical brightening agent mixed in the coating (DG 25.12.2a and DG 30.12.2a / CC P26FBO and P32FBO).

This is another Ebay lot I received. It was described as:




Unfortunately, it is not only the "13p reformers" traffic light that is missing.
To the right is a set of stamps dedicated to William Caxton. The set contains four stamps. The 11p stamp, however, is a plain gutter pair and not a traffic-light gutter pair.

In the middle, at the top, is the set of four 'cultural traditions' stamps. There are five pairs: a pair of the 8 1/2p stamp, another of the 13p, and three of the 10p stamp. That of the 11p stamp is missing. It appears the dealer has something against either the number 11, or legs.

There, also, is an extra pair of the 8 1/2p Christmas stamp.



I think it, mostly, is carelessness. I have written the seller. Let's see what he will do.

This post card from Puerto Rico:




While old and an interesting photo, it is the other side which caught my purchase interest. This is a nice registered post card and with the registration fee paid by a difficult to find used thus 400A. The forwarding and re-registration numbering adds as well. The last goodie worth mentioning is the Dead Letter Office marking.

Not quite received today, but these are a random sample of some of the stamps that have been rounding out my collection from a Mystic Stamp 3.5 lb mix of everything purchase. I've been slowly working my way through it for a couple of months now. I love the surprise of not knowing what I'll be turning over next!

My dual wave UV lamp came today!

Parcelpostguy - The Registered postal is quite nice!
From where did you acquire?
Thanks,
pat

Direct mail order retail purchase from a postal history California dealer. The dealer got it as a walk in at Cleveland GASS.

Edit; I got it as a fun and difficult 400A usage.

Numismatic rather than philatelic, but I got a completely unexpected gift in the mail today. My friends at the Tolkien Estate sent me one of the Royal Mint's new £2 coins commemorating J.R.R. Tolkien. September 2nd was the 50th anniversary of the Professor's passing.

Purely by chance ("if chance you call it") it arrived today of all days. September 14th on our calendar corresponds to Halimath 22 on the Shire Calendar, Yavannië 30 or Cormarë (Ringday) in the New Reckoning, Bilbo and Frodo's birthday.

Received a nice booklet pane of Scott 279Bk with vertical watermark.

I just got a nice postcard written in Esperanto that was mailed from Antwerp (Belgium) to Lima (Peru) on 26 September 1902. It's now my oldest Esperanto postcard, even though it's only 27 days earlier than the one that was previously my oldest.

A few weeks ago on this thread I reported on a piece of British postal stationery, specifically one issued for the British Empire Exhibition of 1924 and 1925. I indicated in that posting that there were eight different variants, with a one penny postcard, and a penny-halfpenny (or three halfpence as it says on the card) post card, envelope, and letter card for each of the two years that the Exhibition operated. They all featured the same images as the regular adhesive postage stamps that were issued the same years. Today in the mail I received the last of the eight that I still needed, the penny-halfpenny post card for 1924.
This card, as well as the penny-halfpenny post card for 1925 also features something unusual for British postal items: the name of the country. As is well known, Great Britain has never put its name on its postage stamps, a privilege that is unique to GB.