What Did You Do Philatelically: Today Or Recently?

Geoff - that's unfortunate - a reference collection of the 'Semeuse' would have been wonderful! I presume you are allready aware of these online sites, just thought I would share in case you don't as they are really helpful when studying the Semeuse:
https://www.francephilatelie.com/va...uses-de-1921
https://www.francephilatelie.com/va...amee-de-1906
http://semeuse22.free.fr/137_types_...arietes.html
http://phila-dico.soforums.com/t206...-Semeuse.htm
http://cpl14.fr/?page_id=2239

Jon - yes, I thought it might ease the pain when I started sorting! This was the lot

https://www.warwickandwarwick.com/a...hived/188781

And these were the Cinderellas

https://www.warwickandwarwick.com/a...hived/188790

Many thanks for the links.

I sorted and mounted some Dahomey. Unfortunately a lot of CTOs as only 3 of 32 stamps were postally used.

Dan

Jon (Blaamand)

Thanks for the may links on France......hope you keep them safe as I have already too many and will get lost when I do France, after Brazil and Argentina........!!
Keep safe my friend - René

Geoff and Rene - sure, I'm always pleased to help.

@Geoff - I understand your pain, that seemed like a nice Sower collection. On the other hand - it's good to see others are interested in that girl, too

Rene - no worries, the links are safe. Earlier all my links were a mess, so in order to organize and keep them safe, I am now organizing all my links pretty much the same way as my stamps - sorting them A-Z, one folder for each letter - and one sub-folder for each country. Starting my Description of each link with the year of issue, when relevant, and then they are automatically presented chronlogically in the folder for each country. Would recommend this.
Now my only concern is all the websites that change name/address or simply vanishes.

Wednesday I gave a display on Estonia postal history 1745 to 1945 at a Philatelic Society about 60 miles away to the NE of London.

Thursday I went to my own Philatelic Society's summer action and bought a new Lighthouse album, complete with 50 pages, for £3.50. This will be perfect for mounting and writing up a large number of SWA covers still in an embarrassing pile 3 months after buying them at auction

Three months after buying them and they're not mounted is embarassing? Yikes!

I've got SEVERAL collections I'm still working on breaking down YEARS after acquiring them.....



I'll just have redouble my efforts so I can get to the point where I'm only embarrassed, eh?

I spent the day yesterday (and more $ than planned) at the NAPEX show in McLean, VA. I picked up a number of 7-1-71 new city covers for my collection, and even found some Postal People FDCs from Baltimore. Both of these were nationwide First Day releases and fun to hunt. Also found some postcards from my old home town of Waynesboro, PA; some pricey, some not. And I bought a few small country collections (one with some better Ireland randomly included), and some larger foriegn covers that I will soak the stamps off of. Some hi-denom used Canada that I was missing, and a few other things. I also met Justin, who helps run and market the Hipstamp site (not an accomplishment, I think he met everybody).

If you are able, I would highly recommend visiting this show over the next two days. The exhibits are interesting (especially if you like Asia), and it seems to be a good year, material-wise and crowd-wise.

I spent the day putting together a set of US commemoratives for my son-in-law, who is beginning to collect. So far I have finished 1893-1965, culling them from my duplicates. I am sliding them into a Lighthouse 64 page stock book so he can decide at a later time what kind of album he wants to use.

This week, I've finally begun the huge task of sorting through my France and Colonies duplicates, with a view to getting feeder albums off to auctions, other stuff on to ebay etc. Incarceration in the house during the World Cup provides some scope for this. Also putting some material from other countries on ebay.

Shamed into action by Stampman I have now mounted all the SWA occupation covers in the newly bought Lighthouse album. They need to be written up, but at least they are housed!

Went to the COLOPEX show here in Columbus today. Some nice exhibits (really cool one-pager showing the evolution of postal card rates in the USA through the use of Tupperware Party postcards, and a very nice exhibit on the SCADTA Airmail issues of Colombia. Were also some very nice Ireland exhibits and a very detailed study of the first Polish gold currency issue of 1924). Only bad thing was the location of the show this year made reading exhibits difficult - it was in a multipurpose room inside a school annex to a Church and the room had drop panel ceilings with those large square light panels every few blocks. So much of the exhibits were in rather murky light which made them hard to read.

There was a bourse, saw a few dealers I've known over the years, but didn't really buy much. Partially due to being on tight budget (though I did get a new Linn's Multigage to replace the one I lost). But also partially due to the prices - I would love to support the dealers but I can not in good financial conscience pay 75-85% of Scott for items I know I can pick up for 50% or less of Scott online from Delcampe or Hipstamps.

There was a pretty good crowd of collectors considering I was there on a Friday around the Lunchtime hour. Mostly older folks but some younger and even a few kids.

Overall it was an OK show but remembering how Colopex used to be much bigger even a decade ago, it's a bit depressing to see how the show has declined (much like most regional shows in the USA have been experiencing.) Of course we have STAMPSHOW here in Columbus so I'll get to double-dip on stamp shows this year and I can't wait to see the exhibits that will be on display.

Here in Omaha we're hosting Stampshow next year. Our local show held yearly the weekend after Labor day seems to have been in a decline over the years. It at one time was a three day event, now just two with far fewer dealers. I heard complaint last year that attendance was way down. Due to the APS event a month earlier the Omaha local show won't be held next year I have to wonder if the one this Fall will be the last? .

Got an APS circuit today for French Colonies and used some of the money I didn't spend at COLOPEX to fill a bunch of holes in my New Caledonia from a circuit book priced at about 30% catalog value.

I spent a lot of time with Swaziland. I had picked up an ebay lot of several British Africa countries on Scott pages. I assume these were International - paper was thin and often on both sides. I prefer Steiner.

Also organized my "to be mounted" and "spares" binders with dividers to get the countries organized in alphabetical order.