Dragon Slayer

 Dragons need to be slain and who better than a warrior with a sword. Arrows are to easy, you can just take pot shots as they fly overhead and hide with every blast of fire behind a rock. It takes a real man to march out with just a shield and sword to slay one on the ground. Kind of looks like a toddler dragon though, well perhaps slaying dragons on the ground can only be done with young ones that can't fly yet.

 This is Latvia #'s 64,65 and 67 in my book. 64 and 65 issued in 1919 and 67 in 1920. 

JimmyB

Fortuity Yet Again

 It's kind of creepy for me how events in my life simply by chance randomly tie together. A perfect example is this short story.
 A gal at work brought in a binder of numerous philatelic items to show me after I loaned her a Scott's book on F.D.C.'s. Pressed for time in the break room I had to quickly look through and actually spotted a few items that were of interest to me. Anyways, I passed a home made album page of Transvaal and she asked me where it was. Transvaal is one of those stamps I check out when I'm sorting through a mixture that I've looked up and then quickly moved on sorting. It's somewhere in my head, but I haven't filed it so I said that I think it's in Africa(actually it was in South Africa). Perhaps my brain works in a way that it is cluttered, but yet somehow semi-organized. Today I come home and immediately set to making a blog post because yesterday was a day in hell for me. GTA V came out Tuesday and times been precious, no time to show a stamp to anyone yesterday. Anyways, I begin looking for something to share and choose this. Two King George V's from the Bechuanaland Protectorate. Searching for something to remark on these two stamps I do some sleuthing and come across a wiki article mentioning that in 1910 a 6 pence stamp of Transvaal was overprinted for the Bechuanaland Protectorate. I definitely need now to ask her about which Transvaal stamps she has(she had a lot of stuff to look at in 15 minutes I stretched beyond that as much as I dared). It'd be so cool if it turned out to be a 1910 6 pence. Maybe I'll start buying lottery tickets once again.
 King George V rocks and he's on my top 2 list of stamps. I need to share more of what I've got of these in my collection.
 These are issued on Dec 12, 1932.  The first two lower denominations #'s 105 and 106 out of a set of 12 stamps in my catalogue, engraved, watermarked and good looking with a 12.5 perforation.

JimmyB

Been there, Wish I Done That.

 This may come as a shock to most folks, but my job is not thrilling. I get all my enjoyment at work conversing with coworkers. I was conversing with a sweet gal named Ling and happened to mention(yeah, just happened to bring up) that I was searching for stamps and postcards. She in turn just says that she'll have her sister mail me a postcard from Australia. Wow, that shows you how nice she is. Zero interest herself in any philatelic endeavors whatsoever and boom, she's having her sister send me a card. Turns out to be a card of Perth, Australia which my ship(when I was a Navy Lad) pulled into. That was 30 years ago and how I've wished over the years I had a memento of it all. Also, it was franked with a 2013 stamp of a 40 spotted pardalote(yeah, I'm a bird nut also, with 4 birds who actually "converse" with me) which actually has about half that more spot's than 40. Also a pair of tourist spots(cripes, I unintentionally made a pun) in Australia(Fremantle's Fisherman's Wharf and Sydney's The Rocks) from 2008. Now she's telling me she's got some stamps for me and keeps forgetting to bring them in and I'm so unsure of how to show a little gratitude.

JimmyB

7 Ancient Wonders

 I received my first Postcard of an ancient wonder of the world today from my good friend Mohamed Ibrahim who is in the FB group "Postcards swap". It also happens to be a Unesco site and gives me another card to check off my list. The Pyramids and Great Sphynx. The affixed stamp listed as "Egyptian Art" 2002-2005. I definitely need an update from a Facebook friend on this one.

JimmyB

Manxmen

 Another super duper fantastic issue of the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar. Yes, Nelson is present on the stamp, but this set is for the men from the Isle of Man. Manxmen they are called. John Quilliam is represented as the "Manxman" on the 22p stamp on the lower left. Nelson made him First Lieutenant on the HMS Victory, a 104 gun first-rate ship of the line. The lead ship which Nelson was on leading the charge and commanded by Captain Thomas Hardy. The fact that Quilliam survived the suicidal position of being on the lead ship is amazing. As fantastic as the strategy was, the Victory along with the Royal Sovereign(splitting off as a lead ship to the right) bore the worst of it all in the total British annihilation of the French and Spanish navies. "God Save The Queen!!!!"

JimmyB

Older stamp of him

 September 3rd I shared a stamp I had with Emperor Dom Pedro's image on it. This is an older stamp of him with a much younger likeness. #57 in my book and rat tat shape to be sure. I had someone comment on a recent post that one of my stamps was just a space filler because of the condition. I'm sure he feels this one is too, but please don't be a killjoy and make remarks like that. I'm not pulling anyone's teeth to look at my posts. It's kind of like looking at a man's wife and saying to him he'd need to drink a case of beer to......well you know what I mean.
 This is #57 in my book and issued in 1866.   Valued at $5.00 if in much better condition than this.

 

JimmyB

Rock the Church

 I got a great postcard from Katrin Fraenkler in FB's "Postcards Swap" group depicting the Luther Memorials in Eisleben and Wittenberg.  I've only got  978 cards to go to complete the entire set, provided that is, that the U.N. doesn't continue adding more sites to the list(they added 19 sites this past summer) Heritage Site Map. Thank you Katrin, I hope you receive your Mounds card soon if you haven't yet already.

. 

JimmyB

Not Jersey Shores

 Back to my Battle of Trafalgar anniversary stamps. I posted the 34 pence several years ago, well here is the complete set. The HMS Belleisle, HMS Sovereign, HMS Neptune, HMS Euryalus and HMS Mars all portrayed in their glorious unprecedented victory!! Issued in 2005 on the 200th Anniversary of the greatest naval victory in the history of the world!!

JimmyB