Time definitely does fly, as it’s been a bit over a month since my last post. Yes, I did have a relaxing summer vacation with plenty of sun and heat.

A short review of Stanley Gibbons Stamps of the World 2010

During my vacation I did manage to loan a copy of Stanley Gibbons “Stamps of the World (SOTW) 2010″ catalog from local library. All-in-all it was very different from my outdated (late 1990’s) copy, and I did have a ball browsing it.

The 2010 catalog is softbound paperback, printed on good quality (slightly shiny) paper in full color. Featuring 5 massive volumes I definitely had hard time carrying the set home. I definitely hope they’d publish the entire SOTW-catalog on single DVD.

The preface didn’t contain anything out of the ordinary. I have a feeling that with each (annual) volume the prefaces get shorter and duller; possibly a sign of attempt to save space at all means possible.

The included “stamp identification guide” was interesting read and well planned, but IMHO it could have gone a bit further. For more advanced collector like me, there was very little of meaty tidbits.

The actual listings looked pretty much the same as a decade ago. Maybe my biggest moan would be that for some countries the listings ended several years before what I would have expected (2008/2009).

All in all, I’d say that the “Stamps of the World” catalog continues to be the same, heavily simplified, but nice-to-browse stamp catalog it has always been.

Misc tidbits

Otherwise I have very little news from the summer. I didn’t do much stamps, sadly. The heatwave (with temps nearing +35 celsius degrees day&night) made sure most folks (like me) didn’t do much.

Time spent browsing the SOTW 2010 got me thinking about updating my bookshelf contents; most of my printed catalogues are decade(s) old. But ahem… A quick scavenge on eBay and Amazon used books showed a wealthy selection, but… Though few years old catalog editions don’t pay much,the international postage fees (between 10-30€/US$ per book) doubling up the costs are way too much for my scrooge-like heart…Thankfully I did manage to find some cheap goodies from local second hand shops: a 2002 Norma specialized catalog of Finnish stamps cost me 1€ on local jumble sale; and an ancient annual volume of old Philatelica Fennica (Finnish stamp magazine) cost me 80 cents on another second hand shop.

Last weekend I managed to get rid off over 10kg of used Finnish postcards (mainly Christmas) in two boxes. They had been eating up floorspace for few years already, and I was more than delighted when a random collector friendship of mine mailed me to say he’d take them up while driving on my neighborhood. For 20€ it was a good deal on both ends.

Last night I was drooling over some websites of Finnish stamp shops. I didn’t order anything (yet), but the recent offer of Lighthouse deluxe 64-page stock books for 12€ ea. (if buying a full box) seems very tempting. In addition my misses would like to buy some (read at least 5 kilos) misc worldwide kiloware for upcoming autumn nights. All in all, it sounds tempting, but very likely both of us need to scale down our wishes in order to keep within our stamp budget.

But that’s pretty much all I have to say for now…

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