Far From the Madding Crowd: Kindle hints

I’ve been benefiting a lot from the advice given on this blog so I thought I’d start sharing my own Kindle experiences, beginning with a bad one. I decided to have Far From the Madding Crowd as my bedtime book. I do have a copy but couldn’t be bothered going outside in the dark to find it, so I downloaded a Kindle version.
Being a cheapskate, I looked for the cheapest version and went for the first one that came up, which cost 86p. It’s unreadable! It’s formatted
like
this: two lines followed by a line of one word only, with many strange


gaps like that one. There’s no need for it, as I’ve had many free downloads which are a pleasure to read. I’ll be deleting the book from my Kindle and finding the hard copy.

No, Royal Mail, I will not be buying your Olympics stamps

Here’s something you rarely see: a letter with a so-called special stamp on it and a legible postmark. When’s the last time you received one? Almost every letter posted has a gold 1st Class or blue 2nd Class stamp on it, while packets and parcels have computerized labels. In spite of this, every year Royal Mail brings out several sets of special stamps (which I still think of as commemoratives) in order to exploit unfortunate collectors whose ambition is to have a copy of every British stamp ever issued. What’s worse, they claim that these stamps are highly collectable and will become heirlooms. Oh yeah? Like those ‘heirloom’ Millenium stamps everyone hated? Don’t they realize that as soon as an object is described as a collectable it ceases to be one? If only we all knew which ephemera we’re throwing away now would indeed be collectable one day!

I gave up collecting these stamps long ago and now buy only new definitive stamps and save postally-used commems when I’m lucky enough to get any. This booklet dropped into my letter box this week.



If you can read the print, note the use of the weasel word ‘products’. Since when did stamps become products? What earthly use to anyone is a cover with a coin attached to it? We are offered the Olympics stamps in every possible variation of sheet, any number of different covers, postcards, miniature sheets, booklets; you name it. With the help of a calculator I worked out that to buy every item on offer would set you back £834.11 . For that money you could buy a decent collection of British stamps or even blow the lot on one rarity. In the latter case you would have a thing of beauty which would probably increase in value, unlike these worthless Olympics products. Of course, if you really love these new stamps or are a collector of sports issues, go ahead and buy. You can see some of them here.
Otherwise, what a waste of money! I much prefer these:



and they’re cheap as chips.