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May. 12th, 2008 08:45 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerOtherwise known as the study of stamps, but philately is more fun to say, and it reminds me of an episode of The West Wing where Josh and Donna banter beautifully.
I’m thinking about the topic for two reasons recently. First, the price of stamps went up today. I may be the only person under fifty who writes enough letters to care that sending them is now going to cost me forty-two cents. But I do. Especially because I have approximately sixty forty-one cent stamps left, and one cent stamps are annoying. Having two stamps makes the envelope look lopsided. :(
Second, I’ve been studying philately for my story. Santa Catarina, like Leichtenstein and Andorra in the real world, makes a lot of money off its limited issue stamps.
Leichtenstein also makes a lot of money off false teeth, of all things (and helping people evade taxes, but that’s prosaic and boring). And I thought giving Santa Catarina a thriving greeting card industry that specializes in pictures of kittens was strange.
On a less larcenous note, I read a book where the hero is a stamp collector (among other things): Carrie Brown’s Lamb in Love. It’s very peaceful and lyrical and quite nice if you just accept the fact that all the characters, despite being nominally British, talk like Americans. It would probably drive Britpickers mad.
I’m thinking about the topic for two reasons recently. First, the price of stamps went up today. I may be the only person under fifty who writes enough letters to care that sending them is now going to cost me forty-two cents. But I do. Especially because I have approximately sixty forty-one cent stamps left, and one cent stamps are annoying. Having two stamps makes the envelope look lopsided. :(
Second, I’ve been studying philately for my story. Santa Catarina, like Leichtenstein and Andorra in the real world, makes a lot of money off its limited issue stamps.
Leichtenstein also makes a lot of money off false teeth, of all things (and helping people evade taxes, but that’s prosaic and boring). And I thought giving Santa Catarina a thriving greeting card industry that specializes in pictures of kittens was strange.
On a less larcenous note, I read a book where the hero is a stamp collector (among other things): Carrie Brown’s Lamb in Love. It’s very peaceful and lyrical and quite nice if you just accept the fact that all the characters, despite being nominally British, talk like Americans. It would probably drive Britpickers mad.
