Waht the hlel is tihs? I had read from research, from Cambridge University that it doesn’t matter what order the letters are in a word so as long as the first and last are correct. The human brain doesn’t read every letter but the word as a whole so makes it easier to decipher. Thought I’d use this to write a message on the envelope and explain where it has to be delivered. Seems Cambridge was right!
Well I never! Before Christmas I received a letter from her Maj thanking me for congratulating her on sixty years on the throne and the Jubilee along with a note that says I hope I will understand that because of the enormous amount of letters she has received it has not been possible to reply to me until now.
Now I had never sent any letter so this is the only explaination I can think of.
Back in June I did of course do some Jubilee mailers for the occasion. One of them is re-created above, using the national anthem ending in GOD SAVE THE and the Jubilee stamp. They never arrived so I assumed some stamp nut or collector within the Royal Mail had kept them for himself. I even emailed Royal Mail later to have a little moan. My address was printed on the back to keep the front clean.
SO… I can only assume whoever picked it up took my address as the senders address and forwarded it onto the palace for her pleasure. So low and behold I think someone’s nabbed it and half a year later she says thank you. Well thank you your Majesty for indeed brightening up my blog. A little bit of me was tempted to write to the palace and explain the mix up but think I’ll let this one slide!
Celebrating the Chinese New Year. One of the Chinese traditions for the New Year is to burn money for old ancestors in the after life for good luck. I didn’t know this and guessed the majority of posties wouldn’t either… and I just thought a wad of money would look great as a mailer. Address and stamp on the money band. Would a lose bung of what could be forign currency just go through… oh yeah
How would this stamp work with the mailer? A nice cute little vulnerable chick on a journey could either of been perhaps learning to swim posted on a rubber ring, chirping an address, growing into a fine swan or maybe just on the end of an Eagles talons for lunch!
“Blip” to obtain delivery address. This was the only written instruction on the envelope under a QR code, simple enough. The QR code was generated online using my address and then just printed on the envelope and posted as normal. This took around two and a half weeks to arrive though. I’m guessing whoever it arrived at didn’t have a smart phone? Or perhaps just plopped to one side till someone knew what to do with it? Any way postie scribbled address on the front and voila!
The leap year anti-proposal kit. Another leap year mailer but playing on what is special about the day rather than the day itself, February 29th being the only day ladies are supposedly allowed to propose to men for marriage.
The second leap year mailer posted after the last collection on the 28th to get the 29th of February frank. This one only came through yesterday so took two weeks. No definition to explain the 11p postage of sorts just the little line ‘once in every four years’ under the stamps with the address on the back, but this got franked twice front and back missing the stamps so postie put a little line through them.
This extra day of the year seemed to good to miss as a day to try and post something to get the 29th of February frank. Post office doesn’t do a 29p stamp so had to improvise with a 2p and a 9p, set above a dictionary definition of the leap year day. Address just scribbled on the back but did they mind it only having 11p on it… no!
Valentine mailer. An alternative play to the traditional valentines card. Done with about 50 penny stamps, though technically half of them are not valid with not being whole stamps, but no surcharge on this one. Bit more unusual than the traditional offerings… cheaper too!
Just playing on the transportation of the stamps. This fella got a clean machine frank and Mr. Postie left the others alone.
And there was light, well an address. This one was making dear old Mr. Postie work a little bit more for the address. It was an origami folded piece that I found in an old book whereby you hold it up to the light to get an illuminated heart shape from the folds of paper in between. Used this shape to put the basic destination info inside with an instruction on the front of how to get it. The two comps above show how it looked before posting and how the address appears to Mr.Postie holding it up to the light.
Lets decode again! Nothing unusual about the stamp or how it is used, this one is all about the address again. The whole thing was done on a typewriter, yeh. The numerals was left in the address on the front and an A-Z decoder typed out on the back for them to work it out. It got there with just the bare amount of information decoded from Mr. Postie just scrawled in biro above the coded letters.
Every little helps. Another alternative form of ‘payment’ was a Tesco savings stamp. Went through no problem. Wonder if the barcode on the stamp had anything to do with it sneaking through? Maybe Mr. postie was just feeling sorry for someone’s mistake or just thinking what daft sod would waste £1 when a real stamp costs less!
Well it’s a stamp… just not a postage one. Green Shield stamps were also withdrawn in 1991 so it sort of doubles up as a celebration of them. But alas didn’t make it though without a charge, perhaps because they don’t have a value printed on them?
Lets decode! Nothing unusual about the stamp or how it is used, this one is all about the address. The address on the front was written in sign language, apart from numerals with an A-Z decoder on the back (I’m not that cruel). It came back with a note cello taped to the front with my address on it. Love the way they didn’t quite decode it properly and spelt my surname as FIDSON rather than WILSON mixing up the W’s and F’s.
