Keighley and Worth Valley Railway, England

Next is a lovely train card (which whenever I look at, I think it is somewhere in Germany, dont know why)

Damems on the Keighley and Worth Valley Railway is the smallest standard gauge station in the UK.

Locomotive 43924, a '4F Class' from 1920, was the first in the UK to be restored to working order, after rescue from a scrapyard.

Well done! Who would put this into a scrapyard? Tsk tsk tsk!! 

Number of lovely stamps of course, and i just figured out that by trying to remove the address I had also ruined that last stamp but Im not gonna be waiting to go home and rescan it, cos then this update will surely not happen...

Ill start with the non-queen stamp (not sure if Ill pinpoint the right Queen ones).

The top right stamp is from a set of 5 Christmas stamps issued in 1983. It is so lovely and I never would have guessed it is a Christmas one!

The stamp below it was issued one year earlier, and is from a set of four commemorating the 100th Anniversary of the Death of Charles Darwin.

That ruined one is also from 1982, from a set of 5 stamps representing British Mariners. This one shows Lord Nelson (and it is 24p, face value).

As for the Queen - I gave up on here... I really cannot distinguish among all those shades of purple and blue and brown... I wish they would start putting the year on the stamps, would make things so easier.

Kilaeua Lighthouse, USA

Next comes a card from Bryon.

The card shows the Kilaeua Lighthouse, on the northernmost point of the Hawaiian Island, built in 1913.
Interestign fun fact about it is that it can be seen briefly in Disney's animated film Lilo & Stitch, and it plays a more important role in the sequel, Stitch! The Movie. In the film, the lighthouse serves as a rendezvous point where the protagonists are to trade Jumba Jookiba's first 624 experiments (the 625th experiment was taken by Gantu earlier) with the antagonist Dr. Jacques von Hämsterviel for Jumba himself. The lighthouse in the franchise was said in the movie to have shut down years ago due to the financial troubles of keeping it running. Towards the end of the film, however, Experiment 221—an electrical experiment that Lilo names "Sparky"— is given the lighthouse as a new home, and he uses his power to make the beacon shine again.

Well, for those of you who have watched it, this may be interesting trivia... i still need to put this on my watching list :)

a number of lovely stamps on the back! Two are from the amazing last year's set of Bioluminescent Life of a total of 10 stamps. The stamp on the left features a firefly, while the one on the right a marine worm. These stamps do not glow in the dark, as some may wonder, but they are highly reflective under white light - something I yet need to test.
The remaining two stamps are quite older - the left one, issued in 1977 shows the Peace Bridge, an international bridge between Canada and the United States - and as the name suggests, it was named to commemorate 100 years of peace between the United States and Canada.
The last stamp is from 1968, simply titled Register and Vote - and I guess it is another self-explanatory stamp as well :)

Baku, Azerbaijan

Welcome February! With postcards mainly from last year.

But there is a card overdue that is about time to show... well, there are thousands of cards that are overdue, however, this is new country we are talking about and previously I would post new countries soon after their arrival... however, it has been several months since this one had arrived and it is about time to pay proper attention to it (and funny thing within a short period of time I actually ended up receiving two cards from Azerbaijan, but one at a time :))

This is one of the countries that I would really love to go to, but the prospects about it right now are rather low, leaning towards non-existent. But oh well, there are other options at hand so it is not that bad after all... but no spoilers right now :)

Anyways, the card shows a really lovely night view of Baku, where you can among else see the Flame Towers which is a trio of skyscrapers, including the tallest in the country, with a height of 182 m.
The towers symbolize the long history of fire worshippers that considered Azerbaijan as a birthplace for the prophet Zoroaster. The buildings consist of 130 residential apartments over 33 floors, a hotel tower that consists of 250 rooms and 61 serviced apartments, and office blocks.
Construction began in 2007, with completion in 2012, with an estimated cost of US$350 million)

The Flame Towers consist of three buildings: South, East and West. The facades of the three Flame Towers function as large display screens with the use of more than 10,000 high-power LED luminaires, as you can see in the video below.

The stamp is from a set of two EUROPA stamps issued in 2006, for the 50th anniversary of the first EUROPA stamp.

Maastricht, The Netherlands

And after ticking another country off the list, back to something else now.

I haven't really considered visiting Maastricht.... but after having received this card, my plans kinda changed.
This is one of the most beautiful bookstores in the world (according to Alvin, and im pretty sure he is right).
Built in 1294, the cathedral features large open spaces boasting three-story bookshelves. Being that the church contains 1,200 square meters of shopping space with only 750 square meters of floor space, the architects decided to design vertically. They incorporate the modern scheme of the shop without obstructing the religious motifs or structure of the ancient venue. Within the space, there is also a cafe. As a nod to the bookstore’s past-life, there is a long table shaped like a cross in the eating area, which is conveniently located where the choir formerly situated themselves.

How can you not want to visit this place? So if you end up in Maastricht and wanna do something that is not really touristy, this is a great way to spend your time. If I end up in Maastricht, this would be my first destination, for sure!

Two nice stamps on the card. Christmas one on the left, from the set of 10 Christmas stamps issued last year. The other stamp is from 2018, showing the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision - Beeld en Geluid.

Copenhagen, Denmark

And one more card for today which I have in my collection thanks to Genek.... and myself.

You may know or you may not know, in September last year I did a one day trip to Copenhagen. The fact that you may not have been informed about it through a postcard, is the ridiculously high postage rate... probably the most expensive one I have experienced so far (even worse than my last trip, whose postcards are on their way :P)

Anyways, it was great to see Copenhagen and even lovelier to meet Genek, even though the weather did play trick on us. However, that didn't ruin our experience of the Danish capital.
And out of the entire city, the colourful Nyhavn probably was my favourite spot!

Nyhavn, ninja style 

Nyhavn is a 17th-century waterfront, canal and entertainment district, stretching from Kongens Nytorv to the harbour front just south of the Royal Playhouse, lined by brightly coloured 17th and early 18th century townhouses and bars, cafes and restaurants. It also harbours many historical wooden ships

It was constructed by King Christian V from 1670 to 1673, dug by Swedish prisoners of war from the Dano-Swedish War 1658–1660. It is a gateway from the sea to the old inner city a King's Square, where ships handled cargo and fishermens' catch. 

It was notorious for beer, sailors, and prostitution. Danish author Hans Christian Andersen lived at Nyhavn for some 18 years.

 The first bridge across Nyhavn, which was a temporary wooden footbridge, opened on 6 February 1875. It was replaced by the current bridge in 1912.

                                                                    And, say cheese! 

A nice rose on the stamp (even though Im not a flower person), from a set of 5 stamps issued in 2018.


So, lets close the post for today. Wishing you all a nice week and a nice February!

Donald Barthelme

Recently I won a lottery where I could choose a Classic Writers' card.
There were indeed plenty of writers to choose from which really put me in front of a tough decision, until while scrolling, I noticed this card had the name of Donald Barthelme, and I immediately knew this was going to be my lottery prize!

Frankly, I had no idea how he looked liked, so if it wasn't for the caption, I would have completely ignored this card.
An American short story writer and novelist known for his playful, postmodernist style of short fiction  (April 7, 1931 – July 23, 1989), that I first encountered while at university, when I had the chance to read his story The School. One of the best short-stories I have ever read! Unfortunately back then the internet didn't have as many things as today, so not that many stuff could be found online (though sparknotes existed, which made university life so easier :P) Anyways, as I said, not many things could be found online so I only managed to find just another story by him, called "The First Thing the Baby did wrong" - hilarious!
And somehow after that I just kinda forgot about him (yeah, shame on me), until I actually won this lottery, which made me google him back and forth, and of course, now way more stories have been published on the internet - making me realize what I have been missing all these years.
However, now I'm kinda saving money to order at least some of his books cos I'd really like to have them in my collection - will worry later about lack of space :)


If you would like to read both these stories, just click on the links below

The School
The First Thing the Baby did wrong

And totally unplanned, this post coincides with Donald's birthday, who would have turned 87 today... and also if my dearest grandmother was alive, today we would have been celebrating her 81st birthday! I really really miss her! ❤ ❤ ❤ ❤

Happy New Year 2018 and Welcome Back Here :)

*cough cough cough* (clears throat)

Well, hello hello hello out there! Oh yeah, look who's finally back! :D
You still can't believe it right? Me neither! What I esp. cannot believe is that it has been more than a year since I've done a real postcards-related post here - all those yada dada's don't count to the actual contribution to this blog, but frankly, I didn't expect that the whole Photobucket issue would end up being so demotivating in the end. But truth is, it was, cos the entire starting-things-from-scratch was so tedious, that I just never really got down to it. All the time I kinda secretly hoped that maybe Photobucket would get back to its senses and at LEAST let us unfortunate users use the photos that were already there, prior to their nonsensical decision - but of course, that day still hasn't arrived and obviously, it never will, so I just have to get over it and maybe, just maybe, one day, be able to repair the damage they had done.
But in the meantime, I guess it is time to continue this blog's sole purpose cos despite the dreadful silence here, there are still people out there who still check this place from time to time, and hope for something new. And here I would like to send special regards to my two regular bots in the form of william charles and linda clark - seems that a day doesn't go by without me getting a notification that one of you has visited one of my two blogs - you really seem to be dedicated to whatever you are doing ;-D

And lets get down to some actual business right now, with this super cute surprise that arrived in my mailbox today.

It just seems like the perfect card for this so-called 'grand entrance', plus it is holidays related, so looks perfect.
It is not signed, but based on the cancellation, I can assume who sent it to me ❤

And I just wanna wish you all Happy Holidays and a fab  year ahead. Hope life gives you health, love and lots of lovely surprises in your mailbox :)
Thank you for all the awesome cards you sent me last year - finding those surprises in my mailbox can often cheer me up even on a very shitty day, so keep them coming! :*

Fort Lauderdale, USA

Glenn has been on one of his cruises lately, and as always, never fails to send me a card from wherever he is, regularly feeding my hungry mailbox.

This card is from Ft. Lauderdale, which if I got it right, was the embarking point, but seems it has arrived like, the last...  cos just the other day i received one from the Bahamas, saying it was the last stop - but then taking a look at the cancellations something doesnt make sense so I'm a bit confused,  but alas, what matters is that they have arrived :)

Ft. Lauderdale always associates me to my best friend from primary school who moved there back then. To the rest of the world it is this popular tourist destination with plenty of sunshine, lovely beaches at the Atlantic Ocean shores.
It is named after a series of forts built by the United States during the Second Seminole War. The forts took their name from Major William Lauderdale (1782–1838), younger brother of Lieutenant Colonel James Lauderdale. William Lauderdale was the commander of the detachment of soldiers who built the first fort. However, development of the city did not begin until 50 years after the forts were abandoned at the end of the conflict.
Three forts named "Fort Lauderdale" were constructed: the first was at the fork of the New River, the second was at Tarpon Bend on the New River between the present-day Colee Hammock and Rio Vista neighborhoods, and the third was near the site of the Bahia Mar Marina.

being disproportionate in size, the cancellations kinda overshadow the stamps and this is the thing that kinda got me confused - when I checked Glenn's blog, it said that he was already back from his cruise at the end of November, but the cancellation here says 04 December, so who knows what has happened.
The stamps are from a series of four Forever stamps issued in 2016, called, Sonbirds in the Snow. Featured on these three are, from left to right: the golden-crowned kinglet (or Regulus satrapa), the cedar waxwing (or Bombycilla cedrorum), and the red-breasted nuthatch (or Sitta canadensis).

Thanks a lot lot Glenn for this, and all the other surprises sent my way!!

Bicycles

My dear Agi always somehow managed to stumble upon cards with trains or bicycles and decides to surprise my mailbox! And I was delighted to see that heh, what a coincidence, she has decided to blew dust off her blog as well :D

A few weeks before New Year's I bought new lights for my bicycle. The previous ones were steady-yellow lights, but the new ones are both in colour plus they are flashing, so it is a kind of a totally new attraction on the gloomy streets of Skopje (winters here are always gloomy, aka pollution goes through the roof and despite being a recurring issue year after year, it still persists, the Government keeps buying time until like spring time, when the pollution levels drop down and then everything is just swept under the carpet until next winter and then this vicious circle continues. Believe it or not Skopje was on the top of the list of most polluted cities in the world with cities in India and China trotting behind us. I wish more people rode bicycles, but then again, the Government doesn't really care to improve the conditions nor stimulate the people for that. So who knows, maybe we, the bike-Nazis are the crazy ones...

Agi used this super cool set of Astrophysics stamps issued in 2017! The stamp on the left shows gravitational waves, while the one on the right shows the GAIA Satelite.

Hvala ti puno Aginice! :* <3

Melaka, Malaysia

Just one more card for today - I don't wanna overwor my rustiness :P

I have been rarely doing swaps for a long while now, partly because I somehow find this whole swap thing has become too demanding and more like a business than something done for pleasure, plus cos of financial reasons too. But sometimes you just spot a card and you know you have to go for it, which was the case with this one.
Sent by Bernard from Malaysia, who says he used to take this train from Ipoh to Singapore, where the journey lasted for almost 8 hours, but now with the new flight services, it takes like an hour. Yep, the planes have ruined it all :D
However, taking the price into consideration too, I'd always prefer a cozy train ride to a flight (trains in Macedonia are exempted from this).

The stamp is from a set of 4, World Post Day stamps issued in 2017. The postcrossing community there even organized a Postcrossing Meeting for the World Post Day.

Thanks a lot to Bernard for this card, and to you all for dropping by.

Till next time ;)