There are stamps, and then there are labels or "cinderellas." Cinderellas look like stamps, but aren't valid nor were ever valid for postage in a country. The reason I prefeace with that is to show you this story about Catherine Zeta-Jones (homina homina homina) on labels from Khakassia, a region in Eastern Siberia (Russia, for those of you who don't know) that doesn't issue its own stamps, but uses ones from the Russian Federation for their postage. The Universal Postal Union isn't very happy with the folks who print these labels, and they're going to great lengths in philatelic publications to expose them for the frauds they are.

So if you get offered something from Khakassia or Abkhazia or some place that doesn't sound like a country, don't buy it. You're only putting money into the hands of cheats.

Wow! If I had to fulfill a public service requirement, I would definitely go here. Talk about your cushy jobs. I wonder if the APS is doing anything like this...

Yes! Someone noticed us! Spread the meme!

Zeldman goes postal. Very apropos, I believe.

The USPS is tightening already strict rules on what can and cannot be portrayed on American stamps. Under new guidelines announced last week, no stamp may be issued portraying a subject which has already been shown during the past 50 years. The previous limit had been 10 years. Another change has to do with colleges and universities. Already limited to stamped postal cards, a further limit of the 200th anniversary of the founding of an institution has been placed on them. Guess I won't be seeing MIT on a postal card in my lifetime (est. issue 2065).

In the latest regarding stamps and baseball, Canada Post has announced that they'll be issuing a stamp commemorating the 25th anniversary of the Toronto Blue Jays. According to the Bloomberg item, the 47-cent stamp will depict a blue jay and a baseball. Oo, that's obvious! Why didn't I think of that? I should design stamps for Canada! Yeah, that's it!

OK, so I haven't been around for a few days. I've been busy doing other stuff. So sue me.

Anyway, a week and a half ago, I got a message from a Mr. Steve Lewis out in the St. Louis area. He works for the St. Louis Cardinals team magazine, and the magazine will be doing an article on the legendary playing fields stamps. Steve didn't know when they were being issued and asked if I could help.

I was able to send him 2 messages. The first was detailed their issuance in April, concurrent with Opening Day, a very logical time to issue baseball stamps. The other was the next day after I received the latest issue of Stamp Collector, which had the info that they weren't going to be issued in April, but rather some time in June or July. No reason had been given for the change.

After forwarding this information to Steve, he was very grateful and offered to send me Cardinals stuff. How was I supposed to say no? In any case, the package of stuff arrived on Saturday. Inside were a couple of stickers, some commemorative cards, a Mark McGwire poster, a scorecard, and a commemorative program from the 2000 NLCS, where my Mets beat the Cardinals, 4 games to 1. Let this serve as a public thank you to Steve and the Cardinals' organization for their generosity. Thanks, guys!

See, it does pay to know your stamps, kids. *G*