Roll on the weekend!

Injustice may be a relative concept, but it clicks into sharp relief when you are the victim.

In school today I am going to do something that would have been impossible in my educational establishment in Wales: teach six (count them!) lessons in one day!  There we had a five period day from just before nine in the morning to half past three in the afternoon.  How different from the school life of our own dear Catalonia!

Theoretically it would be possible to teach eight periods a day of lessons ranging from fifty to fifty-five minutes!  School starts at 8.15 am and finishes at 4.45 pm, so teachers can be in school for over nine hours as we are not encouraged to leave the premises for lunch.  We are like a closed community!

Yesterday I received my latest issue of stamps on a first day cover.  I always feel slightly guilty as I take each cover out of its protective envelope and gaze at the stamps.  I know little about the community of stamp collectors but what little I do know would seem to indicate that my main reason for collecting (aesthetic appreciation) is the lowest form of motivation for the true aficionado.  Not, of course that I class myself as anything like an authentic stamp collector.  When have I ever evinced even a momentary interest in phosphor bands or perforations or colour shift or the like?  I just look at each stamp as a mini work of art and long for the days when we might get another set as satisfying as the Social Reformers of 1976 by David Gentleman.

I have to admit that the latest issue of British stamps featuring 10 of the world’s threatened species are remarkable showing full-face shots of the animals – the image of the golden lion tamarin is especially effective.

The Post Office appears to be continuing the gimmick approach to its stamps (highlighted by the moving stamps of Thunderbirds) by having two of them designated “intelligent” which means that if the elephant and tiger stamps are scanned by smartphones the owner will be able to watch “exclusive” video footage on the phone itself!

I have been looking through the totally inadequate web site of the Post Office and I note that even though I have a standing order for each new set and mini-sheet set of stamps to be sent to me I have not received all of them.  I will have to be more careful and ensure that I am getting what I am due.

I have now, using the computer in the IT room to which I was condemned to take the lesson of an absent colleague, found a list of all the commemorative stamps for QEII and I have painstakingly gone through my collection of FDCs to find out where the gaps are.  They exist and they are many!  Do I really want to fill those gaps up?  A rhetorical and real question.  The fact that I have found a web site with what looks to be quite reasonable prices for my missing covers is tempting.

On the other hand . . .