After albumizing two-plus rows of glassines full of 'Keep' stamps in my first Long & Noble Crusade beginning March of 2023, we're now in L&NC 2.0. After sorting the 'Save' stamps in June of this year, they formed only one row in 2.0. So that's progress. Wanting to winnow that row further, I'm doing a 'need and checked' review through all four Traveler albums of mine. Normally sorting by continent, I merged all the glassines into alphabetical order like the albums. Starting at 'A' this week (top photo).
With album open, I arrange the glassine contents (Checked for duplicates) looking for matches in the albums (if none, it's a Need). If it's a Need, or it's a better cancel or condition, I swap them on the spot. If too much movement on the album page will be required to add the new arrivals, or more pages need to be printed due to a significant addition to a country [are you listening, Korea?] they go back in the glassine for albumizing.
This one-row was tightly squeezed into the photo-box lid, with hinges in Tupperware. (On one particularly humid day, I had to separate ALL the hinges in the envelope and store them in a cool place for a couple of days. The 500 or so hinges in the envelope were well on their way to becoming one big hinge!) Tonight I got to Mozambique (alphabetically, not physically) and I've already filled half a baggie with doubles and the row is shrinking. So the process is working. It has my....stamp of approval!
Now, with the stamps winnowed, it's a question of albumizing them. With a known quantity for each country, I'm able to pre-select pages from two previous Travelers and the Ambassador stamp-show-find albums. I interleaved them where they will go in each of my four albums. Now, the albums look like they're .... bulging. And it's like somehow shoehorning a new chapter into an already-written book - it is a little unnatural to slot in another title page for Nicaragua, for instance, when there's already one there with flag and crest stickers. Undaunted, I still prefer the original album page format, even if I don't place each stamp in its matching black & white image on the page.
So it's on to albumizing...Afghanistan, Aland (a new one for me!) and then it's on to Andorra and Angola. After I reach Zimbabwe, it will again be time to level the album's contents thereby distributing them equally among all (soon to be five) Traveler albums.
Still evading me is the will to albumize large, daunting country baggies like Bulgaria, China, Poland and Russia. I did interleave some Poland, Romania and Prussia, finding Bulgaria and China too daunting and early in the alphabet. I guess you could say I'm Stalin, er, stalling! Either way, I'm on my way to breaking out the fifth Traveler! The Crusade continues...
