'A Sort Out Brings Back Memories'

 Lockdown is not the most riveting way to live nor is it great for putting you in a festive mood but one of the things it is good for is inspiring a person to have a sort out a clean up or both!

Now, my room is perpetually a 'total bombsite'. I may well be 'The Clean Up Man' and thus a  'champion of the litter picker' but I am also fiercely sentimental and HATE getting rid of things! (lol) Such a trait is often like a ball and chain around your leg because if you don't throw things away it means you have to find somewhere to put them! I guess in many ways it is one of the reasons I love my favourite shop, 'Teddy Tinkers' in London Rd, Hastings so much. My friend Kate's shop often reminds me of my bedroom in the respect that it is full of memories, curiosities and reminders of the past. Kate does keep the stock in her shop in a much more orderly fashion than I do though, I hasten to add!

Anyway, with blogging on my mind today I decided to try and find a 'curiosity from a Christmas long ago' that I was recently given to show you all but (as usual) was unable to locate it and instead found something completely different!

Tucked down the side of an otterman that 'Lord Lucan could have hidden in this last 50 years' (so little have I 'reached' it!) I came across a plastic bag with some old stamp albums, birthday and Christmas cards in. Now, when I say 'old' I mean from the 1970's and early 80's - though the plastic bag they were in had 'Sounds Exciting From Decca - An Outstanding Series Of Records To Suit All Tastes' written on it - so we could even be talking early 1970's!

One of the items inside the bag was this sweet little Christmas card I drew and coloured in as a kid! 'To Nanny May' said the blue envelope it was in and inside in my handwriting it simply says 'Happy Xmas from Tony'. Well, seeing as I am 55 now this little card must be approaching 50 years old! Amazing really seeing as it is still in such good condition... Sadly, I lost 'Nanny May' in 2014 (aged 104!) but she is often in my thoughts and I expect I 'got the card back' when she died and we were clearing her house.

 

In lots of ways I don't see this discovery as 'sad' thought because it proves how much my Nan loved my 'rather basic' effort - keeping it for the rest of her life - far better then than any of the 'swanky' type Christmas cards we all buy (well, used to!) each year

Talking of which, the bag also contained a selection of VERY NAFF 1970's Christmas cards! If you think today's 'Deluxe' Christmas cards that you can buy for about 99p a box (of 12) are poor quality you should have been around in the early 70's and bought some of the 'shockers' people used to order packs of from their Kays Catalogue! Thin! By gum, Charles Hawtrey was a body building champion compared to them! (lol) In spite of their 'budget element' though I have to say that they too have stood the test of time rather well in this plastic bag. 'Printed in U.K.' or 'Printed in Great Britain' was always on the back of these cards, which if nothing else proved that a) we used to manufacture something here then and b) that people were much more patriotic than they are today. The fact that the cards were of REALLY awful quality didn't seem to matter to people it was all about 'buying British'!

I don't know about you but I would LOVE to be able to flick through some of those old Kays and Littlewoods catalogues from that time again now - not only would it be fun to laugh at the 'fashions' it would be fascinating 'drooling' over the toys & games section! I still have a few of my 1970's boxed games (like 'On The Buses', 'Movie Maker' and 'Exploration' but none are in great condition and I saw one of those 'antique selling shows' on T.V. the other day where a man was having a 'Dr. Who & The Daleks' boxed game valued. £40-50 it was worth and I used to have one! (sob) 

If you are willing to 'pay through the teeth' for retro replicas you can get 70's toys like the 'Scepter Interceptor' from 'Space 1999' on the Internet (Gerry Anderson Official Website) but at £125 a go I think I will stick with my memories!

As far as the stamp albums I found they were dated 1977. I used to buy them from 'The Stamp & Coin Shop' in Norman Road, St Leonards - where I also bought most of my stamps. Obviously, all of the stamps inside are now almost 50 years old but I doubt very much if any are worth a great deal.

One of the stamp albums even has a few of the little packets that the Stamp & Coin Shop used to sell their stamps in - all good for bringing back memories of school  and of 'fun and adventures on our bikes' (mine was a 'Chopper') - like the time we rode to West Ham (near Pevensey) and back with my mates Norman Crouch, Gary Willis, and Paul Jenner. I wonder if any of them still have their old stamp albums? I doubt it - I do tend to be a bit of a 'one off' when it comes to hoarding!