Monday, September 12, 2005

Cinderellas

Who uses it: Stamp collectors
What it means: "Cinderellas" are things that look like stamps but were never used for postage -- examples include revenue stamps, Easter Seals, and souvenir labels. Collectors call them "Cinderellas," because they're not part of the official catalogs -- they're not invited to the collectors' ball, no matter how pretty they might be.
How you can use it: To refer to anything you're excluding from a group or leaving behind. "I'll take these three apples, but that bruised one's a Cinderella."

Happy birthday today to Frau Susanne Schulz, the belle of every ball.

Late yesterday afternoon, my friend Susan and I were driving around the Bridgewater area, which is an interesting mix of old farms and spectacularly wealthy estates. We passed a weekend farm with two large catapults in the front field. Susan told me that they're for the owners' annual Pumpkin Chunking event, when they invite the whole town over for a picnic and a pumpkin-catapulting contest.

What could be more satisfying than hurling a pumpkin a great distance? Catapults -- or trebuchets -- satisfy something deep in the human heart, or at least in mine. For more on this subject, I strongly recommend Jim Paul's book, Catapult: Harry and I Build a Siege Weapon. And if you build your own, invite me over. I'll bring the pumpkins.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the good wishes!

Am starting to understand the blog a little better, but could identify with movie quotes more readily.

Also having trouble with the light green-have to strain to read some of the lighter text.

Otherwise, nice to be updated again--I missed you!

Belle

Ellen Clair Lamb said...

I'm not crazy about the light green, either, but haven't had time to tinker with it. I'll be in D.C. at some point next week, and hope that the all-knowing Joseph Mathews will be able to help me set up something that looks a little better.