Lopping, Shopping, Birthdays and Bargains.

Our local council announced it would be conducting a pickup of green waste over the next week. It is the perfect opportunity to deal with some of those bigger pruning jobs and dispose of the waste unsuitable for the compost bin.
The announcement seems to have mobilised most of the town into gardening mode. I’ve never seen so many people in their gardens with secateurs, loppers and pruning saws, and roadsides are piled with prunings. In our street it looks like someone has been planting mature kerbside shrubs and gives an idea of what it could be like if the grass nature strips were replaced with verge-side plantings like those created by Josh Byrne on Gardening Australia.

To take advantage of the council pick up we decided to deal with a few things we’ve been putting off for a while. Between our place and next door we’ve had some kind of native tree with a collection of long skinny trunks topped with fine foliage and occasional creamy coloured brush-like flowers. There were two significant problems with the tree. Firstly it was planted on top of the water and gas pipes supplying the house. Secondly, parts of it were leaning over the neighbour’s place. The latter problem has been the reason it was left alone for so long. I didn’t want to hack away at it and have it fall through their roof.

After work on Friday I made a token attempt to cut some of it back, tackling some of the lower, untidy branches leaning over my neighbour’s property. On Saturday we went out for the day and on our return found that our neighbour had continued what I had started and had removed those parts hanging precariously over his house, leaving the remaining tree looking very untidy. Sunday therefore turned into a day of tree lopping and armed with a handsaw I spent a couple of hours cutting the tree back until I was left with five, two and a half metre high stumps. It took me 45 minutes to cut the first one down as low as I could and every muscle and joint was aching. I wasn’t looking forward to the other four stumps.
At that point the neighbour across the road started up a chain saw to attack his own garden and offered to come over and finish my job. Two minutes later and it was all done and all that remained was a stump barely 30 centimetres high.

All of this was much more work than we had intended to do, but at least a major job has been completed with a lot less effort than I’d expected.

Our day out on Saturday that allowed next door to make an assault on our tree was a trip to Canberra. We did a circuit of antiques shops and galleries hoping to find a bargain or two, and since it was Gloria’s birthday we had lunch in a café at Beaver Galleries opposite the Australian Mint. We’ve been to the gallery before to look at the art glass on display but we’d never been to the café.
We both ordered Vegetable Lasagne and were amazed at how good it was. At first the serving seemed a bit stingy, with a solitary rectangle of lasagne in the middle of the plate, but the value was in the tasting and the serving size was more than adequate to satisfy our appetite (which unfortunately led us to miss following up with a serving of one of the tempting cakes on offer).
Each layer of the lasagne contained a different type of veggie; with eggplant, yellow and red capsicum and zucchini being accompanied by a subtle but tasty tomato sauce. Additional flavour was provided by a spoon of green pesto on top. It was the kind of meal that makes you want to take your time and enjoy the different flavours in every mouthful.

Our shopping trip wasn’t quite as successful as the lunch, but for the second time we unexpectedly stumbled across a piece of Helmut Hiebl glass. Until recently Hiebl was a renowned and respected glassmaker with some of his work being held in Royal Collections. I have heard that poor health has caused him to stop practising his craft. The two pieces of his work we have found recently would probably be classed as paperweights. The first shaped like an apple was purchased without realising it was his work. It was signed but we didn’t recognise the signature until we got home and compared it to a piece we already owned. On Saturday we found another signed paperweight in the form of a mushroom, however this time I recognised the signature as soon as I saw it.
In the last couple of months we’ve had quite a bit of luck with finds of art glass. Gloria found a signed piece by Peter Crisp for a few dollars in a local antique shop; we found the two signed Helmut Heibl paperweights and also, the find that most excited me was an early signed piece by Setsuko Ogishi, made in 1984 while working at the Jam Factory Craft Centre in Adelaide prior to the 1987 opening of her own Hunter valley studio and gallery.
Awareness of an artist’s work and recognition of their signatures has allowed us to find pieces priced well below their real value, although (while appreciating the lower price) the real joy is in finding and recognising the piece in the first place.

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photos:
1) roadside prunings
2) the remains of our heavily pruned tree.
3) the Palette Cafe
4) Maureen Williams glass from her exhibition at Beaver Galleries.

"Antiques" & Collectables

Our interest in “antiques” and collectables probably started through watching David Dickinson’s “Bargain Hunt” when we subscribed to PayTV several years ago. Contestants were given a sum of money and then let loose in a market where they had to buy items to sell at auction at a later date.
The winner would be the couple who made the most “profit” at auction. I put the “ ” around the word profit, because the result for both competing teams was often a loss and the winner was deemed to be the team that lost the least.

Throughout the many episodes we saw, we started to become familiar with some of the types of items purchased. One favourite was iridescent glass by John Ditchfield. Another was an occasional piece of Charlotte Rhead pottery.
We started to make infrequent visits to antique/collectable shops and looked out for the names that had been made familiar through our viewing of the show, but the few items we came across were well outside of our budget and we could never justify the expense of purchasing them.
That did not prevent us from admiring those items as works of art and we could always enjoy the pleasure of stumbling across a piece that we recognised before we read the label. In fact, during our recent trip to the Wagga Antique Fair (see previous post), I spotted and identified a Charlotte Rhead vase on a distant stall well before we reached it.

Charlotte Rhead’s work is a personal favourite. It is not common so the shops are not overrun with her pottery. This makes it a bit of a challenge to find – which adds to the pleasure of spotting something of hers. Good examples of her work can be between $500-$1000, so I will never add one to my collection of bits and pieces (a recent purchase of two pottery whiskey bottles for $4.00 each is more fitting to my budget).

Gloria is always on the lookout for glass. She regularly watches “Sun Sea and Bargain Spotting” on ABC2. This show is a more extravagant version of the “Bargain Hunt” concept and involves shopping for collectables at European markets and later selling the purchases at a British market.
Gloria is amazed at the very cheap cost of Murano glass at those markets. Some pieces are picked up for a few pounds each – the same pieces here would be sold for well over $100.
Glass is usually very often difficult to identify. A few pieces are signed and some retain the manufacturer’s stickers, but the majority tends to be anonymous. Recently we saw a bud vase selling for around $140 that was advertised as “possible Murano”. Gloria later bought a smaller but identically styled vase for a tiny fraction of the price at another shop. I have since seen a vase exactly the same as Gloria’s on ebay being advertised as retro “Christina” from Sweden. What a difference a bit of ambiguity can make to the pricing of “collectables”.

Killer Frosts and Bargain Hunting

Half way into spring and we’re still getting killer frosts. My butternut pumpkin has shrivelled to nothing after a night with a minimum temperature of -3 Celsius. The frost got to it despite being covered. At least I have an abundant supply of seed to try again,

I have also had slight frost damage on my squash and potatoes which were also covered. My first bean seedlings are also a bit iffy at the moment being the only frost tender things I forgot to protect over that cold night, but they may pull through since they had a little cover from some surrounding plants.

Around here the growing seasons are seriously affected by the two extremes of frost and heat. We seem to get only a month between the late frosts after winter and the early scorching heat leading up to summer. The same kind of effect can be evident in autumn, with early frosts dealing the death blow to the last crop of frost tender veggies.
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A week ago Gloria and I went on an “antiques” quest, starting at the Wagga Wagga antiques fair and then doing a circuit of the antiques shops in nearby towns. Mostly we tend to treat these places as museums admiring the artistry of earlier ages, but when we stumble across a bargain we occasionally make a purchase. Gloria was able to pick up some Art Glass vases for a very good price. Not only do they look good they can be put to practical use to display flowers from the garden.

She also bought a less practical vase, a piece by Colin Heaney from Cape Byron Hot Glass. She has liked his style of work for a number of years after buying a piece in Sydney and she was hoping to find something else by him. However, being very much amateurs we had to rely on the dealer’s labelling to be aware that Heaney was the maker.

The vase was the first thing that Gloria saw when we entered the fair. It was in a cabinet at the entrance. It was identified only as “Art Glass - signed” with no details of who made it. It was a very attractive glass vase covered with various vivid colours (mainly blue) in a metallic like finish. We made a note to check it again when we’d been around the rest of the stalls.

Eventually we went back to the vase and after attempted haggling the vase was purchased. The stall owner suggested that it dated to the 1930s when that particular style of glass was popular (I had my doubts – the “88” etched beside the indecipherable signature gave me a clue). When we got home I had a closer look at the signature and for some reason I compared it to the signature on the Colin Heaney piece Gloria had bought before. It was the same. Without knowing, she had actually bought the piece of Colin Heaney glass that she had hoped to find and the “88” beside the signature DID indicate it was made in 1988 and not in the 1930s. She also bought it for half the price she had paid 10 years ago.

While Gloria got a little carried away with her glass purchases, she was not the only one to make an exciting discovery. I picked up a hard covered, illustrated copy of Richard Adam’s “Watership Down” enclosed in a slip case for the exorbitant price of…

$3.00!!!

Autograph Collector (part 2)

While buying autographed photos can make elusive signatures accessible, it is not the most satisfying way of building a collection and the cost is often more than most can afford. It’s not a method I would use again.
Affordability is one of the reasons I have chosen to continue collecting autographs as opposed to collecting other things. It’s a hobby that can be adapted to suit your financial situation.

In my previous blog entry I mentioned some of the ways I’ve used to obtain autographs. They are mainly low-cost. At most it has involved the purchase of a CD or a book at a signing event.

I also request autographs via mail, which is another low-cost method. The only expense being a couple of stamps and envelopes (I always send a self addressed, stamped envelope to be used to return the signed item) and of course, something to be signed.

That brings up the question about what kind of item we can post in the hope of getting it signed. Personally I’ve not been willing to take the risk of sending things of value through the mail. Not only is there the risk of losing the item, but the postage costs also increase.
My preference has been to send blank index cards or if I’m writing to an author I’ll send a book label. The cards are reasonably easy to find in stationery shops but I had a little difficulty obtaining suitable labels.
Most of the more common book labels stocked by book shops are too ornate. It took me quite some time to track down what I wanted and then I had to order them in. I therefore ordered extra to make sure I had enough to last for a few years. (examples can be seen on my previous blog entry).

Both the index cards and book labels are easily enclosed with a letter to the targeted celebrity and neither cost so much that it would be a disaster if the desired reply was not received.

When I send a letter I usually enclose three index cards. Sometimes all are returned signed, sometimes none come back. The occasional non-return of book labels is more disappointing because they were not easy to get and they cost quite a bit more than an index card.

However there are compensations that make up for those disappointments. Occasionally a reply will be received that contains much more than a signed card or label. I have received handwritten letters from several celebrities. Some authors have included promotional postcards associated with their books. Others have returned signed photographs instead of the cards I’d sent to them.

I’ve found it helpful to keep a record of the letters I’ve sent out, including address details and the date of mailing. When a reply is received the date of receipt is also recorded. Some replies come back within a couple of weeks. Others can take months. Some requests remain unanswered.

What do I do with the autographs that come back? The book labels are of course stuck into one of the author’s books. I keep the index cards in albums I’ve created out of loose leaf folders and plastic pockets. I try to mount the autographed card alongside a photo of the celebrity (see the Geena Davis page on the previous blog entry), or if there’s no photo available I’ll try to find something else that’s relevant; for example I have a card signed by Arthur C Clarke mounted with a handbill advertising “2001 A Space Odyssey”.

While I said that affordability is one of the reasons that I collect autographs, sometimes cost should not cause us to hesitate if a signature can be purchased at a reasonable price. There is always the likelihood of missing out on something special if we are too reluctant to spend a little money. Fishermen are renowned for their stories of “the one that got away” and I have a comparable autograph-hunters story.

It was a signed, first edition of Peter Carey’s “True History of the Kelly Gang” that was being sold soon after the books release for around $50.00 (AUD). The book went on to win the Booker Prize in 2001 and now a first edition UNSIGNED copy of the book is selling for $450.00 AUD.


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Autographs above are 1) American Country singer Chely Wright 2) Australian Country singer Kasey Chambers and 3) American Country Group SheDaisy.

All signed on the blank index cards I'd provided. SheDaisy also returned a signed black and white photo, personally addressed to my wife "Gloria".

Autograph Collector

Several years ago I started collecting autographs. It is a hobby that probably had its roots in my childhood when my parents bought me an autograph book while we were on holiday. The first entry in the book was the signature of a well known British comedian of the time who was performing in the town where we were staying. He very patiently waited as my mum searched her handbag for a pen. I’m surprised the experience didn’t become part of his comedy routine as my mum pulled all manner of things from the bag as she tried to find the pen she knew was somewhere in there…

I’m not sure why I renewed my interest in recent years. Maybe it was because I’d accumulated several signed items and realised that I was the owner of a small collection. That realisation became the motivation to add to what I already owned.

Like many hobbies, collecting autographs can be a very expensive hobby to pursue. There’s always someone trying to get us to part with our money. It all depends on how extreme we are willing to be. At first I was a bit too extravagant and spent quite a lot obtaining signed photographs of Hollywood stars such as Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bruce Willis, Keanu Reeves, Sigourney Weaver, Winona Ryder and others. That initial obsessive burst came to an end when I realised I could not justify spending that kind of money on things that had no real value. I also became aware that there was a much more satisfying way to increase my collection.

I now want to share some of those ways.

Firstly my collection is more or less focussed. While I wouldn’t turn down the opportunity of obtaining a worthwhile signature I concentrate on areas that interest me and restrict my active pursuit of autographs to those areas of interest.

My collection consists mainly of authors and country singers/musicians. I also have several sporting autographs which came about mainly through working for a company that sponsored several Olympic swimmers like Grant Hackett.

Very rarely would we regularly stumble across celebrities in our daily lives, so we need some way of contacting those in whom we have an interest. The more high-profile the celebrity, the less likely it will be that attempted contact will succeed.
After turning from my earlier extravagance most of my autographs have been obtained through the following methods.

Meet and greet opportunities after concerts. Many of my country music autographs were obtained in this way. The most profitable single occasion was a music “expo” which featured several artists performing prior to spending time meeting fans. Keith Urban also made a brief appearance here in the very early days of his solo success in America. This event was not restricted to the country genre. My daughter was also able to meet the members of Killing Heidi, a band she liked at the time.
I have found that country artists tend to be very generous to their fans. Maybe it’s because their genre does not have the profile given to commercial “radio-friendly” music. Australian country artists have also been accessible through in store appearances. If you can’t personally attend, some stores will allow you to purchase signed merchandise through mail order. Similar opportunities arise quite regularly in the literary world. Major book stores and publishers will hold book signings to promote newly published books. When I worked in Sydney the major book stores would often host visiting authors at signing events. Again if you are unable to attend, the stores will often take mail orders of signed books.

Apart from these public commercial events, I have had success through writing directly to a celebrity of interest. With musicians and authors this is usually done via their record company or publisher. Some of these are more helpful than others. I have always found MacMillan to be a very helpful publisher who in the past has forwarded correspondence to the intended author.


AUTHORS

A valuable resource for finding addresses has been the local library's copy of Who’s Who. Included in its brief biographical details the book often provides a mailing address. Most of the times I used that resource resulted in a signed reply including one from the cricket great Don Bradman.

One of the most memorable signatures I obtained personally was actress Geena Davis. She competed in an exhibition archery event prior to the 2000 Sydney Olympics. I was fortunate enough to be working nearby at the time and was able to call in to see her compete during my lunch break and was more fortunate to meet her on two separate days. The illustration at the beginning of this blog entry is a compilation made up of media photos, her autograph and a photo I took of her competing.