S is for the Super-Size of the Quest Ahead!

So, in case you haven't been reading the blurb for the last few months, the collection is out of storage, and I'm starting to pick-over it, a lot is still in a heap in the garage, and a few things don't seem to have surfaced at all yet, but they will . . . and there's plenty to keep the Blog going, take this as a case in point;

This is one of 9 identical boxes of 'unknown' flats (we looked at some of the 'Wild West' box a few weeks ago), to which you can add another, twice as long, with known margarine premiums, that is: they either have the issuer moulded on, or the little paper label saying ei-fein or whatever; four boxes of US 'comic flats' and all the Russian/East-European stuff, which is more spread around, and other stuff I've forgotten! There are also two crates of those A4 sheets of foam-board with the lead flats.

In front of it are the Christmas cracker 'Putti Orchestra' figurines which have come in over the last 7-years, in a little 4"x5½" self-seal bag, which is my standard size.

In the box are approximately 150 four-by-five-and-a-halves, each with an index card 'stiffener'. At an average of two posts a day there's nearly 3-months worth of posts there, technically, in the one box, but as you can see; some subjects have several bags, while lots of bags only have one or two examples in!

After sorting the new ones into the older sample, there are still several with only one! You can see it's the earlier 'Hong Kong' ones (1) which are building-up fastest, as there are more of them in the backs of hall 'phone drawers, or 'the' kitchen drawer, to end-up at car-boot sales, or in the hands of house-clearers and so slowly enter the secondary market.

I've numbered them as I think they were probably issued, but it's only a gestimate, with (1) in from the mid-late 1970's through to (5) being probably still current, the pink 'china' one being in a cheapie-cracker in a restaurant in Frimley a few years ago. I also added annotations to the cards as I was combining the two lots, makes it easier to sort into them next time.

Ignoring the base marks for a moment, these are all the poses and colours so far found, on these ephemeral, cartoony, seasonal, novelty figures, and with the exception of the red one, they are all so flimsy their bases tend to fold flat in the bags!

The next card in the box, and only added at the time these shots were taken, are these alien/clown orchestra figures, are they from 'down below'? We know the Devil has all the best tunes!

All figures of both types are about 30mm and soft polyethylene; the last three sculpted on both sides, the Putti are single-sided reliefs, smooth on the reverse. And they will probably be moved to a fantasy box, as they are hardly 'civilian', just non-military.

In the same box was something instantly recognisable . . . now! Clearly another Rundlutscher Spitztüte Wundertüten probably from Kuefa Kreisel, and I expect to find more as I dig-out the other boxes!