Author: Thomas

I have sorted out one major problem with the database today, which leaves the issue of vendor advice notes to be resolved, a bid book creation process to be streamlined and one or two other things. Also of course there is a whole new auction to produce4 images for, to say nothing of my responsibilities for producing press releases.

Today’s imaging, once I got to that stage of the day was all postal history lots, but I have only a few of those left now, before I move on to something different.

As usual I have some pictures for you…

Another fine and varied day at James and Sons. As well as making sure that the Royal British Legion had images an descriptions of all the lots in the April Sale, so that they knew what sort of stuff we take for auctions, I found sorted out sold items according to the pick lists, picked out unsold items for a couple of our vendors who will be at Diss Fair tomorrow and made a start on imaging for the May auction.

I missed a piece of cricket history through being at the auction  yesterday, as led by skipper Chris Rogers’ 241 not out Middlesex achieved the highest ever successful run chase in a match at Lords, racking up 472-3 to win a match they appeared to have lost.

As usual I have some pictures for you…

The April auction is over, with the usual mixture of great successes and abject failures. The books were an utterly predictable disaster, with only a handful of Pevsners selling, while the cigarette cards also failed to attract much interest. On the credit side, militaria fared well, as did coins.

My day included a lot of heavy lifting, operating a computerised bidding system that I am not yet terribly familiar with and also locating various items for customers either to view or that they had purchased.

Today I will be working on the database and starting to image lots for the May sale, which takes place on the 24th at the Maids Head Hotel in Norwich.

I have no new images for you, so I will resurrect a few good ones from the archive…

The images for the April sale are all done, the queries are all resolved, and I have been able to spend most of the day working on the database. Hopefully I will be able to concentrate fully on database work on Thursday and Friday of next week, after the auction.

I did not do much imaging today (only a handful of lots that had slipped through), so in addition to the two blogworthy images I did produce I am also providing a series of images to demonstrate the assembling of one very large image at the end as well…

The imaging for James and Sons April sale is finally complete (It took me until 3 O’clock this afternoon to finish off the last bits), and although there will be some heavy work loading and unloading the van and laying out auction lots (I have been given responsibility for setting out the book lots to best advantage – big surprise!), I may finally get time to do some database work, for the first time in a while.

As well as the last lots of Liebig Company picture cards, following on from several thousand older cigarette cards, there was some interesting ephemera in todays lots.

Bad light spoiled a classic finish between Lancashire and Warwickshire yesterday, meaning that save for Yorkshire’s thumping of Northampt0nshire every game in this round of championship matches was drawn. When the light dipped below the critical level Warwickshire needed 25 with five overs remaining and five wickets still standing – all four results possible although a tie or a Lancashire win would have had generous odds at that stage.

As usual I have some pictures…

I enjoyed my Easter weekend. Although I did not catch much of this year’s Classic FM Hall of Fame, I was able to listen to the last couple of hours, and was pleased to see that the Rachmaninov Piano concerto no 2 did not stay at number one. Vaughan Williams’ The Lark Ascending regained the top spot. A full listing of the 300 pieces that make up the Hall of Fame will be available on the Classic FM website.

Judging from the scores I saw on cricinfo yesterda, near the end of the third day, the current round of county championship matches has been badly hit by the weather.

The massive backlog of imaging for the April auction is nearly cleared, so I hope to get some time to do some work on the Database on Thursday and Friday, and possibly on Tuesday before starting to move stuff for the auction.

As usual I have some pictures for you…

Yes folks today is precisely one year since I started at James and Sons. With my database system set to attempt to handle its first live auction soon, my roles as imager, email text creator and press release producer also all going swimmingly I have every reason to regard my first year in the job as a success.

Of course, the biggest development involving James and Sons in recent times is the Great Centenary Charity Auction commemorating 100 years since the WWI and raising funds for blast injury victims.

I rarely say much about religious matters in this blog since I am entirely irreligious myself and generally have other things to concern myself with, but I was a trifle frustrated after a hard day’s work to find my journey to King’s Lynn delayed for half an hour because of the Walsingham pilgrims.

I have some good images for you as usual…

Havup to the casng attended a routine eye test on Wednesday morning I will be picking up a new pair of spectacles on Thursday morning. Because I am now off Jobseekers Allowance and do not receive any other benefit that qualifies me for free treatment/ frames I have had to pay the full cost. Officially my eye test cost £20, the frames £45 and an extra anti-reflective layer because of my computer work £30, unofficially I have forked over £95 for a new pair of spectacles.

I managed to do some work on the database yesterday, but today will probably be all imaging, as there is a fair bit to do, and it needs to be done today.

A lively meeting last night (on the economy) – yes I am in Norwich -, and it looks like being a pleasant walk into town and up to the castle to catch the bus. I am working later hours than normal today because Norfolk Green are running a Sunday service.

As usual I have some pictures for you…

Yesterday I attended a launch party for a series of charity auctions commemorating WWI and raising funds for the Royal British Legion. This was held at Raynham Hall, seat of the Marquess and Marchioness of Townshend.

It went off extremely well, and so thought David James who will be running the auctions themselves (hence how a member of the hoi polloi like yours truly had an invite). Though  I do not possess a full suit, smart trousers, a previously unworn smart shirt, a red silk tie and my smartest jacket were sufficient to pass muster.

It was a delightful event and as you will see (there are a lot of images at the end of this post), the surroundings were really quite special.

Today I worked mainly on the database, but I also dealt with some high quality militaria…

Although I got to do a tiny amount of database work at the end of the day, today was mostly taken up with imaging as I had expected.

There were some interesting items in there, as the pictures I include below demonstrate…