Pickles by Brian Crane for December 14, 2024

I really thought he was gonna lick the self stick stamp

Opal, you did not pick the stamps … you had teased Roscoe with a steak and he licked them all.

Yes, but the envelope flap is still glued that way!

How many Real (non-email) letters have your received recently? They are very personal and I feel happy to get them!

Well, Opal, during WW2, one of the OSS chiefs toured the facility where US postage stamps were made. He took note of the open vats of glue, and pointed out that if someone managed to put a poison in those vats, they could do a lot of harm. So lets hear it for self-sticking stamps!

I never licked them. I used a moist rag to dab it and apply it.

I was in a grocery store yesterday at the checkout, and a man asked whether they had stamps. He and I tried to explain, but the guy at the checkout had no idea what a postage stamp was.

Could a criminal possibly expose his identity through DNA if he licked the stamps on his mailed ransom note?

I inherited 20-year-old non-lick stamps, and I have to use Elmer’s glue with them.

Don’t worry about germs, Earl. By the time the Postal Service delivers those cards, any germs that were on them will have died of old age.

Of course, the envelopes can still be licked, but you may end up like Susan on Seinfeld

I remember licking stamps. But then, I remember brown packing tape that you had to wet to activate the glue before sticking it to the box.

How can we forget? Yuk

This post from a Gen Z youngster discovering non-self-adhesive postage for the first time went viral last year:

“So I am traveling in Greece (am from the US). And I bought some post card stamps to send a postcard home. But just as I was about to put it on, i realized there is no backing to them. They’re just a piece of paper. So my first thought was they must have given me the wrong thing. The second thought was to keep trying to find the sticky part. So dumb me sitting at the airbnb table was fumbling with this single stamp for literally like 15 minutes before I realized this was not working. So obviously, I googled it. Apparently you’re supposed to lick the back and stick it on. Obviously right… I feel so dumb, but I’ve also never heard of stamps like this before so a little confused and a little surprised.

Update: I’ve realized that this is because I am too young to know. I am 20, and apparently stamps with sticky backing came out the year I was born(2002)."

As I remember it, the glue used on stamps tasted like horse hooves, or at least how I imagine horse hooves would taste. Anyhow, they tasted AWFUL.

So…did anyone ever get poisoning from licking stamps or envelopes? People lick a lot worse than that!

Don’t forget DNA can be collected from those licked stamps.

The lowest I remember a 1st class stamp is 4 cents when I was a kid in the sixty’s. Yes, you had to lick them.

Until I got on to using a wet sponge for a “licker” I hated putting on stamps and sealing envelopes.

Earl, you’re incorrigible!

Most people just text.

I receive real cards from the animal charities I donate to. Maybe will get a few from family or friends.

Yeah, and the after taste, too! Yuck!

Even more popular were S&H Green Stamps, but the concept of both was outlawed with the advent of cloning.

He’s NOT impressed.

Be grateful for progress there then.

My mother just used to wet a sponge and put it in a bowl then press the stamp on it.

I don’t remember anyone ever getting sick from an envelope where the person licked the stamp or the seal. I don’t even remember any stories about something like that.

This happened to me long ago. The funny bit is my mom was helping me look for them as well. (◔◡◔)