Someone's having a Mail-Art Baby

[Jen Staggs]

Apparently, licking too many stamps can have little-known consequences like pregnancy.  Thankfully, Dean Marks has provided an unusual mail-art object for the delivery: a French-government-supplied bandage kit!  Complete with plastic scissors, drape and two tweezers in the French national colors.  Trop bien!  Merveilleux!  It also includes a real scratch-n-sniff strawberry stamp, a thing I didn't know ever existed and I am sooo excited.  What a fantastically weird and wonderful piece of mail-art madness.  Merci, Mr. Marks!!

[Dean aka Artist in Seine]

Maybe I can answer that for both of us ... No.  I have been in Europe since 1978, I couldn't memorize baseball batting averages as a child and was therefore sent out of the country to Germany where children have to learn about Beethoven, Mozart, and baroque style art instead.

And you are going to love this part, ...... my Easter and sometimes summer holidays was spent in

Barrington, IL

[DKeys]

I had no idea Kat-do you miss the US?

[Katerina Nikoltsou (MomKat)]

DK, after the holidays, I am going to try the Marks-formula for trashpo posting!

And by the way, there are a bunch of us "transplants" in Europe:

An American in Paris: Dean

A Brit in southern France: Valentine Mark...

An American in Greece: Katerina

A Brit in Holland (some call it the Netherlands): Rod Summers

Then there are a few transplants in Japan..,

Well, we are NOT ex-Patriots like Hemingway and company...

just mail artists " living abroad" ;-)

[DKeys]

LOL Dean. This is EXtRemEly helpful but I still don't get it. Just kidding. You are WAY too wonderfully organized. I only hope I can fit enough stamps on the thing I will put in the mail box to you and run quickly away.So you are an American in Paris?

[Dean aka Artist in Seine]

Let us try that again:

	Euros	USD
Barcodes	€0.89	$1.23
The Paris Trashpo Project 19 September 2011	€0.89	$1.23
Keep on plugging	€1.75	$2.42
Cracked in the Egg – The Master Chef	€1.75	$2.42
Something old, Something New Sandpaper	€1.78	$2.46
Where the rubber meets the Road, there is a fork	€2.36	$3.27
Scary Nights	€0.89	$1.23
White Christmas	€1.75	$2.42

[Dean aka Artist in Seine]

If you go on the US mail website, they have a easy to follow chart that will give you the rates for overseas mail.

But from France, just give you an idea .......................... are you ready for this?  Are you sure?

But don't look at the last line ....... yet.

			Euros	USD
06 Oct 2011 Thursday	005 Op 036	Barcodes	€0.89	$1.23
19 Sep 2011 Monday	Katerina & Dean	The Paris Trashpo Project 19 September 2011	€0.89	$1.23
13 Oct 2011 Thursday	055	Keep on plugging	€1.75	$2.42
21 Oct 2011 Friday	060	Cracked in the Egg – The Master Chef	€1.75	$2.42
05 Nov 2011 Saturday	070	Something old, Something New Sandpaper	€1.78	$2.46
04 Nov 2011 Friday	071	Where the rubber meets the Road, there is a fork	€2.36	$3.27
11 Nov 2011 Friday	077	Scary Nights	€0.89	$1.23
15 Dec 2011 Thursday	099	White Christmas	€1.75	$2.42

[DKeys]

Thanks for sharing your technique Dean--sort of a mail and dash. I usually do that when I have an idea of the postage, but on more bulky items I don't know how much postage.Weighing and calculating gets too complex for me except when I'm sending within the US. I also will stop putting a return address because you're right that gives them more incentive to send it on. Will see if I can get this to you.how much postage do you use Dean, for one of your standard size 3D pieces roughly in US dollars? 

[Katerina Nikoltsou (MomKat)]

See, Dean knows how to get strange mail art through the postal systems and to arrive in mint condition!

He even knows about the US "mailbox" ( note to Valentine Mark Herman, ahem!)

that is blue and bulky and on the corner and sometimes has a "snout"...

(Dean is a Minnesota boy, and we all know about those from Minnesota?)

So, time to buy a little scale and not go to my Greek post office...just throw it in the 

corner  POST Box and without a return address...see what happens? Fun!

[Dean aka Artist in Seine]

I don't get it? 

1) You buy the stamps in advance;

2) You make the Mail Art;

3) You weigh the Mail Art;

4) You put the appropriate amount of stamps on it;

5) You put it in the mailbox.  (In America it’s those big blue boxes on corners, sometimes they have a long looking nose so that you can mail things without getting out of your car.  America is amazing!)  

Once it is in the box, it’s their problem!

Note: I don’t put a return address on it.

Once I was in the South of France and tried to mail Mim’s telephone at the post office.  (I had forgotten to bring my mini scale with me so I didn’t know how much postage it needed.)  (Don’t worry; the mini scale is now on the vacation checklist.)

Anyway, the lady said; “No sir, you will have to put that “thing” in an envelope.”  I said “Yes Madame, of course”, and then went outside and put it in a mailbox across the street.

It got to Mim with no problem and in mint condition.

Freedom to Post whatever you want!  

“Dare to post what you like most.” Quote by Dean Marks, 14 December 2011  Maybe a good title of a book?

http://iuoma-network.ning.com/photo/phone-homme-et

http://iuoma-network.ning.com/photo/phone-homme-et-1?context=user

http://iuoma-network.ning.com/photo/received-from-wild-crazy-dean-m...

[Dean aka Artist in Seine]

Happy that this made it to you.  It looks better in the photos than I remember it.  I hope you never have to open it and use it, but at least they will be there if you need them.

PS Black nail polsh?  What kind of Mail Art mother are you going to be?  Very cool indeed.