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Well I had a good look at Ebay to see whats out there. This week they have a very good selection of briar pipes, some very old and some from the 1960s/1970s with a couple being of an Apollo Moon type style. This translates as someone high on acid in the late sixties produced a severely messed up Falcon style pipe to be smoked by other messed up people. The prices across the board seem be between $15 and up and if you are a wood man there are plenty of bargains around this weekend. In the meerschaum universe there are a whole crop of crap that seems to have surfaced. Some nicely colored pipes with broken or missing amber stems and damaged cases. For those of you into smoking garden ornaments there are a couple there that are interesting, particularly the Confederate soldier figurine which seems competitively priced. There are the usual litany of meerschaum bulldogs, pokers etc some with amber stems and half decent cases. I found a couple of 'cutty' pipes in meerschaum which are missing their cases and as usual seem to have suffered from amateur repairs in the 1910s. A couple I have bid on as they might clean up in time with a long stay at Tim Wests pipe hospital. In the tobacco world there a few mid 1940s tins of tobacco which are still sealed if that sort of thing floats your boat you might see change out of thirty quid and the usual pile of stuff that is a few years old but someone thinks is valuable.
Etsy has the usual spread of modern meerschaum pipes. I wouldn't buy one but my friend Andre has done so in the past. He thinks the pipes are pretty OK quality and at $45 a throw he thinks of them as almost disposable. They do seem to color well and they all seem to come with the male/female union for fixing the stems to the shanks. Overall I find Etsy this week to be rather boring with very little to commend itself to the serious meerschaum smoker. The briars and accessories are way over priced and I seem to see the same stuff go around on Oi Vay before popping up on Etsy. Well there you have my review of the various auction sites!
Etsy has the usual spread of modern meerschaum pipes. I wouldn't buy one but my friend Andre has done so in the past. He thinks the pipes are pretty OK quality and at $45 a throw he thinks of them as almost disposable. They do seem to color well and they all seem to come with the male/female union for fixing the stems to the shanks. Overall I find Etsy this week to be rather boring with very little to commend itself to the serious meerschaum smoker. The briars and accessories are way over priced and I seem to see the same stuff go around on Oi Vay before popping up on Etsy. Well there you have my review of the various auction sites!