Strike-anywhere matches dipped in paraffin wax do have a limited shelf life - someone pointed this out on the forum a while ago, and I tested it with a couple of wax-dipped matches I had made up some time previously. Neither of them would strike at all; the tips just scraped off. Apparently, the wax, over time, gets absorbed into the match head, so it no longer strikes.

I don't know if nail polish has the same problem, but I suspect it doesn't. Also, it seems that coating the match head with nail polish and then dipping the whole assembly in paraffin might be a good solution. (The nail varnish would protect the match head from the paraffin, and the paraffin would waterproof the butcher twine. In theory, at least.) <img src="images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />