Starting with my journal post of two days ago, follow the amazing events leading to the completion of ?Born on the Bayou?.

Greetings all, it?s beginning to look a lot like Christmas around here as I woke up to several inches of fresh snow! Not in any hurry to shovel snow, this cold winter morning offers me a great opportunity to sit with a hot cup of coffee and reminisce on the events of the past week.

Two days ago in a journal post, I wrote about the difficulty I had in buying a MS-61 1892-O Morgan Dollar. The main problem was there are so few coins available that meet my criteria of MS-60 to 61 for less than $200. I considered buying an AU coin, but the thought of paying up to $90 for a coin that earns three points is unacceptable. Sometimes I do not mind buying a coin with a $1 per point ratio, but $30 per point, no way. That said there was a glimmer of hope in that I was tracking a coin that met most of my criteria on E-Bay for $225. Although the coin was over my budget, I was pondering on whether to buy the coin anyway. When I posted my journal of two days ago, this thirty-day listing had nine days left for me to decide before all of a sudden, later that day, the seller ended the listing. Now the decision on whether to buy the coin anyways was out of my hands. Frustrated, saddened, but relieved that I had stuck with my budget; I began to prepare myself for the long haul.

The internet is a wonderful tool to find most anything you want, and I thought to do a Google search on the 1892-O dollar. The problem you encounter with Google searches is that they are like mining for gold; you have to dig through tons of rock to find the mother lode. Well, after going through several pages, I came upon a link that looked somewhat promising. I clicked the link and it redirected me to a website called thefind.com . Thefind.com appears to be a single point website whereby subscribing merchants' post links to their wares. From the main page, a prospective buyer enters a keyword search, and then the site redirects you to a page that describes the number of stores and matching products in your search. From there the thumbnail links redirect you to the vendor?s web page. Now I was beginning to get somewhere as a search of ?1892-O Morgan Dollar? returned 157 products in 58 stores. Several of the links did not match the search, and some were obsolete, but suddenly, and unexpectedly I hit the mother lode, and there it was, an 1892-O PCGS MS-61 Morgan Dollar! As an extra bonus, the dealer whose page I had been redirected advertised all his certified coins for sale at Numismedia Fair Market Value. This allowed me to purchase the coin within my budget and at the same time save $33 over the E-Bay listing!

I?ve learned much about patience and living under a budget with this set, and today I am a savvier buyer because of it. So now, with my coffee gone and my journal post finished, it?s time to go outside and shovel snow. I am attaching a photograph of a PCGS MS-63 rainbow-toned 1901-O Morgan Dollar I recently purchased through Teletrade. Until next time, happy collecting and Merry Christmas!

Gary