Lem E

I checked the mail Saturday, expecting to find something else and found a package from NGC that I immediately realized had to be the new award plaque. It turns out it included the coin too.

We were outside with the boys and I showed the package to Shandy and she initially, seeing NGC, thought it might be the Zimbabwe and Italian coins.. somehow.  I don't know why. She's seen the boxes from NGC before when coins come back and this padded envelope looked nothing like that, but, as she put it, the coins are just what she thinks about when she sees "NGC."
The package didn't get opened until late that night. If I look tired in the shot, it's because I was.  Saturday happened to be a very big Pokemon Go event - a game I started playing with Ben, Shandy and my mother in law a couple of months ago and that's been eating up a lot of my normal social media, writing and coin time.  I started playing it with Ben in part because I knew he'd need friends and allies to get the full game experience and It has also allowed me to learn the game and then teach those things to him to help him and my mother-in-law as she's gotten into it. It has turned into quite the bonding thing for all of us. Saturday turned into hours of trying to catch legendary Pokemon in group fights called "raids" and that turned into a teaching moment about community and teamwork and working together to do things no one could do alone.
But... I was tired when it was over.  
I couldn't help but chuckle at the coin choice this year - a 2021 MS70 ASE. This is exactly what I expected last year and then they really surprised me with the Morgan dollars. But, because of last year, I hadn't been expecting it necessarily this year. I was thinking it might be another Morgan.  
But, now that I have this, I have the twins - The two Zimbabwe plaques.  

Yup. Shirts changed. I didn't get the PMG plaque down from the office and take this one until the following night. Kids are exhausting.  
I have some things I need to post about when I can get a couple of hours to write one of these days / nights. I also need to stop trading with my wife at night and get us looking at those Venezuelan coins to get those lined up and ready.
As always, I'm very grateful to NGC (and PMG) for the awards and the recognition, and I am still very much excited about some new sets and new projects in the pipeline that I hope will prove worthy successors to this Zimbabwe project.

Mike has earned some kind of "I told you so," as he made references back in, I think, October, about the Zimbabwean coin set winning "Best Presented" this year and I was like, "Nope. Nah. Not gonna happen."
I am, once again, very honored by the award and the recognition. 😃
I'm thrilled for Coinbuf, Lem E, deposito, jgenn and coin928 for their wins, many on sets that have been long labored and personal projects. It's a humbling thing sometimes to be listed next to such endeavors. But some of you guys really need to stop counting yourselves out and selling short your chances.
My wife and I popped a bottle of Champagne Friday night that was left over from New Year’s Eve. I’m not sure if this means we had a lame NYE party or if we bought too much booze. I guess it’s cool either way. She wanted a photo to go with this post and specifically dragged me back up to my desk to get the case from Father’s Day with the 5 gold coins in the background of the shot because she was feeling the need to be artsy I guess. Poor choice of subjects if you’re going to be artsy. Ick… 35… I’m getting older and these kids are sucking the life out of me and the hair off my head.  But the wife keeps insisting that I look Handsome... now where's that Meme of the Old Man saying he was lied too... 

The comments from the judges mention the set having 21 coins, and it does - 23 actually - but I only had 14 graded and in the set as of Dec 1. Which is the main reason I was convinced that set had not a chance - not a one - this year. But, the coins are ready, I've already started the online submission form, and I will be finishing it as soon as I can. Now that this has come through though I think I’m going to be tacking on some 500 Lire Italian coins at the end of the submission.
Shandy of course immediately joked, "so, you won, so now we're going to just drop that and move on to something else, right?" But, naturally she knows that isn't what we're doing and I think she'd kill me if I tried after all the shared effort looking at and picking coins.
This seems to be becoming a recurring theme for me - I win and then I spend the credits mostly on the set that won - which will not win again - rather than putting it (and the time and energy) towards something new that might win next year. I spent all of the PMG credits from the note set winning on that same collection. Fun collecting, but bad strategy I suppose. But, you can't just not finish something like that after putting so much into it.
My candidate for "Worst of the Best 2020" is now "Best Presented 2021" - just to continue to reference the past of this journal as we prepare to start a new cycle in earnest.
This is going to be one set where it’s going to be a lot of fun for me over time to see the progress of it in the archives over time - getting to see it as it was in 2020 with one coin and no banner, see it in 2021 with the banner, and, hopefully, maybe, see it as the #1 in 2022 with all the coins filled in / 100% complete, and then maybe see it again in 2023 with some coins upgraded. Snapshots in time as the set progressed - assuming it stays #1. I guess we’ll see if anyone wants to throw down in a crazy-off.


The 10G set is another one that I love being able to look back at how it has incrementally grown and improved over now 6 years of being #1, but I think I’ve said that before.
But this outcome has reinforced my decision to cull the submission down to 22 of the best coins from the original 33 and then move on to other things for now once the set is full in a graded state. And I do have at least two things I'm looking at that are in the pipeline, and which will probably now be 2022 projects instead of 2023 projects.
As far as the journal awards go, I'm not going to lie - I'm more than a little sad to see that go - and not just because this means I'll have to do more than just run at the mouth if I want to keep winning major awards and because this means I'll never catch up to Gary.
The Journal Awards had been given out every year since about 2004 or 2005 and, as such, they were one of the oldest and most consistent features in the awards. But participation has been dropping for years and I think it was down again this year vs last year. And I guess this year was the year NGC decided enough was enough and to pull the plug on them. I had thought we were at thus point 2 years ago when the journal awards weren't announced / listed for 2019 but instead they actually upped it by extending the $500 credit to the journal awards where it hadn't before. I guess the last two years were the last chance to see if it would rebound and it... didn't.
Now that they are officially axed, I don't expect the journal awards to ever return but I hope NGC will consider replacing them with something like the community awards that are given on the Comics side - something that can celebrate some of the people that make it worth it to keep visiting the chat boards and who come to share the joy of collecting and not to grind political axes and grumble.
But... while the journals awards are done, don't think you're rid of me yet. I posted in 2019 when I thought they were dead and in 2020. I expect to have more to say in 2022, though I expect inevitably, eventually, my time and efforts will likely go elsewhere for a while just like they did from 2010 to 2017 - because life is like that, and I can't always actively collect, and I don't post or have much to say when I don't actively collect.
But, right now, I'm collecting pretty darn actively. 😃

Here is another coin that Mark recently shot photos of for me.  This one I was able to get good photos of myself but not as sharp or with with the subtle color showing as well. 
 

Ok instalment 3 of 12, I have already posted this coin once or twice but just for the sake of completeness I'll add a journal entry for this one too.   I am a long time dedicated Lincoln collector and love the coin/series partly as I like the original wheatie design, but mostly for the historical significance of President Lincoln.    I own many books written about him and enjoy learning about him, visiting the Ford theater the first time I went to DC was a real thrill for me.
While most of my collection is focused on high grade registry quality red and red/brown coins I do enjoy rich lustrous brown coins like this.   In some ways the details of the design are almost even more highlighted on coins like this vs full red examples.   As many of you may know there has been much discussion in the collecting world dedicated to the blue toned Lincolns and IHC's, much of that discussion about the origins and originality of the blue color.   While I know that blue on copper coins can be created it is my belief that it can happen naturally also, and in my opinion this is one of those original coins.
 

I continue to work and getting better at taking my own coin photos and slowly am getting better.   But when I want some really good photos, like the kind I want for the coins in my three first place registry sets; I go to the professional Mark Goodman.   I have used three or four pro photographers in the past and a couple others were very good, but I have always felt that Mark was the very best of all those I have tried.   Anyway here are a couple of compilation photos of some of my registry coins that I wanted to have better photos of than I was able to produce.    All together I sent Mark 12 coins to image and as usual could not be happier with the results.   I'll add new entries to show each coin from this group and I plan to keep this going as I have plans to send Mark more coins in the first part of 2022.
Ok enough with the hype lets get to the coins.   First is a new addition this year to my 1st place 1940 year set, this is one beautiful walker if I say so myself.   Mark was able to bring out the subtle color and showcase the luster perfectly.   This MS67+ CAC green bean coin is really stunning and a great addition to my set.

So, unlike with the PMG plaque, which arrived on 2/27 - much to my shock – I can’t really call this one a surprise in the mail. I’d seen other’s posting about getting theirs on Monday and Tuesday, so I knew the arrival of this package was probably imminent. Still, it was great to get it.
My home office and my windows sit almost directly above the front door to the house, so I heard the carrier scanning the barcodes and the beeping as it was dropped off and I wondered in that moment if that’s what it was because I wasn’t expecting anything else in the mail today.
I didn’t open it right away. I took it upstairs and stuck it in the bedroom to wait until after the kids were asleep. I will likely repeat what I did last year and try to get a shot of the two boys together this year holding the two plaques for this year now that I have both, but I wanted to get a minute and just enjoy opening this and looking at it in peace myself. I opened the PMG plaque with Sam around and it took a while before he let me have it back.


So, here’s the coin:

A MS64 1881-S Morgan, which will be quite a partner / buddy for my MS64 1882-S Morgan.  I'm now ranked in the top 1,700 for Morgan sets in the registry. It's straight to the top now! #1 set, 2021 awards!
I had guessed that the coin would be a 1 or 2 ounce graded silver NCLT from 2020. I was wrong and very pleasantly surprised. Fenntucky Mike posted an image of his full slab and (unsurprisingly) looks like all these Award Winner coins have the same 7-digit invoice number and they’re numbered 001 through… 50? I think? He got number -008 and I have -022. Gary appears to have -034.I wonder who got -001? Who got the last / highest number. I'm sure it was all random but it is funny to think about.
(Edited to add this bit, which I'd said as a comment elsewhere) Honestly, the sheer number of coins they had to give away - and the unstated expectation that everyone would be getting the same / mostly the same thing - is the main reason I was REALLY expecting the coin to be 2020 NCLT, just because those would fit because of the year and would be easy to get in an arbitrarily large number in the same basic grade / condition (69/70).They really surprised me with this one, managing to give 50+ people MS64 Morgans from San Francisco from just a couple of years, but, as Gary said, they are more common dates. Even then, I really wonder if it was at all "interesting" to round them up and how they went about it - Did they go into the market for RAW coins until they had enough MS64s? Did they buy some of their previously graded MS64's on the market? A little of both?
When the PMG plaque arrived I posted a shot of the 5 together and Fenntucky Mike said something along the lines of I’d need another or a bigger shelf soon. I shifted some things around, cleaned up my desk, and popped over to Michael’s to buy another stand last month, so here is my proof. I made it work (for now). If NGC or PMG are nice enough to give me something next year I'll cross that bridge and deal with that “problem” when the time comes.

I also got the new certificates in the mail over the weekend. So far, I’ve managed to keep track of all the certificates I’ve gotten since 2016 – including now 5 certificates for the 10G set for all the years since my marriage and Ben's birth.. 
Thanks again to NGC! Thanks again for those who read these and say they like it / what I write.
The version of myself that Joined the registry in 2007, the version of myself that started this journal as a 20 year old, did not, and would not have imagined this. Not what’s sitting on my desk hutch now, not my life as it is now, not my wife or my sons, not this past year.
I’m not done yet! More to come!
Side note, but one of Shandy’s current obsessions is our next housing situation. With our current lease up on 3/31/2022 she’s looking to move us closer to her parents for more access to free baby-sitting and more date nights. So there’s a good chance that, if I win anything next year – be it plaques or certificates – they’ll be delivered to the new address / the new home or subject to mail forwarding. But we’re hoping that will be the last home – for the foreseeable future anyway. She was looking at this last night even!
I think Ben’s Beyblade collection now numbers 19 – with three more seemingly lost forever in some magical void that only children can access in some 1-way capacity. I’m pretty committed to not buying more but he does get a weekly allowance now so what ne does with his allowance is his business!

Sam’s intensive therapy is over. Yay! His last day was actually the Thursday I posted about getting the plaque in the mail. Three weeks of stress and crying and having a generally unhappy 2-year-old can end – but it was for his own good, and he did great. He’s supposed to continue to wear a cast and restrict his left hand one day a week and one meal a day to continue the development of motor skills with his right hand, but that hopefully won’t be as contentious.
Shandy and I both got the first CoVID shot (both Moderna) in March and we’re getting the 2nd dose on 4/20 and 5/1 respectively. So, we’ll be fully vaccinated by mid-May and we’re looking forward to getting to go out to eat again soon and to actually do something fun for her birthday in mid-June. We’re also hoping that we’ll really get to go on a cruise this year, unlike last year. I will still have missed two local coin shows that happened in January or March but… such is life.
Last year I’d attended a show in the Woodlands area in January and talked to a dealer about seeing them again at a show in March to see if they’d found any of the key-date 10G coins I needed in their inventory. I never got to go to that show in March because of CoVID and now I’ve had to miss the January and March shows this year. And… this is why we get contact info, people! Stupid virus…
The European pocket change from PawPaw is now fully mixed in with the coins I’ve had for years from my grandfather and others. I managed to not need another binder after all.  I vaguely remember thinking maybe I made a mistake by getting such a large / thick binder in the first place. I don’t feel that way now! That binder is heavy though!

Also: 2x2s Forevah! Flips only for submissions as to not make NGC annoyed.
But… What I feel like the big news is is that we’ll probably be moving much sooner than expected now.
Shandy poked me to ask out landlady what terms / requirements she’d put on letting us out of our lease early (11 months early) and I did. We fully expected her to hold us to the terms of the lease and we wouldn’t be able to leave early, but she’d like to sell and she’s willing to let us vacate pretty much as soon as we want with 1 month of notice so she can list the house, get it ready and flip it.
So… It looks like we may be leaving this house in May – next freaking month. OMG! The reason she pressured me and the reason why we’re looking to move now rather than later is so that we don’t have to move during Ben’s Kindergarten year. She wants to minimize the disruption to him, which I completely understand. It also has implications for Sam’s timing of entry into pre-school in early 2022.
So… yeah. That escalated very fast… this afternoon! I texted the landlady in the late morning and she called me back at 12:15 PM and we were pre-approved for a loan by 1:30-ish.

Is it horrible that I just keep mentally going back to the implications this has for the return shipping / timing on my current and planned NGC and PMG submissions? Is that horrible? That that is a major thing in my head as all of this is going on?
This is the only home Ben has ever known. He does not remember the place before this, the place we brought him home to and left when he was 18 months old. Now we’re looking to leave here when Sam is just a little older than that, and it is funny to think that Sam likely won’t remember this place. I think this is the 5th home I've had since starting this journal and the next one will be number 6.
… Time to buy some moving boxes I guess.
Also: As of this morning, this journal has surpassed 10,000 views. Wow. That feels like a lot. I wonder how much of that is me?
 

Lol, So some context to this great feat of mine.   I recently asked for the registry team to include a new Lincoln set that does not require the varieties to be included in it.   Nothing against those who like collecting the varieties but its just not my thing.  To my surprise today I noticed that NGC created the set that I had asked for!    So I jumped in and created the very first set and am sitting in the number one spot; I have no doubt that as soon as the big guns spot the new set they will leapfrog over me and I'll end up in the 6 or 7 spot as I am in most of the Lincoln sets.   But I can say that for once I have the top Lincoln set in one category no matter how short lived that claim ends up being.   I think I should be drinking a brandy in a sniffer glass with a big stogie, tomorrow its back to beer.