Revenant

I don't think this post is going to be long for the world - I'll probably pull it down in the near future because it's not going to have any relevance here beyond the fact that I know there are a few here that are probably curious and I don't know that I've really addressed it.
The rebound / recovery from a shunt revision isn't necessarily as bad as you might think it is from dealing with other surgeries on the body or thinking of it as "Brain surgery." Because they're not opening the gut, cutting into a lot of tissue and muscle. This isn't something where you spend days in the hospital afterwards while they're waiting for you to walk around the nurse station and waiting for you to have a good bowel movement. Yes, they are cutting into the person's head - there is an incision and a scar, but they're inserting a tube into the brain - they're not cutting into it or anything. In this case it was a step less than that. They just replaced his value. The tube / catheter going into his brain and the part going to his stomach were fine. They just replaced the valve - the hardware that's normally under his skin but outside his skull.
So, his recovery is almost immediate afterwards. He has to get out of the anesthesia and the have to make sure he's okay. We have to be careful about the cut to keep it clean, keep him from damaging stitches and keep it from getting infected...
However...
He starts feeling better immediately.
As in, they operated at 8:30 AM, he was out of surgery and awake by about 9:30 or 10:00 and before lunch time was even properly here, he had his appetite back and he was eating.
We were released the next day - about 30 hours after surgery we were going out the door and driving home. 
He was walking around fine, and not only that but jumping and trying to roll on his head of all things. He's feeling great and you have to hold him back and tell him to be careful - especially near his head and the incision.
He went home feeling fine, playing with toys again, eating like I don't think he's eaten in weeks.
The recovery is immediate, the only thing is the cut has to heal.
We went out on Tuesday night - just 4 days after surgery, and he stayed up late, walking on his own around the neighborhood, refusing his pediatric wheelchair so he could walk with his mother and walk up to houses. to say "Trick or Treat."





 

I don't think this post is going to be long for the world - I'll probably pull it down in the near future because it's not going to have any relevance here beyond the fact that I know there are a few here that are probably curious and I don't know that I've really addressed it.
The rebound / recovery from a shunt revision isn't necessarily as bad as you might think it is from dealing with other surgeries on the body or thinking of it as "Brain surgery." Because they're not opening the gut, cutting into a lot of tissue and muscle. This isn't something where you spend days in the hospital afterwards while they're waiting for you to walk around the nurse station and waiting for you to have a good bowel movement. Yes, they are cutting into the person's head - there is an incision and a scar, but they're inserting a tube into the brain - they're not cutting into it or anything. In this case it was a step less than that. They just replaced his value. The tube / catheter going into his brain and the part going to his stomach were fine. They just replaced the valve - the hardware that's normally under his skin but outside his skull.
So, his recovery is almost immediate afterwards. He has to get out of the anesthesia and the have to make sure he's okay. We have to be careful about the cut to keep it clean, keep him from damaging stitches and keep it from getting infected...
However...
He starts feeling better immediately.
As in, they operated at 8:30 AM, he was out of surgery and awake by about 9:30 or 10:00 and before lunch time was even properly here, he had his appetite back and he was eating.
We were released the next day - about 30 hours after surgery we were going out the door and driving home. 
He was walking around fine, and not only that but jumping and trying to roll on his head of all things. He's feeling great and you have to hold him back and tell him to be careful - especially near his head and the incision.
He went home feeling fine, playing with toys again, eating like I don't think he's eaten in weeks.
The recovery is immediate, the only thing is the cut has to heal.
We went out on Tuesday night - just 4 days after surgery, and he stayed up late, walking on his own around the neighborhood, refusing his pediatric wheelchair so he could walk with his mother and walk up to houses. to say "Trick or Treat."





 

I don't think this post is going to be long for the world - I'll probably pull it down in the near future because it's not going to have any relevance here beyond the fact that I know there are a few here that are probably curious and I don't know that I've really addressed it.
The rebound / recovery from a shunt revision isn't necessarily as bad as you might think it is from dealing with other surgeries on the body or thinking of it as "Brain surgery." Because they're not opening the gut, cutting into a lot of tissue and muscle. This isn't something where you spend days in the hospital afterwards while they're waiting for you to walk around the nurse station and waiting for you to have a good bowel movement. Yes, they are cutting into the person's head - there is an incision and a scar, but they're inserting a tube into the brain - they're not cutting into it or anything. In this case it was a step less than that. They just replaced his value. The tube / catheter going into his brain and the part going to his stomach were fine. They just replaced the valve - the hardware that's normally under his skin but outside his skull.
So, his recovery is almost immediate afterwards. He has to get out of the anesthesia and the have to make sure he's okay. We have to be careful about the cut to keep it clean, keep him from damaging stitches and keep it from getting infected...
However...
He starts feeling better immediately.
As in, they operated at 8:30 AM, he was out of surgery and awake by about 9:30 or 10:00 and before lunch time was even properly here, he had his appetite back and he was eating.
We were released the next day - about 30 hours after surgery we were going out the door and driving home. 
He was walking around fine, and not only that but jumping and trying to roll on his head of all things. He's feeling great and you have to hold him back and tell him to be careful - especially near his head and the incision.
He went home feeling fine, playing with toys again, eating like I don't think he's eaten in weeks.
The recovery is immediate, the only thing is the cut has to heal.
We went out on Tuesday night - just 4 days after surgery, and he stayed up late, walking on his own around the neighborhood, refusing his pediatric wheelchair so he could walk with his mother and walk up to houses. to say "Trick or Treat."





 

I don't think this post is going to be long for the world - I'll probably pull it down in the near future because it's not going to have any relevance here beyond the fact that I know there are a few here that are probably curious and I don't know that I've really addressed it.
The rebound / recovery from a shunt revision isn't necessarily as bad as you might think it is from dealing with other surgeries on the body or thinking of it as "Brain surgery." Because they're not opening the gut, cutting into a lot of tissue and muscle. This isn't something where you spend days in the hospital afterwards while they're waiting for you to walk around the nurse station and waiting for you to have a good bowel movement. Yes, they are cutting into the person's head - there is an incision and a scar, but they're inserting a tube into the brain - they're not cutting into it or anything. In this case it was a step less than that. They just replaced his value. The tube / catheter going into his brain and the part going to his stomach were fine. They just replaced the valve - the hardware that's normally under his skin but outside his skull.
So, his recovery is almost immediate afterwards. He has to get out of the anesthesia and the have to make sure he's okay. We have to be careful about the cut to keep it clean, keep him from damaging stitches and keep it from getting infected...
However...
He starts feeling better immediately.
As in, they operated at 8:30 AM, he was out of surgery and awake by about 9:30 or 10:00 and before lunch time was even properly here, he had his appetite back and he was eating.
We were released the next day - about 30 hours after surgery we were going out the door and driving home. 
He was walking around fine, and not only that but jumping and trying to roll on his head of all things. He's feeling great and you have to hold him back and tell him to be careful - especially near his head and the incision.
He went home feeling fine, playing with toys again, eating like I don't think he's eaten in weeks.
The recovery is immediate, the only thing is the cut has to heal.
We went out on Tuesday night - just 4 days after surgery, and he stayed up late, walking on his own around the neighborhood, refusing his pediatric wheelchair so he could walk with his mother and walk up to houses. to say "Trick or Treat."





 

I don't think this post is going to be long for the world - I'll probably pull it down in the near future because it's not going to have any relevance here beyond the fact that I know there are a few here that are probably curious and I don't know that I've really addressed it.
The rebound / recovery from a shunt revision isn't necessarily as bad as you might think it is from dealing with other surgeries on the body or thinking of it as "Brain surgery." Because they're not opening the gut, cutting into a lot of tissue and muscle. This isn't something where you spend days in the hospital afterwards while they're waiting for you to walk around the nurse station and waiting for you to have a good bowel movement. Yes, they are cutting into the person's head - there is an incision and a scar, but they're inserting a tube into the brain - they're not cutting into it or anything. In this case it was a step less than that. They just replaced his value. The tube / catheter going into his brain and the part going to his stomach were fine. They just replaced the valve - the hardware that's normally under his skin but outside his skull.
So, his recovery is almost immediate afterwards. He has to get out of the anesthesia and the have to make sure he's okay. We have to be careful about the cut to keep it clean, keep him from damaging stitches and keep it from getting infected...
However...
He starts feeling better immediately.
As in, they operated at 8:30 AM, he was out of surgery and awake by about 9:30 or 10:00 and before lunch time was even properly here, he had his appetite back and he was eating.
We were released the next day - about 30 hours after surgery we were going out the door and driving home. 
He was walking around fine, and not only that but jumping and trying to roll on his head of all things. He's feeling great and you have to hold him back and tell him to be careful - especially near his head and the incision.
He went home feeling fine, playing with toys again, eating like I don't think he's eaten in weeks.
The recovery is immediate, the only thing is the cut has to heal.
We went out on Tuesday night - just 4 days after surgery, and he stayed up late, walking on his own around the neighborhood, refusing his pediatric wheelchair so he could walk with his mother and walk up to houses. to say "Trick or Treat."





 

So, I've always thought the expression "It's all over but the crying" was a funny one, in part because when something is over people can be crying because they're happy or because they're sad. You see it on awards shows all the time with the happy cry, but, given that televised award shows are often for TV and movie stars who are, after all, professional pretenders, it does make you wonder sometimes how much of the happy crying is genuine.  
What I never knew, however, but what a little bit of quick googling has now taught me, is that this is apparently the name of and a line from a Hank Williams Jr break-up song from 1947. Which was... a bit before my time, if I'm being honest. I am now wondering what the broader cultural awareness of this song and the cultural origins of the phrase seem to be. Am I not aware of this song simply because I'm not 60-80 year old or is this something that most other people in their mid-30s currently are aware of and I'm just out of the loop?  
But, anyway... 
The registry awards are now closed. I wish everyone luck. I'll resist the temptation to make the obvious Hunger Games reference.
I thought I'd take the occasion to follow-up on a post from last year.
After I won in 4 Modern Italian categories last year my wife had jokingly asked, "So, 6 next year?" My response at the time was that I'd be happy to hold 2-3. It looks like the end result is going to be 5 for this year - Very solidly not bad.  

I guess we'll see how long people let me continue to get away with this.  I think the only set in that group that it would REALLY annoy me to see get knocked down from #1 would be the now-100% complete 500 Lire set that includes two coins her family brought back from Italy. That one I really would want to defend.
Somewhat to my surprise, the 1932 set was not challenged or bumped after the CAC points were removed, and, for the first time in 3 years, it'll take the top spot, and take both the overall and the NGC award, bringing that one up to 25 Best in Category awards earned over 16 years, which goes far beyond what I ever expected for that set.

For a little context - I've been in the Registry for 15 years from 2007-2022 and earned 48 Best in Category awards, and literally almost half of those are on that 1 set.
Some of my recent efforts are starting to change that. I think this is going to be my best year ever in terms of BiC awards and a few more years of this might help make that set less of an out-sized contributor, but I do still find it kind of amazing. But I think it continues to be a source of pride for my Father-in-Law.
I can't remember if I ever talked about this at the time (looking back, it would appear that I did not), but a year ago I gave my stepfather a 6-coin glass-lid Volterra display case as a Christmas present - very similar to the 5 coin case my wife gave me a year prior. When he saw it and saw that it held 6 coins he understood immediately and there was zero need to explain exactly what the idea for it was. And yes, 6 slots would do - because short of winning the lottery we are never getting that $20 Double Eagle.  But! If we ever do win a couple of hundred million dollars, I will gladly buy a new custom 7-coin case.  And at that point I doubt I'll ever have to worry about that set losing the top spot in the category ever again, and I wouldn't be surprised if some of the old coins in the set - like the MS63 $10 Eagle - got some upgrades.  I tried to talk my Stepfather into some MS67RD pennies over the years I think but he hasn't bitten so far.  
For my part of the crying, I think the main thing I wanted to get done that I failed to do was that I failed to get pictures done and update the presentation fully on the 5L and 10L sets. Like I said before though, I was pretty sure that was dead as soon as Sam went into the hospital earlier than expected.  I also did not get the turtle coins fully imaged, and I have not set up anything for showing off that effort as it moves forward, but I've known for a while that that was going to be more a "next year" thing that I was just starting to work on this year, so I don't mark that as much of a failure.
I think the major focuses for next year will be to:
1) bring the Austral set closer to 100% if I can - it closed this year at 61%, there are 5 coins that I'll need to find and grade, and I've managed to pick up a raw example of 1 of those 5 so far.
2) do more with coins from the short-lived Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland and maybe spread into the Republic Era that lasted from about 1965-1980 - an interesting period given that the country was in a Civil War for pretty much the entire time. But I do want to try to fill in this gap between my Federation-era sets and my Zimbabwe set. This year though, given that I have "A Tower of Towering Giraffes" and "A Parade of Dancing Elephants," I think you're going to see "A Bouquet of Flame Lillies" and maybe "A Leap of Vigilant Leopards."
3) do more with Turtle coins. I really am working on a few things with this, picking up some various raw coins where I find promising examples. Much like with Sam, I'm going to build this I think, even if all Ben ever does is roll his eyes at me for it later.  
4) work on my "Golden Nickels" set. I realized recently that I only have 5 coins listed in that little custom set I have, even though I've added several coins to the collection in the last couple of years and I think I could actually have 10 coins in that set right now. But I think the extent to which I've ignored and neglected this set is a testament to how much I don't like the old Custom set system at this point, which probably bodes poorly for the turtle set, if I'm being honest.  
Because, yes, it is sometimes fun to make these statements, call the shots, and see a year down the road if I actually kept to plan and did what I said I was going to do.
But that's my ramble for the day. Lots of laugh emojis just because I'm feeling silly and trying to relax after last week.

So, I've always thought the expression "It's all over but the crying" was a funny one, in part because when something is over people can be crying because they're happy or because they're sad. You see it on awards shows all the time with the happy cry, but, given that televised award shows are often for TV and movie stars who are, after all, professional pretenders, it does make you wonder sometimes how much of the happy crying is genuine.  
What I never knew, however, but what a little bit of quick googling has now taught me, is that this is apparently the name of and a line from a Hank Williams Jr break-up song from 1947. Which was... a bit before my time, if I'm being honest. I am now wondering what the broader cultural awareness of this song and the cultural origins of the phrase seem to be. Am I not aware of this song simply because I'm not 60-80 year old or is this something that most other people in their mid-30s currently are aware of and I'm just out of the loop?  
But, anyway... 
The registry awards are now closed. I wish everyone luck. I'll resist the temptation to make the obvious Hunger Games reference.
I thought I'd take the occasion to follow-up on a post from last year.
After I won in 4 Modern Italian categories last year my wife had jokingly asked, "So, 6 next year?" My response at the time was that I'd be happy to hold 2-3. It looks like the end result is going to be 5 for this year - Very solidly not bad.  

I guess we'll see how long people let me continue to get away with this.  I think the only set in that group that it would REALLY annoy me to see get knocked down from #1 would be the now-100% complete 500 Lire set that includes two coins her family brought back from Italy. That one I really would want to defend.
Somewhat to my surprise, the 1932 set was not challenged or bumped after the CAC points were removed, and, for the first time in 3 years, it'll take the top spot, and take both the overall and the NGC award, bringing that one up to 25 Best in Category awards earned over 16 years, which goes far beyond what I ever expected for that set.

For a little context - I've been in the Registry for 15 years from 2007-2022 and earned 48 Best in Category awards, and literally almost half of those are on that 1 set.
Some of my recent efforts are starting to change that. I think this is going to be my best year ever in terms of BiC awards and a few more years of this might help make that set less of an out-sized contributor, but I do still find it kind of amazing. But I think it continues to be a source of pride for my Father-in-Law.
I can't remember if I ever talked about this at the time (looking back, it would appear that I did not), but a year ago I gave my stepfather a 6-coin glass-lid Volterra display case as a Christmas present - very similar to the 5 coin case my wife gave me a year prior. When he saw it and saw that it held 6 coins he understood immediately and there was zero need to explain exactly what the idea for it was. And yes, 6 slots would do - because short of winning the lottery we are never getting that $20 Double Eagle.  But! If we ever do win a couple of hundred million dollars, I will gladly buy a new custom 7-coin case.  And at that point I doubt I'll ever have to worry about that set losing the top spot in the category ever again, and I wouldn't be surprised if some of the old coins in the set - like the MS63 $10 Eagle - got some upgrades.  I tried to talk my Stepfather into some MS67RD pennies over the years I think but he hasn't bitten so far.  
For my part of the crying, I think the main thing I wanted to get done that I failed to do was that I failed to get pictures done and update the presentation fully on the 5L and 10L sets. Like I said before though, I was pretty sure that was dead as soon as Sam went into the hospital earlier than expected.  I also did not get the turtle coins fully imaged, and I have not set up anything for showing off that effort as it moves forward, but I've known for a while that that was going to be more a "next year" thing that I was just starting to work on this year, so I don't mark that as much of a failure.
I think the major focuses for next year will be to:
1) bring the Austral set closer to 100% if I can - it closed this year at 61%, there are 5 coins that I'll need to find and grade, and I've managed to pick up a raw example of 1 of those 5 so far.
2) do more with coins from the short-lived Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland and maybe spread into the Republic Era that lasted from about 1965-1980 - an interesting period given that the country was in a Civil War for pretty much the entire time. But I do want to try to fill in this gap between my Federation-era sets and my Zimbabwe set. This year though, given that I have "A Tower of Towering Giraffes" and "A Parade of Dancing Elephants," I think you're going to see "A Bouquet of Flame Lillies" and maybe "A Leap of Vigilant Leopards."
3) do more with Turtle coins. I really am working on a few things with this, picking up some various raw coins where I find promising examples. Much like with Sam, I'm going to build this I think, even if all Ben ever does is roll his eyes at me for it later.  
4) work on my "Golden Nickels" set. I realized recently that I only have 5 coins listed in that little custom set I have, even though I've added several coins to the collection in the last couple of years and I think I could actually have 10 coins in that set right now. But I think the extent to which I've ignored and neglected this set is a testament to how much I don't like the old Custom set system at this point, which probably bodes poorly for the turtle set, if I'm being honest.  
Because, yes, it is sometimes fun to make these statements, call the shots, and see a year down the road if I actually kept to plan and did what I said I was going to do.
But that's my ramble for the day. Lots of laugh emojis just because I'm feeling silly and trying to relax after last week.

After a weekend of vomiting with no fever or other signs of sickness, saying that he was vomiting because his head hurt so bad and not being able to get him to eat or keep food down, we took Sam into the Hospital (ER) on Monday instead of waiting for November 13th. He was ultimately admitted and after 2 more days of not being able to find any other explanations or being able to get him to eat without vomiting we decided to go forward with the shunt revision.
The one thing that seemingly succeeded in stopping the vomiting was giving him an abdominal girdle, which increased pressure on his gut, which lowered the ability for the shunt to drain into his gut, which increases the pressure in his head. This outcome from the girdle was another piece of evidence to suggest over draining and that replacing the valve with a programmable one that would let us actively control flowrates was the way to go.
He came through it like a champ.

His response post-surgery makes everyone hopeful that we'll go home tomorrow. The hospitalization on 11/13 should no longer be necessary now.
I think we'll still get to take him trick or treating, but we'll probably be pushing him along in the wheelchair and not expecting much walking from him.
Monday and Tuesday, while there was a lot of sitting in a hospital room, I did end up finishing drafts of my last four write-ups for the Austral set. I've still been working on them and tweaking them as I feel the inclination and need, but the set presentation is more or less finished, pending me getting graded examples of some of the coins I'm missing or strong upgrades down the line.
My wife joked with me that, "See? This was just what you needed! (To get the write-ups finished.)" For what it's worth, I was fully planning on stealing moments here and there and getting the last four busted out this week anyway. I don't think it would have been too crazy of a week at work and I think I could have gotten them done around the same time anyway. And I was just set on pushing myself to finish it before the deadline, period. But... this did give me time with little else to do. So, it was done.
I've engaged in a bit of retail therapy while we've been here. I've ordered the 1986 2L, the Rhodesian 3 pence and the Fiji 6 Pence I'd talked about with my wife after I got the Rhodesian 6 pence for my birthday last week, and another Italian coin - I think a 5 Lire. I wasn't paying too much attention if I'm honest. I saw something for one of the modern Italian sets in a good grade for a good price and I just bought it... Most of what I'd ordered is arriving in the mail today. 
Also, this morning I just put in offers on some additional Rhodesian (federation period) 3 pence coins and the seller accepted so I'll be getting those.
I also found a listing for another coin with a turtle on it that I found interesting, so I ordered 4 of those raw. We'll see how those look in-person soon, I think.
Like I said, retail therapy.
But some of these may set the stage for 2024's efforts.
Edited to add: Apparently that group of 3 coins combined into 1 order wasn't delivered today because it went from Pennsylvania to California and not to Texas. Hopefully they get it to the right state soon. Fortunately, none of those really matter for this year.

After a weekend of vomiting with no fever or other signs of sickness, saying that he was vomiting because his head hurt so bad and not being able to get him to eat or keep food down, we took Sam into the Hospital (ER) on Monday instead of waiting for November 13th. He was ultimately admitted and after 2 more days of not being able to find any other explanations or being able to get him to eat without vomiting we decided to go forward with the shunt revision.
The one thing that seemingly succeeded in stopping the vomiting was giving him an abdominal girdle, which increased pressure on his gut, which lowered the ability for the shunt to drain into his gut, which increases the pressure in his head. This outcome from the girdle was another piece of evidence to suggest over draining and that replacing the valve with a programmable one that would let us actively control flowrates was the way to go.
He came through it like a champ.

His response post-surgery makes everyone hopeful that we'll go home tomorrow. The hospitalization on 11/13 should no longer be necessary now.
I think we'll still get to take him trick or treating, but we'll probably be pushing him along in the wheelchair and not expecting much walking from him.
Monday and Tuesday, while there was a lot of sitting in a hospital room, I did end up finishing drafts of my last four write-ups for the Austral set. I've still been working on them and tweaking them as I feel the inclination and need, but the set presentation is more or less finished, pending me getting graded examples of some of the coins I'm missing or strong upgrades down the line.
My wife joked with me that, "See? This was just what you needed! (To get the write-ups finished.)" For what it's worth, I was fully planning on stealing moments here and there and getting the last four busted out this week anyway. I don't think it would have been too crazy of a week at work and I think I could have gotten them done around the same time anyway. And I was just set on pushing myself to finish it before the deadline, period. But... this did give me time with little else to do. So, it was done.
I've engaged in a bit of retail therapy while we've been here. I've ordered the 1986 2L, the Rhodesian 3 pence and the Fiji 6 Pence I'd talked about with my wife after I got the Rhodesian 6 pence for my birthday last week, and another Italian coin - I think a 5 Lire. I wasn't paying too much attention if I'm honest. I saw something for one of the modern Italian sets in a good grade for a good price and I just bought it... Most of what I'd ordered is arriving in the mail today. 
Also, this morning I just put in offers on some additional Rhodesian (federation period) 3 pence coins and the seller accepted so I'll be getting those.
I also found a listing for another coin with a turtle on it that I found interesting, so I ordered 4 of those raw. We'll see how those look in-person soon, I think.
Like I said, retail therapy.
But some of these may set the stage for 2024's efforts.
Edited to add: Apparently that group of 3 coins combined into 1 order wasn't delivered today because it went from Pennsylvania to California and not to Texas. Hopefully they get it to the right state soon. Fortunately, none of those really matter for this year.

After a weekend of vomiting with no fever or other signs of sickness, saying that he was vomiting because his head hurt so bad and not being able to get him to eat or keep food down, we took Sam into the Hospital (ER) on Monday instead of waiting for November 13th. He was ultimately admitted and after 2 more days of not being able to find any other explanations or being able to get him to eat without vomiting we decided to go forward with the shunt revision.
The one thing that seemingly succeeded in stopping the vomiting was giving him an abdominal girdle, which increased pressure on his gut, which lowered the ability for the shunt to drain into his gut, which increases the pressure in his head. This outcome from the girdle was another piece of evidence to suggest over draining and that replacing the valve with a programmable one that would let us actively control flowrates was the way to go.
He came through it like a champ.

His response post-surgery makes everyone hopeful that we'll go home tomorrow. The hospitalization on 11/13 should no longer be necessary now.
I think we'll still get to take him trick or treating, but we'll probably be pushing him along in the wheelchair and not expecting much walking from him.
Monday and Tuesday, while there was a lot of sitting in a hospital room, I did end up finishing drafts of my last four write-ups for the Austral set. I've still been working on them and tweaking them as I feel the inclination and need, but the set presentation is more or less finished, pending me getting graded examples of some of the coins I'm missing or strong upgrades down the line.
My wife joked with me that, "See? This was just what you needed! (To get the write-ups finished.)" For what it's worth, I was fully planning on stealing moments here and there and getting the last four busted out this week anyway. I don't think it would have been too crazy of a week at work and I think I could have gotten them done around the same time anyway. And I was just set on pushing myself to finish it before the deadline, period. But... this did give me time with little else to do. So, it was done.
I've engaged in a bit of retail therapy while we've been here. I've ordered the 1986 2L, the Rhodesian 3 pence and the Fiji 6 Pence I'd talked about with my wife after I got the Rhodesian 6 pence for my birthday last week, and another Italian coin - I think a 5 Lire. I wasn't paying too much attention if I'm honest. I saw something for one of the modern Italian sets in a good grade for a good price and I just bought it... Most of what I'd ordered is arriving in the mail today. 
Also, this morning I just put in offers on some additional Rhodesian (federation period) 3 pence coins and the seller accepted so I'll be getting those.
I also found a listing for another coin with a turtle on it that I found interesting, so I ordered 4 of those raw. We'll see how those look in-person soon, I think.
Like I said, retail therapy.
But some of these may set the stage for 2024's efforts.
Edited to add: Apparently that group of 3 coins combined into 1 order wasn't delivered today because it went from Pennsylvania to California and not to Texas. Hopefully they get it to the right state soon. Fortunately, none of those really matter for this year.

After a weekend of vomiting with no fever or other signs of sickness, saying that he was vomiting because his head hurt so bad and not being able to get him to eat or keep food down, we took Sam into the Hospital (ER) on Monday instead of waiting for November 13th. He was ultimately admitted and after 2 more days of not being able to find any other explanations or being able to get him to eat without vomiting we decided to go forward with the shunt revision.
The one thing that seemingly succeeded in stopping the vomiting was giving him an abdominal girdle, which increased pressure on his gut, which lowered the ability for the shunt to drain into his gut, which increases the pressure in his head. This outcome from the girdle was another piece of evidence to suggest over draining and that replacing the valve with a programmable one that would let us actively control flowrates was the way to go.
He came through it like a champ.

His response post-surgery makes everyone hopeful that we'll go home tomorrow. The hospitalization on 11/13 should no longer be necessary now.
I think we'll still get to take him trick or treating, but we'll probably be pushing him along in the wheelchair and not expecting much walking from him.
Monday and Tuesday, while there was a lot of sitting in a hospital room, I did end up finishing drafts of my last four write-ups for the Austral set. I've still been working on them and tweaking them as I feel the inclination and need, but the set presentation is more or less finished, pending me getting graded examples of some of the coins I'm missing or strong upgrades down the line.
My wife joked with me that, "See? This was just what you needed! (To get the write-ups finished.)" For what it's worth, I was fully planning on stealing moments here and there and getting the last four busted out this week anyway. I don't think it would have been too crazy of a week at work and I think I could have gotten them done around the same time anyway. And I was just set on pushing myself to finish it before the deadline, period. But... this did give me time with little else to do. So, it was done.
I've engaged in a bit of retail therapy while we've been here. I've ordered the 1986 2L, the Rhodesian 3 pence and the Fiji 6 Pence I'd talked about with my wife after I got the Rhodesian 6 pence for my birthday last week, and another Italian coin - I think a 5 Lire. I wasn't paying too much attention if I'm honest. I saw something for one of the modern Italian sets in a good grade for a good price and I just bought it... Most of what I'd ordered is arriving in the mail today. 
Also, this morning I just put in offers on some additional Rhodesian (federation period) 3 pence coins and the seller accepted so I'll be getting those.
I also found a listing for another coin with a turtle on it that I found interesting, so I ordered 4 of those raw. We'll see how those look in-person soon, I think.
Like I said, retail therapy.
But some of these may set the stage for 2024's efforts.
Edited to add: Apparently that group of 3 coins combined into 1 order wasn't delivered today because it went from Pennsylvania to California and not to Texas. Hopefully they get it to the right state soon. Fortunately, none of those really matter for this year.

Some of you may recall that, when I started buying graded Modern Italian coins in late-2021 to build sets for / to celebrate / in honor of my wife, one of my initial wants / goals was as 1986 Mint set for Italian coins. 
I haven't talked about it much recently because... it just came together quickly and I completed it easily and... it was built but doomed to rot in the purgatory that is the custom set feature in the old registry.  

Seriously though, how do you even brag up a custom set these days? Is there even an easy or clear way to access them from the New Registry site or am I right in thinking you have to go through the old Collector's Society site? This is the single biggest thing that keeps me from getting excited about building a turtle themed set. I'm just worried it will get no visibility or attention.
Anyway...
That set included 7 coins.
- 5 Lire
- 10 Lire
- 20 Lire
- 50 Lire
- 100 Lire
- 200 Lire
- 500 Lire
What you do NOT see there is a 2 Lire...
Done, right? RighT?!?
That's every coin that is in the Franklin mint sets from the period... So that's a full set, RiGhT?!?  They wouldn't lead me wrong, Right?

So, then what is THIS!?!?!

Well... it would appear that Italy DID make 2 Lire coins in 1986, but they did not make them for circulation. They only about 73,200 of these to go in BU sets and made about 17,500 proofs to go in Proof sets.
It DOES totally make sense to me that they would not be striking 2 Lire coins for circulation at the point where they're striking 500 Lire coins.
It does make sense to me that the Franklin Mint would not have included very limited release coins for these little collectable cards - 1) how would they have gotten enough of them, even if they cornered the market on the BU sets? and 2) why would their target audience want sets that included coins that they would not have seen in their travels or used if they went to the country? It kind of goes against the concept of those sets / what it seems like those sets were trying to do.

Anyway... I found this thing on eBay and the seller was offering it for about $36. It would cost at least $19 (plus shipping) to grade one myself, assuming I could find one worth sending in to try with, And finding and buying that raw coin would cost a few bucks soo... at that price, why not just take a guaranteed MS66? They only made 73,200 of them, 37 years ago, and I imagine that many or most of those are still locked in sets and not available for me to try to pick up as an individual piece. And I've found that trying to buy those old sets can get pricey.
So, I just bought it, and this will go in with the rest of the set once I get it.
Coin #8...
The 2 Lire coins from 1986 did not circulate and they were not strictly speaking struck for circulation, but they're BU / MS coins, and I am going to include this one in that set for my wife.
I've shown her this denomination / type of coin before and she thought it was interesting and neat. I just hadn't gotten one because I didn't think they had them in 1986 and getting a random 2 Lire didn't fit in with anything else I was working on or trying to accomplish, and I had already started a lot of fires / had a lot of pans in the oven for this.  
 
I wonder if I should just bite the bullet and ask to see if the Registry gods would make this a competitive category for me... 
I would just ask for a Republic era type set and use that for a mint set, but every time I try that lately I get a set with bunch of slots for coins (especially circulating commemoratives) that I don't really want to collect, and given what I know about the circulating comems they did with the 200L and 500L that would almost certainly be the case, and I know there'd be a 1000 Lire slot in that set that I do not want in this set.  
 
Edited to add: There is also a 1 Lire, also only made for BU sets with a mintage of 73K.  I guess there may be some more work to do. 

Some of you may recall that, when I started buying graded Modern Italian coins in late-2021 to build sets for / to celebrate / in honor of my wife, one of my initial wants / goals was as 1986 Mint set for Italian coins. 
I haven't talked about it much recently because... it just came together quickly and I completed it easily and... it was built but doomed to rot in the purgatory that is the custom set feature in the old registry.  

Seriously though, how do you even brag up a custom set these days? Is there even an easy or clear way to access them from the New Registry site or am I right in thinking you have to go through the old Collector's Society site? This is the single biggest thing that keeps me from getting excited about building a turtle themed set. I'm just worried it will get no visibility or attention.
Anyway...
That set included 7 coins.
- 5 Lire
- 10 Lire
- 20 Lire
- 50 Lire
- 100 Lire
- 200 Lire
- 500 Lire
What you do NOT see there is a 2 Lire...
Done, right? RighT?!?
That's every coin that is in the Franklin mint sets from the period... So that's a full set, RiGhT?!?  They wouldn't lead me wrong, Right?

So, then what is THIS!?!?!

Well... it would appear that Italy DID make 2 Lire coins in 1986, but they did not make them for circulation. They only about 73,200 of these to go in BU sets and made about 17,500 proofs to go in Proof sets.
It DOES totally make sense to me that they would not be striking 2 Lire coins for circulation at the point where they're striking 500 Lire coins.
It does make sense to me that the Franklin Mint would not have included very limited release coins for these little collectable cards - 1) how would they have gotten enough of them, even if they cornered the market on the BU sets? and 2) why would their target audience want sets that included coins that they would not have seen in their travels or used if they went to the country? It kind of goes against the concept of those sets / what it seems like those sets were trying to do.

Anyway... I found this thing on eBay and the seller was offering it for about $36. It would cost at least $19 (plus shipping) to grade one myself, assuming I could find one worth sending in to try with, And finding and buying that raw coin would cost a few bucks soo... at that price, why not just take a guaranteed MS66? They only made 73,200 of them, 37 years ago, and I imagine that many or most of those are still locked in sets and not available for me to try to pick up as an individual piece. And I've found that trying to buy those old sets can get pricey.
So, I just bought it, and this will go in with the rest of the set once I get it.
Coin #8...
The 2 Lire coins from 1986 did not circulate and they were not strictly speaking struck for circulation, but they're BU / MS coins, and I am going to include this one in that set for my wife.
I've shown her this denomination / type of coin before and she thought it was interesting and neat. I just hadn't gotten one because I didn't think they had them in 1986 and getting a random 2 Lire didn't fit in with anything else I was working on or trying to accomplish, and I had already started a lot of fires / had a lot of pans in the oven for this.  
 
I wonder if I should just bite the bullet and ask to see if the Registry gods would make this a competitive category for me... 
I would just ask for a Republic era type set and use that for a mint set, but every time I try that lately I get a set with bunch of slots for coins (especially circulating commemoratives) that I don't really want to collect, and given what I know about the circulating comems they did with the 200L and 500L that would almost certainly be the case, and I know there'd be a 1000 Lire slot in that set that I do not want in this set.  
 
Edited to add: There is also a 1 Lire, also only made for BU sets with a mintage of 73K.  I guess there may be some more work to do. 

The family and I celebrate my birthday this week / this weekend, and, this year, unlike last year, neither kid is in the hospital, currently - and I'll take the win. However, we do now know that Sam's in-patient time is going to start on November the 13th. So there's that to "look forward" to.
I now have my historical blurb sections on 4 of my 8 Austral coins written or at least mostly written - these things tend to go through revisions over time and I'm still very much working on them.
For my birthday, Shandy got me an MS66 Rhodesian 6 Pence coin from 1955 (you may note that this is also one of my birthyear set years that I worked on with my step-father).
Now, if you want the funny on this, I'd thought this coin had a turtle on the back of it and that's one of the reasons I put Shandy onto it. I thought it would be a fun addition to the set of turtle coins I'm now unofficially, officially, building. 
It turns out I was wrong. It has a cougar / mountain lion on the back of it. 

The FIJI 6 pence from this period has a turtle on it.

So... That's a little funny... they're both 6 pence coins, from the 1950s and have Elizabeth II on the front. I buy Rhodesian coins a lot and I got myself confused.  Often wrong. Rarely in doubt. 
But I'm still happy to have the coin. This may end up being the start of an Elizabeth II, Federation of Rhodesia an Nyasaland type set, which, let's be honest, we all know was probably coming at some point.  
But this has Shandy encouraging me to get the Fiji 6 pence and a Rhodesian 3 pence to pair with the 6 pence.  So maybe I fail upward? 
I could definitely see the turtle set(s) / turtle coins and a Rhodesian type set being the focus of my coin collecting efforts next year now that the Rhodesian pennies, Rhodesian half pennies, and the 500 Lire set are all basically done.
On that note, Shandy said jokingly that "all of your sets (or at least the ones I am really into and talk about) are either very full and complete or very hard to find coins for." Hmmm....  How about that, folks?  
In the course of our conversation, it came up that the same seller that we've bought a lot of these Rhodesian coins from has just a lot of coins from different places and years and just a lot of cool, random old stuff. I made the comment to her, "Ya know, if you ever see something of his that looks interesting, even if it isn't something I'm collecting but you think it's cool and I'll enjoy it, you can go for it and surprise me." I'm not saying I'd want her to buy just anything or from anyone, but when it's a seller we've bought from a lot that offers generally reasonable prices, I'm down to let her take some risks on her own.
Speaking of coins that are hard to find, I did manage to find a 1990, 1000 Austral coin that looks pretty good (advertised as uncirc, but I have a hard time telling sometimes with the old steel / aluminum coins) and that may end up getting sent in for grading next year to add to the Austral set. I need to find the 100 Austral and the 500 Austral to try to complete that set.
Doing all of this work and making a banner image for the 10L set recently also got me looking at some modern Italian coins and I ended up picking up a 1953 and 1954 10 Lire coin for that set. They're both pretty big wins and additions to the set and they put me ahead of the guy that beat me in the 10 Lire category last year. Those two coins are enough to over-come the 1951 he has in that set. He had another coin in his set that had his point total up to 106 but 24 hours after I added my new coins, he removed the other coin he'd had in his set. I'm not sure if the two events are related but the timing was interesting. It'll be interesting to see if he comes back later this month or next year and we slap it out over the category a little. 
It's very funny in the registry to have sets like the Morgan dollars where there are literally thousands of sets and building a set that gets anywhere near the top can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and then simultaneously to have quiet little, "backwater," modern categories where a couple of guys can "slap it out" a little with 10% complete sets for a couple of hundred bucks.  
That's all from me for now. There will be more forthcoming...  

The family and I celebrate my birthday this week / this weekend, and, this year, unlike last year, neither kid is in the hospital, currently - and I'll take the win. However, we do now know that Sam's in-patient time is going to start on November the 13th. So there's that to "look forward" to.
I now have my historical blurb sections on 4 of my 8 Austral coins written or at least mostly written - these things tend to go through revisions over time and I'm still very much working on them.
For my birthday, Shandy got me an MS66 Rhodesian 6 Pence coin from 1955 (you may note that this is also one of my birthyear set years that I worked on with my step-father).
Now, if you want the funny on this, I'd thought this coin had a turtle on the back of it and that's one of the reasons I put Shandy onto it. I thought it would be a fun addition to the set of turtle coins I'm now unofficially, officially, building. 
It turns out I was wrong. It has a cougar / mountain lion on the back of it. 

The FIJI 6 pence from this period has a turtle on it.

So... That's a little funny... they're both 6 pence coins, from the 1950s and have Elizabeth II on the front. I buy Rhodesian coins a lot and I got myself confused.  Often wrong. Rarely in doubt. 
But I'm still happy to have the coin. This may end up being the start of an Elizabeth II, Federation of Rhodesia an Nyasaland type set, which, let's be honest, we all know was probably coming at some point.  
But this has Shandy encouraging me to get the Fiji 6 pence and a Rhodesian 3 pence to pair with the 6 pence.  So maybe I fail upward? 
I could definitely see the turtle set(s) / turtle coins and a Rhodesian type set being the focus of my coin collecting efforts next year now that the Rhodesian pennies, Rhodesian half pennies, and the 500 Lire set are all basically done.
On that note, Shandy said jokingly that "all of your sets (or at least the ones I am really into and talk about) are either very full and complete or very hard to find coins for." Hmmm....  How about that, folks?  
In the course of our conversation, it came up that the same seller that we've bought a lot of these Rhodesian coins from has just a lot of coins from different places and years and just a lot of cool, random old stuff. I made the comment to her, "Ya know, if you ever see something of his that looks interesting, even if it isn't something I'm collecting but you think it's cool and I'll enjoy it, you can go for it and surprise me." I'm not saying I'd want her to buy just anything or from anyone, but when it's a seller we've bought from a lot that offers generally reasonable prices, I'm down to let her take some risks on her own.
Speaking of coins that are hard to find, I did manage to find a 1990, 1000 Austral coin that looks pretty good (advertised as uncirc, but I have a hard time telling sometimes with the old steel / aluminum coins) and that may end up getting sent in for grading next year to add to the Austral set. I need to find the 100 Austral and the 500 Austral to try to complete that set.
Doing all of this work and making a banner image for the 10L set recently also got me looking at some modern Italian coins and I ended up picking up a 1953 and 1954 10 Lire coin for that set. They're both pretty big wins and additions to the set and they put me ahead of the guy that beat me in the 10 Lire category last year. Those two coins are enough to over-come the 1951 he has in that set. He had another coin in his set that had his point total up to 106 but 24 hours after I added my new coins, he removed the other coin he'd had in his set. I'm not sure if the two events are related but the timing was interesting. It'll be interesting to see if he comes back later this month or next year and we slap it out over the category a little. 
It's very funny in the registry to have sets like the Morgan dollars where there are literally thousands of sets and building a set that gets anywhere near the top can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and then simultaneously to have quiet little, "backwater," modern categories where a couple of guys can "slap it out" a little with 10% complete sets for a couple of hundred bucks.  
That's all from me for now. There will be more forthcoming...  

The family and I celebrate my birthday this week / this weekend, and, this year, unlike last year, neither kid is in the hospital, currently - and I'll take the win. However, we do now know that Sam's in-patient time is going to start on November the 13th. So there's that to "look forward" to.
I now have my historical blurb sections on 4 of my 8 Austral coins written or at least mostly written - these things tend to go through revisions over time and I'm still very much working on them.
For my birthday, Shandy got me an MS66 Rhodesian 6 Pence coin from 1955 (you may note that this is also one of my birthyear set years that I worked on with my step-father).
Now, if you want the funny on this, I'd thought this coin had a turtle on the back of it and that's one of the reasons I put Shandy onto it. I thought it would be a fun addition to the set of turtle coins I'm now unofficially, officially, building. 
It turns out I was wrong. It has a cougar / mountain lion on the back of it. 

The FIJI 6 pence from this period has a turtle on it.

So... That's a little funny... they're both 6 pence coins, from the 1950s and have Elizabeth II on the front. I buy Rhodesian coins a lot and I got myself confused.  Often wrong. Rarely in doubt. 
But I'm still happy to have the coin. This may end up being the start of an Elizabeth II, Federation of Rhodesia an Nyasaland type set, which, let's be honest, we all know was probably coming at some point.  
But this has Shandy encouraging me to get the Fiji 6 pence and a Rhodesian 3 pence to pair with the 6 pence.  So maybe I fail upward? 
I could definitely see the turtle set(s) / turtle coins and a Rhodesian type set being the focus of my coin collecting efforts next year now that the Rhodesian pennies, Rhodesian half pennies, and the 500 Lire set are all basically done.
On that note, Shandy said jokingly that "all of your sets (or at least the ones I am really into and talk about) are either very full and complete or very hard to find coins for." Hmmm....  How about that, folks?  
In the course of our conversation, it came up that the same seller that we've bought a lot of these Rhodesian coins from has just a lot of coins from different places and years and just a lot of cool, random old stuff. I made the comment to her, "Ya know, if you ever see something of his that looks interesting, even if it isn't something I'm collecting but you think it's cool and I'll enjoy it, you can go for it and surprise me." I'm not saying I'd want her to buy just anything or from anyone, but when it's a seller we've bought from a lot that offers generally reasonable prices, I'm down to let her take some risks on her own.
Speaking of coins that are hard to find, I did manage to find a 1990, 1000 Austral coin that looks pretty good (advertised as uncirc, but I have a hard time telling sometimes with the old steel / aluminum coins) and that may end up getting sent in for grading next year to add to the Austral set. I need to find the 100 Austral and the 500 Austral to try to complete that set.
Doing all of this work and making a banner image for the 10L set recently also got me looking at some modern Italian coins and I ended up picking up a 1953 and 1954 10 Lire coin for that set. They're both pretty big wins and additions to the set and they put me ahead of the guy that beat me in the 10 Lire category last year. Those two coins are enough to over-come the 1951 he has in that set. He had another coin in his set that had his point total up to 106 but 24 hours after I added my new coins, he removed the other coin he'd had in his set. I'm not sure if the two events are related but the timing was interesting. It'll be interesting to see if he comes back later this month or next year and we slap it out over the category a little. 
It's very funny in the registry to have sets like the Morgan dollars where there are literally thousands of sets and building a set that gets anywhere near the top can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and then simultaneously to have quiet little, "backwater," modern categories where a couple of guys can "slap it out" a little with 10% complete sets for a couple of hundred bucks.  
That's all from me for now. There will be more forthcoming...  

Welcome to my first Journal Entry! 
I've been wanting to do this for a long time now but didn't know what to put. I know that's what journals are for in the first place is just to write, a way to get stuff off that wet pink ball of noodles in your head.  Maybe I should've been here way earlier?  Either way, here we are now let's get to the meat and potatoes of why we are here now!
So I may tend to hyper fixate onto new things every now and then. I have always been an artist, as a young kid I was very good at drawing but I'm not sure where that has since gone. But this year I found beautiful photos of coins showcasing their extraordinary characteristics. I'm talking about colors I never knew possible to be on coins! The Blues, The Reds, The Purples, Greens, Yellows, Golds, and everything in-between and above and below! I thought to myself, "WOW! How silly.. There's no way that a coin can actually look like that, that's the saturation turned WAAAY up to get those effects." Well I sure was wrong. I found myself stumbling into a world of coin's I'd never ventured into. I did not know just how amazing some coin's could really tone. Then I went down into a rabbit hole of how to store coins for certain types of toning effects and etc. But I didn't care too much for those over the edge, overly fake looking tones. Nonetheless I wanted to be able to capture images of those types of coins for myself! Now did I have any coins in the first place that were as miraculous some of the pictures I had seen? No.. But! I do search lots of bank rolls, mainly quarters and some Lincoln cents. So I have the ability to run into some pretty coins!
Now this whole wanting to become a coin photographer idea literally just bloomed out of one of my journeys on the internet. It didn't really fall into place until I seen a camera and accessory kit on Wal-Marts website. My budget also tells me this is not possible and just let it become a fantasy. Well who knew my wife's credit could qualify us for Affirm which is a get now pay later financing program that Wal-Mart and tons of other places use! So... I got it.. Wow I'm sorry my whole ADHD way of telling stories is or just thought process is all over the place. Ah! Yes! So we got it! "It" is a Canon EOS Rebel T7 with a whole kit and caboodle. Just tons of stuff this kit came with which was a plus. Now I have only ever taken photos with my cell phone or a normal digital camera, NOTHING like this. So I'm still learning and playing with it I think I've owned it for a little over a month now. It's great I absolutely love it and love learning new things so it's been a great journey. Well now I got the camera, do I have those beautifully toned coins to take these amazing photos of? Negative. Or what about the know how or the setup to even do it? Erm, yeah no we don't.. But there we went back into the interwebs! Also we got some really great info from a user known by the name of Robec, he may be here but I met him on Coin Talk's Chat Boards.
This is where I fell into another problem. The setups that some of these people had to get these amazing over the top photos costed a small fortune! I mean some of these Copy-Stands themselves can run upwards of THOUSANDS of dollars! *There's the main topic of this journal entry!* Then not just the stands but the lights, the editing software, the macro lenses, the objective lenses, the focusing bellows holy cow I was in over my head! BUT! You can get some really great photos using what you got and I tell you what, if there's something I'm really good at its working with what you got you know what I mean guys? *Hehehe* So I just went back to the basics and started with the stand. You need a stand to get your camera held in the right position, held steady, and a number of other factors. So I began brainstorming and came up with what is now my new Copy-Stand. I was going to say it's not the prettiest but honestly I really like the look of it. So its a 3/4", 16"x 12" particle board. A 3/4" Pipe Flange, 12" 3/4" Pipe topped with a End Cap. I then gave it the 'Ole Rattle-Can Special in Flat Black. I looks really great! Now I needed something to hold my camera into place! I found a photography company called, "SmallRig". SmallRig - DIY Camera Rigs, Stabilizers and Other Camera Accessories  What I ended up buying is a smart clamp, I also got it off Amazon too. I was really happy when I got it in the mail today and unboxed it to find the quality of the product is outstanding. Its made of sturdy metal, when all setup and the cameras attached and its fitted onto the pipe its snug as a bug. The next thing to work on is getting lights either mounted or just around because I'm sure I'll need to move them around a ton. Here's what it looks like all said and done:
 


Thanks if you made it this far in reading my all over the place story telling. It's how my brain works. Feel free to show what contraptions you all have created. Any advice given is always great. Until my next Ramble!
Happy Hunting ~ TheColoradoNumismatist

I am now happy to say that pictures are up for both the Austral coins and the Peso Convertible coins. 
I'm very happy with how these came out...

But I'm thrilled to say I have a banner image now:
 

I always try to be mindful of how these look on the PC and my phone...
One thing that was important to me was having a prominent placement for the obverse of the 10C coin, which features the national Coat of Arms.
I've even gotten my historical write-ups done for 2 of the 8 coins - which I honestly consider the hardest and most mentally demanding of the tasks I've set for myself this month. The photos and the banner images are mentally much easier. The pictures in particular are mostly just a mechanical process of hammering through the shots and then applying basically the same processing to every shot at this point. Not a very mentally demanding task anymore.
I've also gotten banners done for two other sets that needed them - the 10 Lire set (Finaly!) and a new competitive set that one of my new turtle coins can go into (more on this one later probably - that Colombian turtle coin is really rather impressive).

At this point, my list of things I still want to do is shorter than my list of what I've done - always a proud place to be.
The main thing is just that writing to be done.
The rest of the turtle coins have had pictures of them taken but I haven't edited them yet. I'll probably use that as a mental break and reward for after a couple more of the write-ups are done.
 
 

I am now happy to say that pictures are up for both the Austral coins and the Peso Convertible coins. 
I'm very happy with how these came out...

But I'm thrilled to say I have a banner image now:
 

I always try to be mindful of how these look on the PC and my phone...
One thing that was important to me was having a prominent placement for the obverse of the 10C coin, which features the national Coat of Arms.
I've even gotten my historical write-ups done for 2 of the 8 coins - which I honestly consider the hardest and most mentally demanding of the tasks I've set for myself this month. The photos and the banner images are mentally much easier. The pictures in particular are mostly just a mechanical process of hammering through the shots and then applying basically the same processing to every shot at this point. Not a very mentally demanding task anymore.
I've also gotten banners done for two other sets that needed them - the 10 Lire set (Finaly!) and a new competitive set that one of my new turtle coins can go into (more on this one later probably - that Colombian turtle coin is really rather impressive).

At this point, my list of things I still want to do is shorter than my list of what I've done - always a proud place to be.
The main thing is just that writing to be done.
The rest of the turtle coins have had pictures of them taken but I haven't edited them yet. I'll probably use that as a mental break and reward for after a couple more of the write-ups are done.
 
 

Be honest – how many of you remember that line from the start of Star Wars: Episode 3?
I have bemoaned several times over the last few months that it is hard to get excited or get motivated about building a registry set when you… don’t… have coins… But! I find that it is much easier to get excited about researching and writing about coins for a registry set when you… have coins… and have pictures to go with "da wordy bits."
I also gotta say - even feeling slightly disappointed at some of the grades - there’s a special joy and magic to an unboxing and it’s fun to have coins come home. In spite of that initial disappointment, I was very happy and noticed myself smiling when I opened that box Monday night.
 
My wife also snuck this gem while I was in bed Tuesday night, working on getting the first images edited and posted to sets.

I decided to start with the low-hanging fruit, hitting the 500L coins and the other coins where I just needed to do images for 1-6 coins to “complete” existing sets, before launching into the Argentinian coins and turtle coins, which are 7-8 coin groups for completely new sets. The part that does make these slightly more complicated though is trying to make sure that the images for the new coins match reasonably well with the old images of the coins that have been in the set a year or two, because I want consistency, but I don’t want to rei-image the entire Zimbabwe set (23 coins) because I’m replacing 1 coin. I don’t want to re-image the 11 older coins in the 500L set, just because I’m filling the last 3 holes.
I will also admit to just wanting to be able to show off a completed 500L set to my wife. 
The images are up now. I’d encourage anyone that follows these sets to look at the Zimbabwe type set, the Venezuelan type set, and the Italian 500L set. The new descriptions are up to, and all three sets are now 100% complete (not that that’s new for Zimbabwe anyway).
A fun image I’ll call out is the Reverse shot for the 50 Bolivars, which shows a reverse struck with a die with a shocking degree of wear that I’m just not used to seeing in modern US coins. Yeah – the coin graded MS66, and it has some scratches, clearly, but look at all those signs of die deterioration around the 5 and 0 in 50, around the outer rim of the legend and around the inner ring around the core design. Personally, I just find that very interesting and cool to look at.
 
Side note: But the image she snuck of me on the computer is what it looks like when I’m just working on the laptop in bed at night. When I’m up in my office and taking the coins, the set-up is a little nicer. When I replaced my old laptop about a year ago I got a new one that is the same brand as my work laptop, so it can dock into the same docking cube as my work laptop and I can use the same monitor and speaker set-up without multiple docking stations or monitor switching. It makes the home office situation more enjoyable and fun.
 
The images aren’t ready to go yet but I’ve taken images of the Argentinian coins today, again, finding myself just very excited and happy to get to snap those shots. I’ve gone ahead and gotten the images shot for Austral coins and Peso Convertible coins in 1 go. I’ll just be starting the editing with the Austral coins.
There will probably be another one of these posts soon as the Austral and then Peso Convertible images go up. I do have a feeling that the Peso Convertible images will be edited before I hit the historical write-ups for the Austral set, just because 1) it's easier to cross that one off and 2) Again... pictures are fun. It's shocking - You would never expect a photographer to hold this opinion. I know.
 
So, where does this leave me? … Since I also keep finding new things that need to be done or that I want to get done before November 1st, and some of these are smaller (images on 1-2 coins) than others (making new banner images for sets that I’ve apparently been neglecting).
1) Getting the coins programmed in and in the slots, (Except for the Austral coins)
2) Getting my pre-written descriptions posted on the coins (for the new $10 Zimbabwe coin, 500L set, Argentinian Set, and Venezuelan coins)
3) Getting pictures taken of the 500 Lire coins and getting those posted
3b) Getting pictures of the new 2003 $10 coin for the Zimbabwe set.
3c) Getting pictures of the new 1983 5L and 1984 10L coins for those Italian sets..
3d) Getting pictures of our 1977 5L and 1984 5L coins for the 5L set since I apparently never did that… 
4) Getting pictures on the new Venezuelan coins to maintain the quality of the presentation on that set,
5) Getting the Austral coins imaged and
6) Getting my historical write-ups for the Austral Set ready.
7) Making a banner / set image for the Austral set – which I haven’t made a banner image for this one yet as I usually use images of the graded coins, which
8) Making a banner / set image for the Italian 10L set since I apparently never did that… 
9) Getting the Peso Convertible Coins imaged and posted
10 Getting the turtle coins imaged and..
11) Starting to build some kind of signature set around that???? – More on this later but this is going to be mostly a pure signature set play... but I'm also finding some glimmers of where there might be potential for competitive set off-shoots.
 

Be honest – how many of you remember that line from the start of Star Wars: Episode 3?
I have bemoaned several times over the last few months that it is hard to get excited or get motivated about building a registry set when you… don’t… have coins… But! I find that it is much easier to get excited about researching and writing about coins for a registry set when you… have coins… and have pictures to go with "da wordy bits."
I also gotta say - even feeling slightly disappointed at some of the grades - there’s a special joy and magic to an unboxing and it’s fun to have coins come home. In spite of that initial disappointment, I was very happy and noticed myself smiling when I opened that box Monday night.
 
My wife also snuck this gem while I was in bed Tuesday night, working on getting the first images edited and posted to sets.

I decided to start with the low-hanging fruit, hitting the 500L coins and the other coins where I just needed to do images for 1-6 coins to “complete” existing sets, before launching into the Argentinian coins and turtle coins, which are 7-8 coin groups for completely new sets. The part that does make these slightly more complicated though is trying to make sure that the images for the new coins match reasonably well with the old images of the coins that have been in the set a year or two, because I want consistency, but I don’t want to rei-image the entire Zimbabwe set (23 coins) because I’m replacing 1 coin. I don’t want to re-image the 11 older coins in the 500L set, just because I’m filling the last 3 holes.
I will also admit to just wanting to be able to show off a completed 500L set to my wife. 
The images are up now. I’d encourage anyone that follows these sets to look at the Zimbabwe type set, the Venezuelan type set, and the Italian 500L set. The new descriptions are up to, and all three sets are now 100% complete (not that that’s new for Zimbabwe anyway).
A fun image I’ll call out is the Reverse shot for the 50 Bolivars, which shows a reverse struck with a die with a shocking degree of wear that I’m just not used to seeing in modern US coins. Yeah – the coin graded MS66, and it has some scratches, clearly, but look at all those signs of die deterioration around the 5 and 0 in 50, around the outer rim of the legend and around the inner ring around the core design. Personally, I just find that very interesting and cool to look at.
 
Side note: But the image she snuck of me on the computer is what it looks like when I’m just working on the laptop in bed at night. When I’m up in my office and taking the coins, the set-up is a little nicer. When I replaced my old laptop about a year ago I got a new one that is the same brand as my work laptop, so it can dock into the same docking cube as my work laptop and I can use the same monitor and speaker set-up without multiple docking stations or monitor switching. It makes the home office situation more enjoyable and fun.
 
The images aren’t ready to go yet but I’ve taken images of the Argentinian coins today, again, finding myself just very excited and happy to get to snap those shots. I’ve gone ahead and gotten the images shot for Austral coins and Peso Convertible coins in 1 go. I’ll just be starting the editing with the Austral coins.
There will probably be another one of these posts soon as the Austral and then Peso Convertible images go up. I do have a feeling that the Peso Convertible images will be edited before I hit the historical write-ups for the Austral set, just because 1) it's easier to cross that one off and 2) Again... pictures are fun. It's shocking - You would never expect a photographer to hold this opinion. I know.
 
So, where does this leave me? … Since I also keep finding new things that need to be done or that I want to get done before November 1st, and some of these are smaller (images on 1-2 coins) than others (making new banner images for sets that I’ve apparently been neglecting).
1) Getting the coins programmed in and in the slots, (Except for the Austral coins)
2) Getting my pre-written descriptions posted on the coins (for the new $10 Zimbabwe coin, 500L set, Argentinian Set, and Venezuelan coins)
3) Getting pictures taken of the 500 Lire coins and getting those posted
3b) Getting pictures of the new 2003 $10 coin for the Zimbabwe set.
3c) Getting pictures of the new 1983 5L and 1984 10L coins for those Italian sets..
3d) Getting pictures of our 1977 5L and 1984 5L coins for the 5L set since I apparently never did that… 
4) Getting pictures on the new Venezuelan coins to maintain the quality of the presentation on that set,
5) Getting the Austral coins imaged and
6) Getting my historical write-ups for the Austral Set ready.
7) Making a banner / set image for the Austral set – which I haven’t made a banner image for this one yet as I usually use images of the graded coins, which
8) Making a banner / set image for the Italian 10L set since I apparently never did that… 
9) Getting the Peso Convertible Coins imaged and posted
10 Getting the turtle coins imaged and..
11) Starting to build some kind of signature set around that???? – More on this later but this is going to be mostly a pure signature set play... but I'm also finding some glimmers of where there might be potential for competitive set off-shoots.
 

Be honest – how many of you remember that line from the start of Star Wars: Episode 3?
I have bemoaned several times over the last few months that it is hard to get excited or get motivated about building a registry set when you… don’t… have coins… But! I find that it is much easier to get excited about researching and writing about coins for a registry set when you… have coins… and have pictures to go with "da wordy bits."
I also gotta say - even feeling slightly disappointed at some of the grades - there’s a special joy and magic to an unboxing and it’s fun to have coins come home. In spite of that initial disappointment, I was very happy and noticed myself smiling when I opened that box Monday night.
 
My wife also snuck this gem while I was in bed Tuesday night, working on getting the first images edited and posted to sets.

I decided to start with the low-hanging fruit, hitting the 500L coins and the other coins where I just needed to do images for 1-6 coins to “complete” existing sets, before launching into the Argentinian coins and turtle coins, which are 7-8 coin groups for completely new sets. The part that does make these slightly more complicated though is trying to make sure that the images for the new coins match reasonably well with the old images of the coins that have been in the set a year or two, because I want consistency, but I don’t want to rei-image the entire Zimbabwe set (23 coins) because I’m replacing 1 coin. I don’t want to re-image the 11 older coins in the 500L set, just because I’m filling the last 3 holes.
I will also admit to just wanting to be able to show off a completed 500L set to my wife. 
The images are up now. I’d encourage anyone that follows these sets to look at the Zimbabwe type set, the Venezuelan type set, and the Italian 500L set. The new descriptions are up to, and all three sets are now 100% complete (not that that’s new for Zimbabwe anyway).
A fun image I’ll call out is the Reverse shot for the 50 Bolivars, which shows a reverse struck with a die with a shocking degree of wear that I’m just not used to seeing in modern US coins. Yeah – the coin graded MS66, and it has some scratches, clearly, but look at all those signs of die deterioration around the 5 and 0 in 50, around the outer rim of the legend and around the inner ring around the core design. Personally, I just find that very interesting and cool to look at.
 
Side note: But the image she snuck of me on the computer is what it looks like when I’m just working on the laptop in bed at night. When I’m up in my office and taking the coins, the set-up is a little nicer. When I replaced my old laptop about a year ago I got a new one that is the same brand as my work laptop, so it can dock into the same docking cube as my work laptop and I can use the same monitor and speaker set-up without multiple docking stations or monitor switching. It makes the home office situation more enjoyable and fun.
 
The images aren’t ready to go yet but I’ve taken images of the Argentinian coins today, again, finding myself just very excited and happy to get to snap those shots. I’ve gone ahead and gotten the images shot for Austral coins and Peso Convertible coins in 1 go. I’ll just be starting the editing with the Austral coins.
There will probably be another one of these posts soon as the Austral and then Peso Convertible images go up. I do have a feeling that the Peso Convertible images will be edited before I hit the historical write-ups for the Austral set, just because 1) it's easier to cross that one off and 2) Again... pictures are fun. It's shocking - You would never expect a photographer to hold this opinion. I know.
 
So, where does this leave me? … Since I also keep finding new things that need to be done or that I want to get done before November 1st, and some of these are smaller (images on 1-2 coins) than others (making new banner images for sets that I’ve apparently been neglecting).
1) Getting the coins programmed in and in the slots, (Except for the Austral coins)
2) Getting my pre-written descriptions posted on the coins (for the new $10 Zimbabwe coin, 500L set, Argentinian Set, and Venezuelan coins)
3) Getting pictures taken of the 500 Lire coins and getting those posted
3b) Getting pictures of the new 2003 $10 coin for the Zimbabwe set.
3c) Getting pictures of the new 1983 5L and 1984 10L coins for those Italian sets..
3d) Getting pictures of our 1977 5L and 1984 5L coins for the 5L set since I apparently never did that… 
4) Getting pictures on the new Venezuelan coins to maintain the quality of the presentation on that set,
5) Getting the Austral coins imaged and
6) Getting my historical write-ups for the Austral Set ready.
7) Making a banner / set image for the Austral set – which I haven’t made a banner image for this one yet as I usually use images of the graded coins, which
8) Making a banner / set image for the Italian 10L set since I apparently never did that… 
9) Getting the Peso Convertible Coins imaged and posted
10 Getting the turtle coins imaged and..
11) Starting to build some kind of signature set around that???? – More on this later but this is going to be mostly a pure signature set play... but I'm also finding some glimmers of where there might be potential for competitive set off-shoots.
 

Be honest – how many of you remember that line from the start of Star Wars: Episode 3?
I have bemoaned several times over the last few months that it is hard to get excited or get motivated about building a registry set when you… don’t… have coins… But! I find that it is much easier to get excited about researching and writing about coins for a registry set when you… have coins… and have pictures to go with "da wordy bits."
I also gotta say - even feeling slightly disappointed at some of the grades - there’s a special joy and magic to an unboxing and it’s fun to have coins come home. In spite of that initial disappointment, I was very happy and noticed myself smiling when I opened that box Monday night.
 
My wife also snuck this gem while I was in bed Tuesday night, working on getting the first images edited and posted to sets.

I decided to start with the low-hanging fruit, hitting the 500L coins and the other coins where I just needed to do images for 1-6 coins to “complete” existing sets, before launching into the Argentinian coins and turtle coins, which are 7-8 coin groups for completely new sets. The part that does make these slightly more complicated though is trying to make sure that the images for the new coins match reasonably well with the old images of the coins that have been in the set a year or two, because I want consistency, but I don’t want to rei-image the entire Zimbabwe set (23 coins) because I’m replacing 1 coin. I don’t want to re-image the 11 older coins in the 500L set, just because I’m filling the last 3 holes.
I will also admit to just wanting to be able to show off a completed 500L set to my wife. 
The images are up now. I’d encourage anyone that follows these sets to look at the Zimbabwe type set, the Venezuelan type set, and the Italian 500L set. The new descriptions are up to, and all three sets are now 100% complete (not that that’s new for Zimbabwe anyway).
A fun image I’ll call out is the Reverse shot for the 50 Bolivars, which shows a reverse struck with a die with a shocking degree of wear that I’m just not used to seeing in modern US coins. Yeah – the coin graded MS66, and it has some scratches, clearly, but look at all those signs of die deterioration around the 5 and 0 in 50, around the outer rim of the legend and around the inner ring around the core design. Personally, I just find that very interesting and cool to look at.
 
Side note: But the image she snuck of me on the computer is what it looks like when I’m just working on the laptop in bed at night. When I’m up in my office and taking the coins, the set-up is a little nicer. When I replaced my old laptop about a year ago I got a new one that is the same brand as my work laptop, so it can dock into the same docking cube as my work laptop and I can use the same monitor and speaker set-up without multiple docking stations or monitor switching. It makes the home office situation more enjoyable and fun.
 
The images aren’t ready to go yet but I’ve taken images of the Argentinian coins today, again, finding myself just very excited and happy to get to snap those shots. I’ve gone ahead and gotten the images shot for Austral coins and Peso Convertible coins in 1 go. I’ll just be starting the editing with the Austral coins.
There will probably be another one of these posts soon as the Austral and then Peso Convertible images go up. I do have a feeling that the Peso Convertible images will be edited before I hit the historical write-ups for the Austral set, just because 1) it's easier to cross that one off and 2) Again... pictures are fun. It's shocking - You would never expect a photographer to hold this opinion. I know.
 
So, where does this leave me? … Since I also keep finding new things that need to be done or that I want to get done before November 1st, and some of these are smaller (images on 1-2 coins) than others (making new banner images for sets that I’ve apparently been neglecting).
1) Getting the coins programmed in and in the slots, (Except for the Austral coins)
2) Getting my pre-written descriptions posted on the coins (for the new $10 Zimbabwe coin, 500L set, Argentinian Set, and Venezuelan coins)
3) Getting pictures taken of the 500 Lire coins and getting those posted
3b) Getting pictures of the new 2003 $10 coin for the Zimbabwe set.
3c) Getting pictures of the new 1983 5L and 1984 10L coins for those Italian sets..
3d) Getting pictures of our 1977 5L and 1984 5L coins for the 5L set since I apparently never did that… 
4) Getting pictures on the new Venezuelan coins to maintain the quality of the presentation on that set,
5) Getting the Austral coins imaged and
6) Getting my historical write-ups for the Austral Set ready.
7) Making a banner / set image for the Austral set – which I haven’t made a banner image for this one yet as I usually use images of the graded coins, which
8) Making a banner / set image for the Italian 10L set since I apparently never did that… 
9) Getting the Peso Convertible Coins imaged and posted
10 Getting the turtle coins imaged and..
11) Starting to build some kind of signature set around that???? – More on this later but this is going to be mostly a pure signature set play... but I'm also finding some glimmers of where there might be potential for competitive set off-shoots.
 

Okay, so, after several rounds of going back and forth between “Grading/Quality Control,” “Grading/Encapsulation/Imaging,” and “Quality Control/Finalized,” the submission is finally finalized and shipped, and I have grades.
On a few of them, all I can say is… Woof…
For Italy…
While these mostly are not great I can’t call most of these disappointments. Yeah… the 1995 is lower than I’d hoped for, but the 2000 and 2001 are better than I’d worried they might be. At the end of the day those were a play to at least get the set finished. All three coins are having to go through NGCs review process to add to the registry because none of those three have ever been added to the set before. The 5L was a disappointment – I thought that would do better. But I’m happy with the 10L.
Most importantly - I have made the 500L set I built for my wife 100% complete, including coins her family brought back with them from Italy 30 years ago. I like it.

The Venezuelan coins are where this hurts – Pretty much all MS66s, and so these fall short of what I needed to take back the #1 set with that Best Presented Set… So… maybe next year we’ll try to reclaim the title:

The Argentinian Coins… Again… Overall not what I’d hoped for… but… They’re still going to let me fill out a set with a fun narrative. For the Austral Anyway… I’m taking another look at the Peso Convertible and realizing how many slots that set has for circulating commemoratives I have zero interest in hunting down. Lol
The 63s and the 64s hurt… but the Zimbabwe set also started with some less than stellar and humble grades and such… and I’ve improved from there where I could. 
Once again... we'll call this a foundation to grow from... maybe... We'll see how much I feel like torturing myself and my wallet.


Speaking of the Zimbabwe set, the $10 coin scored! Kind of! – It got an MS62. Which beats the AU58 that I had before and it is now the TOP POP, highest graded example graded by NGC. I had been hoping this would grade MS and not AU like the last one, and it did. So, this is kind of a win… but I had hoped it might MS63.  
Seriously though, finding examples.of these that do not look rough has been hard. I've been trying... for a few years now.

And finally, we have the turtle coins… Mostly 66s. I can’t really complain too much here. I didn’t really expect too many super high grades here and I mostly just wanted these to maybe form the basis for a future signature set. Yes, high grades are nice, but they’re not essential for a non-competitive set…. that I’m not even officially building yet… and they’re still Gem Uncirc grades.
But... Hey! That Tokelau Cent! MS67RD!

Next goals will be..
1) getting the coins programmed in and in the slots,
2) getting my pre-written descriptions posted on the coins,
3) getting pictures taken of the 500 Lire coins to polish the presentation on that set,
4) pictures on the new Venezuelan coins to maintain the quality of the presentation on that set,
5) getting the Austral coins (and maybe the Pesos) imaged and
6) getting my historical write-ups for the Austral Set ready.
These may not all happen in this order.

I managed to make a little progress on my goals this weekend, which is pretty solid in light of the fact that the coins hadn’t been physically delivered yet and 3 of my remaining 4 points relate to imaging and editing shots of the new coins…
1) Getting the coins programmed in and in the slots, (Except for the Austral coins)
2) Getting my pre-written descriptions posted on the coins (for the new $10 Zimbabwe coin, 500L set, Argentinian Set, and Venezuelan coins)
3) Getting pictures taken of the 500 Lire coins to polish the presentation on that set,
4) Getting pictures on the new Venezuelan coins to maintain the quality of the presentation on that set,
5) Getting the Austral coins imaged and
6) Getting my historical write-ups for the Austral Set ready.
But to this I have to add…
7) Making a banner / set image for the Austral set – which I haven’t made a banner image for this one yet as I usually use images of the graded coins, which
Guess what Fed-Ex dropped at my door today:

I’ll have to have an unboxing with the wife soon – probably tonight, possibly not. We also have TV to watch.
I have the day off on Friday and I might try to use some of that time to get some pictures taken – assuming I don’t get a chance before that.
The crush of things at work seems to finally be slacking off after some very hectic months this summer.
Overall, I’d say it’s coming together, which is probably good considering I logged in today to post this and I noticed… Dun dun dun! ... The countdown has begun!

We are officially in October, and this looks like it was (logically) set to start displaying when we were 30 days from the deadline.
I think I at least have a framework for how I want to do the historical write-ups for the Austral set.
The Peso Convertible set is officially becoming a “next year”-thing, I think. 
In the midst of this... we're also getting ready for another hospital stay with Samuel, albeit a planned one this time. To get to the bottom of his headaches and determine if it really is low ICP (intracranial pressure) we're going to pick a Monday when some of the best neurosurgeons in the country are... not on vacation or at a conference... and we're going to go in for them to put in an ICP gauge and spend about three days measuring the pressure in his head. At the end of that, we may go home without answers, we may have a shunt revision and replace his shunt with a programmable shunt, or we could be strapping in for a procedure called and ETV... which could have him in the hospital for 6 weeks... I'm mostly hoping for not that last one.
I am very much hoping that this happens soon, so his headaches can stop. So that does have the potential to impact my ability to pull off some of this... but, hey, we all know I can take pictures and write some stuff in a fairly short period of time if I feel the need, and this has been a source of stress relief for me since before 2019,  so don't count me out there. 
 
On a closing note... That $25 coin is clearly mocking me...  I may have to do something about this... 

I managed to make a little progress on my goals this weekend, which is pretty solid in light of the fact that the coins hadn’t been physically delivered yet and 3 of my remaining 4 points relate to imaging and editing shots of the new coins…
1) Getting the coins programmed in and in the slots, (Except for the Austral coins)
2) Getting my pre-written descriptions posted on the coins (for the new $10 Zimbabwe coin, 500L set, Argentinian Set, and Venezuelan coins)
3) Getting pictures taken of the 500 Lire coins to polish the presentation on that set,
4) Getting pictures on the new Venezuelan coins to maintain the quality of the presentation on that set,
5) Getting the Austral coins imaged and
6) Getting my historical write-ups for the Austral Set ready.
But to this I have to add…
7) Making a banner / set image for the Austral set – which I haven’t made a banner image for this one yet as I usually use images of the graded coins, which
Guess what Fed-Ex dropped at my door today:

I’ll have to have an unboxing with the wife soon – probably tonight, possibly not. We also have TV to watch.
I have the day off on Friday and I might try to use some of that time to get some pictures taken – assuming I don’t get a chance before that.
The crush of things at work seems to finally be slacking off after some very hectic months this summer.
Overall, I’d say it’s coming together, which is probably good considering I logged in today to post this and I noticed… Dun dun dun! ... The countdown has begun!

We are officially in October, and this looks like it was (logically) set to start displaying when we were 30 days from the deadline.
I think I at least have a framework for how I want to do the historical write-ups for the Austral set.
The Peso Convertible set is officially becoming a “next year”-thing, I think. 
In the midst of this... we're also getting ready for another hospital stay with Samuel, albeit a planned one this time. To get to the bottom of his headaches and determine if it really is low ICP (intracranial pressure) we're going to pick a Monday when some of the best neurosurgeons in the country are... not on vacation or at a conference... and we're going to go in for them to put in an ICP gauge and spend about three days measuring the pressure in his head. At the end of that, we may go home without answers, we may have a shunt revision and replace his shunt with a programmable shunt, or we could be strapping in for a procedure called and ETV... which could have him in the hospital for 6 weeks... I'm mostly hoping for not that last one.
I am very much hoping that this happens soon, so his headaches can stop. So that does have the potential to impact my ability to pull off some of this... but, hey, we all know I can take pictures and write some stuff in a fairly short period of time if I feel the need, and this has been a source of stress relief for me since before 2019,  so don't count me out there. 
 
On a closing note... That $25 coin is clearly mocking me...  I may have to do something about this... 

I managed to make a little progress on my goals this weekend, which is pretty solid in light of the fact that the coins hadn’t been physically delivered yet and 3 of my remaining 4 points relate to imaging and editing shots of the new coins…
1) Getting the coins programmed in and in the slots, (Except for the Austral coins)
2) Getting my pre-written descriptions posted on the coins (for the new $10 Zimbabwe coin, 500L set, Argentinian Set, and Venezuelan coins)
3) Getting pictures taken of the 500 Lire coins to polish the presentation on that set,
4) Getting pictures on the new Venezuelan coins to maintain the quality of the presentation on that set,
5) Getting the Austral coins imaged and
6) Getting my historical write-ups for the Austral Set ready.
But to this I have to add…
7) Making a banner / set image for the Austral set – which I haven’t made a banner image for this one yet as I usually use images of the graded coins, which
Guess what Fed-Ex dropped at my door today:

I’ll have to have an unboxing with the wife soon – probably tonight, possibly not. We also have TV to watch.
I have the day off on Friday and I might try to use some of that time to get some pictures taken – assuming I don’t get a chance before that.
The crush of things at work seems to finally be slacking off after some very hectic months this summer.
Overall, I’d say it’s coming together, which is probably good considering I logged in today to post this and I noticed… Dun dun dun! ... The countdown has begun!

We are officially in October, and this looks like it was (logically) set to start displaying when we were 30 days from the deadline.
I think I at least have a framework for how I want to do the historical write-ups for the Austral set.
The Peso Convertible set is officially becoming a “next year”-thing, I think. 
In the midst of this... we're also getting ready for another hospital stay with Samuel, albeit a planned one this time. To get to the bottom of his headaches and determine if it really is low ICP (intracranial pressure) we're going to pick a Monday when some of the best neurosurgeons in the country are... not on vacation or at a conference... and we're going to go in for them to put in an ICP gauge and spend about three days measuring the pressure in his head. At the end of that, we may go home without answers, we may have a shunt revision and replace his shunt with a programmable shunt, or we could be strapping in for a procedure called and ETV... which could have him in the hospital for 6 weeks... I'm mostly hoping for not that last one.
I am very much hoping that this happens soon, so his headaches can stop. So that does have the potential to impact my ability to pull off some of this... but, hey, we all know I can take pictures and write some stuff in a fairly short period of time if I feel the need, and this has been a source of stress relief for me since before 2019,  so don't count me out there. 
 
On a closing note... That $25 coin is clearly mocking me...  I may have to do something about this... 

Okay, so, after several rounds of going back and forth between “Grading/Quality Control,” “Grading/Encapsulation/Imaging,” and “Quality Control/Finalized,” the submission is finally finalized and shipped, and I have grades.
On a few of them, all I can say is… Woof…
For Italy…
While these mostly are not great I can’t call most of these disappointments. Yeah… the 1995 is lower than I’d hoped for, but the 2000 and 2001 are better than I’d worried they might be. At the end of the day those were a play to at least get the set finished. All three coins are having to go through NGCs review process to add to the registry because none of those three have ever been added to the set before. The 5L was a disappointment – I thought that would do better. But I’m happy with the 10L.
Most importantly - I have made the 500L set I built for my wife 100% complete, including coins her family brought back with them from Italy 30 years ago. I like it.

The Venezuelan coins are where this hurts – Pretty much all MS66s, and so these fall short of what I needed to take back the #1 set with that Best Presented Set… So… maybe next year we’ll try to reclaim the title:

The Argentinian Coins… Again… Overall not what I’d hoped for… but… They’re still going to let me fill out a set with a fun narrative. For the Austral Anyway… I’m taking another look at the Peso Convertible and realizing how many slots that set has for circulating commemoratives I have zero interest in hunting down. Lol
The 63s and the 64s hurt… but the Zimbabwe set also started with some less than stellar and humble grades and such… and I’ve improved from there where I could. 
Once again... we'll call this a foundation to grow from... maybe... We'll see how much I feel like torturing myself and my wallet.


Speaking of the Zimbabwe set, the $10 coin scored! Kind of! – It got an MS62. Which beats the AU58 that I had before and it is now the TOP POP, highest graded example graded by NGC. I had been hoping this would grade MS and not AU like the last one, and it did. So, this is kind of a win… but I had hoped it might MS63.  
Seriously though, finding examples.of these that do not look rough has been hard. I've been trying... for a few years now.

And finally, we have the turtle coins… Mostly 66s. I can’t really complain too much here. I didn’t really expect too many super high grades here and I mostly just wanted these to maybe form the basis for a future signature set. Yes, high grades are nice, but they’re not essential for a non-competitive set…. that I’m not even officially building yet… and they’re still Gem Uncirc grades.
But... Hey! That Tokelau Cent! MS67RD!

Next goals will be..
1) getting the coins programmed in and in the slots,
2) getting my pre-written descriptions posted on the coins,
3) getting pictures taken of the 500 Lire coins to polish the presentation on that set,
4) pictures on the new Venezuelan coins to maintain the quality of the presentation on that set,
5) getting the Austral coins (and maybe the Pesos) imaged and
6) getting my historical write-ups for the Austral Set ready.
These may not all happen in this order.

Okay, so, after several rounds of going back and forth between “Grading/Quality Control,” “Grading/Encapsulation/Imaging,” and “Quality Control/Finalized,” the submission is finally finalized and shipped, and I have grades.
On a few of them, all I can say is… Woof…
For Italy…
While these mostly are not great I can’t call most of these disappointments. Yeah… the 1995 is lower than I’d hoped for, but the 2000 and 2001 are better than I’d worried they might be. At the end of the day those were a play to at least get the set finished. All three coins are having to go through NGCs review process to add to the registry because none of those three have ever been added to the set before. The 5L was a disappointment – I thought that would do better. But I’m happy with the 10L.
Most importantly - I have made the 500L set I built for my wife 100% complete, including coins her family brought back with them from Italy 30 years ago. I like it.

The Venezuelan coins are where this hurts – Pretty much all MS66s, and so these fall short of what I needed to take back the #1 set with that Best Presented Set… So… maybe next year we’ll try to reclaim the title:

The Argentinian Coins… Again… Overall not what I’d hoped for… but… They’re still going to let me fill out a set with a fun narrative. For the Austral Anyway… I’m taking another look at the Peso Convertible and realizing how many slots that set has for circulating commemoratives I have zero interest in hunting down. Lol
The 63s and the 64s hurt… but the Zimbabwe set also started with some less than stellar and humble grades and such… and I’ve improved from there where I could. 
Once again... we'll call this a foundation to grow from... maybe... We'll see how much I feel like torturing myself and my wallet.


Speaking of the Zimbabwe set, the $10 coin scored! Kind of! – It got an MS62. Which beats the AU58 that I had before and it is now the TOP POP, highest graded example graded by NGC. I had been hoping this would grade MS and not AU like the last one, and it did. So, this is kind of a win… but I had hoped it might MS63.  
Seriously though, finding examples.of these that do not look rough has been hard. I've been trying... for a few years now.

And finally, we have the turtle coins… Mostly 66s. I can’t really complain too much here. I didn’t really expect too many super high grades here and I mostly just wanted these to maybe form the basis for a future signature set. Yes, high grades are nice, but they’re not essential for a non-competitive set…. that I’m not even officially building yet… and they’re still Gem Uncirc grades.
But... Hey! That Tokelau Cent! MS67RD!

Next goals will be..
1) getting the coins programmed in and in the slots,
2) getting my pre-written descriptions posted on the coins,
3) getting pictures taken of the 500 Lire coins to polish the presentation on that set,
4) pictures on the new Venezuelan coins to maintain the quality of the presentation on that set,
5) getting the Austral coins (and maybe the Pesos) imaged and
6) getting my historical write-ups for the Austral Set ready.
These may not all happen in this order.

Okay, so, after several rounds of going back and forth between “Grading/Quality Control,” “Grading/Encapsulation/Imaging,” and “Quality Control/Finalized,” the submission is finally finalized and shipped, and I have grades.
On a few of them, all I can say is… Woof…
For Italy…
While these mostly are not great I can’t call most of these disappointments. Yeah… the 1995 is lower than I’d hoped for, but the 2000 and 2001 are better than I’d worried they might be. At the end of the day those were a play to at least get the set finished. All three coins are having to go through NGCs review process to add to the registry because none of those three have ever been added to the set before. The 5L was a disappointment – I thought that would do better. But I’m happy with the 10L.
Most importantly - I have made the 500L set I built for my wife 100% complete, including coins her family brought back with them from Italy 30 years ago. I like it.

The Venezuelan coins are where this hurts – Pretty much all MS66s, and so these fall short of what I needed to take back the #1 set with that Best Presented Set… So… maybe next year we’ll try to reclaim the title:

The Argentinian Coins… Again… Overall not what I’d hoped for… but… They’re still going to let me fill out a set with a fun narrative. For the Austral Anyway… I’m taking another look at the Peso Convertible and realizing how many slots that set has for circulating commemoratives I have zero interest in hunting down. Lol
The 63s and the 64s hurt… but the Zimbabwe set also started with some less than stellar and humble grades and such… and I’ve improved from there where I could. 
Once again... we'll call this a foundation to grow from... maybe... We'll see how much I feel like torturing myself and my wallet.


Speaking of the Zimbabwe set, the $10 coin scored! Kind of! – It got an MS62. Which beats the AU58 that I had before and it is now the TOP POP, highest graded example graded by NGC. I had been hoping this would grade MS and not AU like the last one, and it did. So, this is kind of a win… but I had hoped it might MS63.  
Seriously though, finding examples.of these that do not look rough has been hard. I've been trying... for a few years now.

And finally, we have the turtle coins… Mostly 66s. I can’t really complain too much here. I didn’t really expect too many super high grades here and I mostly just wanted these to maybe form the basis for a future signature set. Yes, high grades are nice, but they’re not essential for a non-competitive set…. that I’m not even officially building yet… and they’re still Gem Uncirc grades.
But... Hey! That Tokelau Cent! MS67RD!

Next goals will be..
1) getting the coins programmed in and in the slots,
2) getting my pre-written descriptions posted on the coins,
3) getting pictures taken of the 500 Lire coins to polish the presentation on that set,
4) pictures on the new Venezuelan coins to maintain the quality of the presentation on that set,
5) getting the Austral coins (and maybe the Pesos) imaged and
6) getting my historical write-ups for the Austral Set ready.
These may not all happen in this order.