bagerap

First question has to be where and how were they stored? It isn't unheard of for a form of electrolysis to occur naturally given the right circumstances. Salts may have been exchanged

"When everyone has signed up, who are you supposed to sell to? " About ten years ago IIRC, there was a pyramid called something like Women Empowering Women. It was centred on a small geographical area, the Isle of Wight. Anyway although a runaway success for the founders, so much so that it soon spread beyond its point of origin; it became blindingly obvious that everyone on the Isle of Wight was trying to sell to each other. Press attention ensued and the scheme went the way of all "guaranteed business ventures". Splat!

I was watching that. I defer to Debbie.

ISN = International Silver Network. I sold something to one of their wonks last year. He then spent about two months trying to sell slabbed crap to me! I had to tell him that my policy vis à vis slabs involved large portions of Dremel.

10th July.

It may sound like an urban myth, but it's true. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geotagging However, you can turn this facility off. Check your phone's handbook.

Twenty crowns sounds like Turks & Caicos Islands. Mostly dreadful stuff, but people do buy them (thank God)

We've been here before: http://www.predecimal.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=4257 I sold a Heinz last year for £775.00. Wonder if it's this one?

Been using Debbie's grading scale...Very F**ked to Extremely F**ked! 5mithyg clearly has choice crap. However, one cannot fault his description that it would stand out very well in the purchaser's collection. Maybe he's a reincarnation of the guy in Cornwall who used to have this sort of material by the bucketload. Can't remember his id though (cdsteve(?) or something like that. Caused elderly gent to spit coffee all over his laptop, amusing the lovely Mrs. Bagerap greatly.

'rich even rose-chocolate patina' I may have to nick that for the next time I'm flogging off some dreadful continental tat I have some interesting minor German States to dispose of.

They got it right on the cheaper and nastier version:

No, is trick coin. The engraved side translates to summat .like: " Decree No 1817 of the 3rd September 1870" which was when the enabling legislation for the new currency was passed. Nickel, 27 mm.

Unusual one, initials RW? on a Brazilian 100 Reis 1871:

Whatever the taxman wants from me, he can have. In Churchill crowns and '67 pennies.

The curse of "Free Insertion weekend" strikes again. Up to 100 items, starting price above 99p and no insertion fees. Seven days later and there's acres of tatty overpriced crap to wade through, just in case someone's offering a real coin by mistake.

I've just had a UK buyer with nearly 5000 feedbacks ask: 1) What kind of tracking system I use 2) Can I put the item description on the outside of the packet. (sure it's a 1 ounce silver round) 3) Can I send him a VAT invoice by email. Given his options, he then pays for second class, unrecorded. I paid the extra 86p recorded fee myself as this had all the signs of a claim in the making.

Debbie, you've got yourself a good one. You don't see too many hand engraved Masonic Pennies. The usual rubric is something like: "They received every man a penny". Wages, probably not. Just a little more of the ritual. HTWSSTKS is an acronym for: Hiram, Tyrian Widow's Son, Sendeth To King Solomon. Masonic charitable works are often referred to as being for "the Widow's Son"

Instead of which they wasted money on 300 hours of an escape artiste's time to find out that he couldn't replicate locking himself inside a bag. 300 sodding hours!!!?????

Though to be fair to the seller, who's done me no harm in the past, he did start at 99p. 56 bids later its all gone a bit gaga.

This one surprised me: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1961-UK-HALFPENNY-COIN-NON-EXISTANT-DATE-AA36-/130685379636?pt=UK_Coins_BritishMilled_RL&hash=item1e6d74a434#ht_3946wt_1044 It all looks very altered, but look at the price!

5/7 with some guesswork. The two I failed were the only two I genuinely knew the answers to if I'd thought about it. DOH

The second coin is a Jeton, which was a counting piece. Probably of the type known as Crown & Orb, but sadly of little value in this condition.

Debbie, sorry it's very short notice but you might like this: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/330705889927?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649#ht_500wt_1141

It'd be interesting to catch up on some of the 'old' members, particularly the youngsters, to see if they are still collecting, or if they got to whatever heights they were aspiring to. (See?! I could have used GeoffT's help there since I'm sure you're not supposed to split infinitives or something!) Emperor Oli perhaps? The Emperor is listed in today's birthdays on Coin People. 23 years old today.

Twenty or so years ago our pub team reached the semi finals of the quiz league. They announced a format change, each member of the team would have to elect to answer questions from a selection of specialist subjects. I was pleased to see that one of them was coins. Fortunately they were simple enough and I picked up bonus points from the poor sod in the opposing team who obviously hadn't a clue. The last question concerned the meaning of the letters K.N. Thank you God, job done, points garnered. Afterwards someone told me that a horse called Norton Coin was running at Cheltenham the following day and with the way my luck was running, a bet might be a good idea. Norton Coin duly obliged by winning the Gold Cup at 100-1, even beating Desert Orchid!