£400 for a Penny ?

Example please ?

Yes, happy birthday fella. By the way, when you first showed up, you were into sheep. That still the case ? I've got 650 and between you and me, some of them I could do without..

Very good. Well perhaps I ought to look into the matter then....

Is there an executive summary (no more than 20 words) of what this spat was about - to see if it's worth reading in full ?

I would think it is something to do with the stress the metal is put under during the strike, rather than any chemical activity myself.

Quite a few short skirted ones here in Essex....

Can't see why not. At least it's a missing colon - or die wear and not some silly random dot somewhere. Good spot by the way.

Rascal.

It's an interesting subject, the attribution of a new variety. I had a Charles I unite once and it had a slightly different legend. There are quite a few different ones, but despite searching Scneider and North, I couldn't find one like mine. I sent a scan to the British Museum and they confirmed that I did indeed seem to have found a new combination. I then asked Baldwins if this was important - no, it wasn't. I think getting a new variety established depends a lot on who you are, it's not a scientific process. Look at London Coins current push to have date widths in the old head penny series established as varieties, whilst Michael Gouby couldn't care less. It's all quite imprecise and unsatisfactory in my opinion.

That's the key thing to me, so much of what we know, or think we know can hardly be presented as definitive, yet it so often is.

It's a real issue for sure. Technology is the problem, things are possible which previously would have taken craftsmanship and talent, now anyone can do it. Slabs are becoming a bit like Gilts/Bonds/Sovereign debt - they are a promise, a guarantee which is only as good as the issuer. The minute one defaults......

"The star that burns the brightest, burns the quickest" I've been waiting for this day ever since you exploded onto the forum Dave. You have been well advised to take a step back and a deep breath. For what it's worth here's my opinion. Collecting is like a round of golf. The only thing that matters is what YOU do. Yes there are distractions and irritating playing partners, bad luck, good luck, cheats etc, but none of these things can impact upon you unless you let them. You also can't rush the outcome - a round of golf takes 4 hours and if you try too hard, all you will do is damage your score and enjoyment. If you feel you need a break from coins, organise your collection as you would like it, then put it away in a drawer and do something else that recharges your batteries. I think a lot of collectors go through intense periods and then periods of almost disinterest, but at some point in the future you will 'go again' and when you do you will probably be grateful to your younger self that you didn't dispose of everything. I myself haven't bought a coin this year, I am in remission, but I'm still a coin collector. And as far as this fellow who's got up your nose goes, deal with it. Either take him to court or let it go, don't have it festering. As has been said, all that matters at the end of the day is that you enjoy the hobby. Nothing else is of any consequence whatsoever, save all the aggravation for work and the things you have to do, make the things you choose to do as pleasant as possible. Take control.

Took the first of our new season lambs to the abbatoir the other day, first time I have done such a thing and was interested to see how everything works. Would you believe the carcasses are graded according to how heavily muscled they are and how much fat there is. The grade of your carcass determines the price and there is a european wide standard grading scale. Thing is though, not everybody adheres to it and disagreements on grade are common. We got close on £100 for ours. Next day, took some more in, but this time to market. Similar lambs in every way, fetched £80 because they got a different grade. Sound familiar to anyone ?

Yes, it was always Boadicea growing up. Does anybody actually know ? As far as Mumbai is concerned, it has always been Mumbai to the locals. Private soldiers of the empire were notorious for using (not always complimentary) nicknames based on the local pronunciations. Wipers for Ypres is another one which springs to mind. If you follow this link you can see that with the exception of Chennai (Madras) they are mostly pretty faithful attempts and it's probably not even fair to call them renames... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renaming_of_cities_in_India#Proposed_changes

Plenty of people do however, direct buying from the farm is very much on the rise. Anyhow, the point I was making is that wherever items are bought or sold, there is a 'grading' system which seems to be subjective according to whether one is buying or selling and related to the strength of the vendor's position - if demand for an item is high, then you generally find the grades are 'ambitious'.

Welcome. Can I urge you to persist, sounds interesting. All you need do is resize the scan in your photo editing suite ?

In the modern corporate style, they will spend huge amounts of money on campaigns to notify us of their 'ethical standards' and how much they 'value their customers' whilst with the other hand doing whatever they can get away with to make a buck. The only people they will take any notice of is lawyers because they can hurt them in the wallet. Mere coin collecters are flys on their windscreen. There, that's a nice crabby start to a Sunday......

No returns accepted.

Not really 1949, a few miles south of Colchester on the coast - right in the middle of the Parachute Regiment's firing ranges. Can be awfully noisy at times.

I stopped collecting sovereigns years ago because they were just too small, don't see farthings as an option. I've just about finished 1895 to 1936 in true BU, ok a few gaps, I just don't see the point of starting something I can't finish with the bun head series.... All East Anglian beer is muck, Derek, trust me and heaped upon that shame must be added the fact that they have no decent rugby teams.

I wish. That was when I lived on the Kent/Sussex borders. Now that I have relocated to North Essex, I find I am living in a beer desert. IPA and Woodfordes Wherry ? Exceedingly poor fare. Guilty of absence sir - it's taken me a while to adjust to the new lifestyle. Hopefully becoming more settled now and might even resume the penny collecting. Then again, I might look at something else because I don't have the money I once had and I notice prices haven't come down. How's the dealing coming along ?

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/HENRY-VII-SOVEREIGN-EXTREMELY-RARE-NEF-/330564954137?pt=UK_Coins_BritishHammered_RL&hash=item4cf734e819 Would you put that on ebay ?

I see he's had 18 offers already. It is an amazing coin, can't be too many of them around I wouldn't have thought.

Good for you, 400! I spent 9 hours down a trench looking for a mains water leak, so I'm a lot scruffier than any posing pop star, and... ...I found it! This is nearly 5 feet below ground level ! I have also done that, although mine was a silly little leak in comparison to that. That looks an expensive one at £1 a cubic metre, well done.

At the risk of incurring the members wrath; Yes mate, I spent a lot of yesterday manually plucking lambs to rid them of maggots - it's the real world, I love it. There may be a Dylanesque whiff to your question, but it goes straight over my head because I think he's a scruffy scumbag who can't sing. (you can take the boy out of the city, but you can't take the city out of the boy)