Today I attended my first coin show. The show was held in Rockford which is not too far from home base, so I decided to attend if possible. I mentioned the show to my wife during the week, and she decided to attend with me, since we are both so busy during the week it made the anticipation more exciting to me. One of the strongest pieces of advice mentioned many times by the experienced collectors was to not buy at your first show, instead to walk around, talk to dealers, look at prices, look at grading, get the lay of the land, watch the crowd, listen to the dealing, in other words walk before you run off and max your credit card. My wife sleeps late on sundays, when she gets up she does her toilet and then makes brunch, usually around noon, I was up at half past six and went back to bed, I got up again to stay at half past seven, went to the putor, checked to see if the book I ordered was listed as out of stock now, it was not, I also checked the prices of some other books to check them at the coin show. I took my wallet and took out the cards, and all the cash except for 20 dollars, I was determined to follow the advice, do not spend money the first time you attend a coin show, it was now almost nine, when the show would open, I took the cell phone and drove to the hotel where it was being held. Sweet, I found a spot in the first row right in front of the door, I went in and there was a table with boxes, books, and tickets manned by some pleasent people, they gave me a free ticket to enter for a door prize, and I bought a raffle ticket for a dollar, I think the idea was to help support the local coin club, and if I won a mint set or a gold bullion eagle, that was fine. Going in I was overwhelmed, so many tables, so many dealers, tons of coins, I took a walk around and watched the people, I saw some dealers had attractive displays, other dealers had bargain bins, there were coin books, I checked the price, oh oh, the one I wanted I could buy for twenty five less at the place one of the coin talk members posted a link to. All the dealers seemed really busy, talking to each other, showing things to customers, I wandered through the bourse and in one less crowded corner was looking at rows and rows of slabbed coins, the dealer was a pleasent young man who asked me if I saw anything I would like to take a closer look at. I told him this was my first coin show, and I was just looking for now, his slabs were generally marked with such things, as cleaned, genuine, hairlines and similar descriptions of damaged coins. I mentioned that he had a lot of coins in plastic cases, he told me that those plastic cases guarenteed the value of a coin, He showed me a hawaiin dime and quarter that were both marked cleaned. They looked very nice to me, they were marked nowhere near the 19 dollars I had left to me, then I saw an Isabella quarter, I almost had a mint state one a few months back, missed it by less than an hour, the dealer had offered it to me for 425 dollars, I had saved up for it, and when I had the cash, I was told that it had been sold just before I got there. This one was marked au-50 cleaned, I asked to see it, since I was not planning on buying anything I had not brought my peeper. When I turned it over to look at the back I saw that a price of 700 had been marked, I asked the dealer on the off chance it was some sort of code or stock number if it was the price, he told me yes. I saw one dealer with lots of world silver coins, he was very busy, I saw no price marked as I was standing there my cell phone rang. It was my sweetheart calling, she had woke up and saw I was not in bed, she had checked the putor room and then saw my car was gone, she wanted to know if I was going to have our breakfast together, as I was talking to her I made my way out of the show into the parking lot, I told her I was coming right home. Poor girl, she had thought I had forgotten that we were going to go together, I got home, and we had a nice breakfast and she went to get ready to go, while she was making ready, I put some more cash back in my wallet, I got my list out, we went back to the show together. She was very impressed by the coins, she asked me some questions that I was able to answer, we were looking at capped bust halves and she asked me why that one that was newer was listed as more expensive than that other one that was older, I explained mintages, demand, and conditions to her at least as I understand them. I saw one bin that had a jumble of indian head cents with a sign that said, half off marked price, I went through them and set aside a bunch, to look at, she took the list and sorted through them while I seperated them into possibles, and not possibles, I ended up with 7 that I liked. Now I know that technically I was still at my first coin show, but this was not the first time I was there, so I felt that I had followed the sage advice of my fellow cointtalk members, and now I could be free to buy. I talked to the man selling the coins, and found that he buys them for 75 cents, heck I didnt bring my doubles, so I paid the man, and he told me of the next coin show in the area that he will be at. We walked around some more and my gal had her eye drawn to some bullion gold coins, she told me she didnt know that the Us still minted gold coins, I told her that they were not meant for circulation, the coin was a 1/10 th onza of oro, she asked the lad behind the counter if she could see it, it was marked 5 dollars on the back, I told her that if gold ever fell to less than 50 dollars an ounce that you could still spend it, I told her I see them all around for 140 so if it was less than that I would buy it for her, she asked the price, and was told that it would be 130, so my wife got a gold coin, we were looking at some more capped bust halves and when I expressed admiration for one she asked me if I wanted an early birthday present, I told her that I wanted to wait until I got my book and was more coinfident, she thought that was a clever pun, love is forgiving of even the worst puns. One dealer had a large bin of world coins marked at 25 cents each, or 6 for a dollar, I found a sad little mexican 20 centavos, with the liberty cap floating amid rays, some dings and such, but I bought it and some others for a dollar, my mexican friends at work always seem interested in any mexican coins, the silver libertad I had been looking at earlier was being sold for 28 dollars, I hope to get a better deal than that some time so I did not purchase one. Then it happened, as we were looking at one dealers wares I saw a capped bust half like I had never seen before, I asked the dealer if I could see it, he showed it to me, it had the funkiest set of 8s in the date 1808 that I had ever seen, it was marked for 75 and I was about to hand it back when the dealer said he would go it for 65, I bought it. Red flags abounding, my wife immediately said we have to go now, I think my eyes might have been starting to glaze over, she must of saw that my self control had crumbled in front of her, she led me out of the show to our car, in the car she asked me why I had bought such a doubtful coin. A great question, we talked about it, I have a bust half attribution book on order, when I looked at the coin there were no striations or signs of cleaning, though in about a vg at best condition, it seemed to me to be one that MIGHT be some rare variety. Plus it was the earliest one I had seen, plus even if it is not anything at all except a counterfeit it might be a contemporary counterfeit, which is something I think bears looking into, some others I have talked to all seem to have a counterfeit. If it is a counterfeit I might punch a large copy into the field on the obverse. We talked about the hobby, my brothers hobby is golf, he will travel to a place simply to play golf, I think that a coin hobby is fun, I do not care for golf, and my brother can never take his score card that he spent over 500 on playing golf and hope to resell it for a tenth of what he paid for. So anyway, total spent first time I went to a coin show, 1 dollar, the second time I went to a coin show, 246. I know I will probably not keep upping my spending at that rate, I enjoyed it, I think my wife did also, and the next time they have a show I think I will try to look and talk more and spend a little less.
