I adore that Venusaur, and agree that the cohesiveness of these three cards is really strong. I can’t wait to pick these up for my collection too!
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Once again your collection thread strikes me straight in the feelings, the lottery trio is simply amazing but i’m actually talking about your previous update (yes i’m a slow man and didn’t see it until now). I’ve already earlier mentioned that you seem to be completing one by one my collection goals and was already happy that it looked like you run out of goals on my spreadsheets to complete. And then you do it again by simply making a post so good that i have to widen my collection goals and see you complete them right in front of my eyes before i knew they were my goals too. Luckily for me, the addition isn’t massive, but seeing all the old japanese gym set promos in one place i have no choice but to add them on my list too, the infamous list of goals to be completed by me that have already been completed by you. I congratulate you, and i envy you
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I’m so glad you’ve stopped by Jopo. You make a man feel very good with your warm compliments and great humor! =D (also love the pun, I am also a slow man)
I know the feeling, believe me, haha! And don’t forget for a second that I thoroughly have been influenced by your collection thread and goals as well my friend! The slime army is monumental, it is daring, it is inspiring! I always look forward to seeing you add to it, and I’d love furthermore to see you add some of these new, even if a little offbeat collection additions. It would please me greatly.
The gym pages are such a feel good set of pages to look at. I am a huge sucker for the gym series, english and japanese both. But those exclusives are a pure source of joy.
Thanks a lot man. You make me laugh and smile!
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I’m indeed a slow man since that pun definitely wasn’t intended, also i now see that i replied to stagecoach’s post instead of yours, i’m coming more and more to a conclusion that my brain isn’t very smart 
But i’m glad that i can inspire you too with my collection, i’ve been meaning to post more in my collection thread and since i completed the slime tcg main goal i’m indeed going to post some other tcg collections when i have a chance for that! But while i’m in the process of doing that, pleace have mercy on me in your new collection posts, there’s only so much a man can take!
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Oh lord
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Your collection is endlessly impressive. You have accomplished so much over such a short period of time. Also, you have excellent taste in cards.
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Thanks so much delta! I’m glad to see you stop by, it’s been awhile. I hope things are well with you =)
I’m glad I was able to fund a lot in the last few years with sales of cards I’ve had from years past. I also was lucky to already have all the non e series wotc cards before any 2020 hype. That has allowed me to prosper in many regards. Not gonna lie, that well has largely dried up =D Guess I’ll have to start spending some serious hard earned cash to finish up some of these considerable goals.
Still looking forward to a good addition from you one of these days, perhaps after you get back your cards from grading!
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It has been a while!
I took a brief hiatus so I could build up some more savings, get married, and adopt another cat.
Both were definitely worth it!
I am honored that you are interested in my collection! I am in the process (finally) of preparing my first of hopefully many PSA submissions in a while. In the meantime, I will be documenting what I bought before my hiatus. I would like to start selling some cards and vintage Pokemon items in the near-ish future, but I am nervous because I am a total noob despite having done quite a bit of research. I admire that you have been able to successfully sell and fund more cards.
I also treated myself to a very nice card lately as a reward for achieving a health goal (which I had been saving up for). More to come on that…
It is great to be back and I am very excited to see where both of our collections take us!
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Yay! Major congratulations on getting married, that’s so wonderful! Very happy for you. And, of course, on the lucky cat. I wish you the very best in that, here’s to many, many happy days in your new chapter.
I will keep a look out for your collection. That reminds me, I have to reset bookmarks for all my peeps’ collection threads. Yours was included in there from the old site, gotta get back on that. Also very curious about the new card and story. And good health! Lots of great news here, this is super uplifting!
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Thank you for reminding me about bookmarks. I need to do that too.
I realized that I did not ask how you have been doing. How have you been?
The married plus 2 cat life is wonderful and I feel so grateful and fortunate. I really hope that you have been doing well in all aspects of your life, too. 
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I can’t complain right now. Things are definitely solid for me all around. I’ve been with my lady for a couple years and definitely thinking of the future. Jobs are currently coming in (im working on a show right now scouting areas hehe), so I’m in a good place right now =]
Thanks for asking!
Here’s my two cats!
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That is wonderful to hear! I am glad that you are a cat person as well. Your cats are beautiful! My wife loves black cats and I like multicolored ones. Right now we have an orange tabby and a white cat. They will appear in my collection thread along with cards. I wish you and your lady all of the best. I am glad that you have a lot of work opportunities as well.
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Aww. Can’t wait to see them! Thanks again delta!
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So much positivity in this thread! I love it!
The purrfect place for all the cat people too. Glad to hear everyone’s cats are doing well! 
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This is the second of three updates to be added from before. Same things can be said as before–thank you to my friends and their charming, kind, thoughtful words! After this, one more old update to go, then all is uncharted territory.
September 4th, 2022
It all began one day, long long ago, when I… no, I had no plans any time soon to find this iconic monolith. This infamous, alluring, shiny behemoth of a collectible. This poster child of Pokemon. This just all around glamorous and glittery card. I wasn’t to even think about it. Yes. I would seal away that desire for a long time. No Grand Party for me. Yes, sir.
But then…
And there it was again. This time from a good friend. Damnit, I thought, damnit, why immerse me as you do in this dark hole, sucking me in, jerking me in so many directions, when I want to maintain one fairly diagonal but ideally straight line of a goal! Ah! Why must the temptation always be returned to me! And so what was my reaction, looking at this card, once again, in this thread?
But even yet I still resolved to put it on the back burner. But you know what happens sometimes in the world of Pokemon? An insane deal comes and slaps you in the face. So absurd, so unbelievable, you have to throw a bid in just because you can’t see it go so low that you would kick yourself. And you take it right off the back burner and straight into your belly. Well… I won that super low bid. I finally got my own Grand Party!
It was with PWCC, which I look into pretty consistently, but almost never wind up being pleased with prices, so I rarely ever pursue. Well, I looked this card up and down, and saw that it seemed perfect. I figured it must be a slight dent that isn’t visible without holding it in person. And I am very, very pleased that this copy is absolutely near perfect, and, indeed, having only one flaw. A very fine, easy to miss indent on the back, about a finger nail in length. One third, maybe even one fourth the market price. I was in shock. Especially after finding out that my suspicion was confirmed as to its condition.
But that isn’t the only thing to share regarding this.
Isn’t it funny how things change? I eat my own words dear muk. it does look might fine in the binder =)
I guess now the old back binder is TRULY finished now, eh?! I figure this is just fine a page for it to lay. Normally it would go with trainers but this deserves to go near some illustrators!
Lastly, I will leave it off with a few old collection pieces just to jazz this update up a little. Nothing new here, with the latest addition being the Magikarp from earlier in this collection thread, with the rest being from years ago. But I realized I never shared them 'til now and they are nice pages worthy of showing, including some beautiful destiny. I don’t have my usual photography equipment handy today, so the pictures are low quality, but the contents of these pages makes up for that I believe!
The first, is one of my favorite pages in my whole collection. Rainbows, anyone?
Then of course some classy Neo “alternatives”, which are cards that don’t fall directly into the gen 2 Sugimori binder, that is organized by pokedex order to this day. This section of the binder actually starts with miscellaneous holos, then goes into artist order. Normally it’s either pokedex or artist order only, but sometimes you really do just gotta put some holos all together to make a page shiny and magical.
And some light and darkness! They are all quite spectacular, have always loved all of these. Who doesn’t like destiny? I have to say, among these, the Dark Scizor steals my heart away.
And then, more destiny, but beginning the artist section, with the most fitting intro page. Naturally the Ghastly Line is cosmic and the best. Need we wonder why? We needn’t. Why did they have Baba do Cyndaquil and then Arita the other two? Arghh. Makes no sense. But the odd one out is Baba after all, so I can’t complain too extensively. Bless her beautiful Cyndaquil.
And finally some Komiya flair. Why not? Again, one of my favorite pages ever. The rest of the section is long, all of neo era organized by artist. It is great, but that might be a bit overkill at the current time. (Man, the glare is killing me. Better photos next time.)
When I shipped my PWCC lot back to me, I hauled in everything I’ve bought for the last many months since they got kicked off ebay. Among them are a few pieces of other longtime collection goals, so there’s still more for the future! It was nice timing, as buying has been slow and difficult, with prices of these damn cards being a bit prohibitive. Cheers!
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I will just leave this here =)
Even the AI knows. All I can add is that the rainbow page is just pure magic!
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Holy shoot, that poem hits all the right spots! 
@brendantheclayboy I think I’ve already commented on your additions on the old site, so I’ll keep it brief: Your collection thread is a gift to humanity, please never change
… and congrats again on your absolutely stunning additions, as well as your entire stunning collection in general!
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An amazing update and this time i can be just purely happy for you without any envy! (well of course i always have to envy when one gets a card this gorgeous, but you know collection goal envy) I’m glad that you have shifted in your recent posts into these more valuable cards that i will never add in my goals since this is where these collecting forums bring out their best. I can just purely admire and appreciate an addition a fellow collector has landed without any need to acquire the card myself, just pure happiness that another person has gotten something beautiful to themselves! (You also know that i’m happy for all your additions, even if they make my goal list look hidiously large) I congratulate you, and i’m happy for you!
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This is the final update that has been previously posted. I am now all caught up with this update–from here on out, it is new winds, different directions. And once more, I have to thank my friends for their uplifting and beautiful comments they have made. Thank you guys!
This particular one began with a follow up with sir Pulp, the fan of all things good. This was regarding PSA return stuff…
October 9th, 2022
I have a MASSIVE update here after all, despite what I have said recently! Mwhahaha!
Let’s just get the most exciting one to start with. When I had acquired the lottery trio, I had actually already lined up one of the remaining 3. And I was feeling sure that it was going to be a long time 'til I got the rest. I save the search for them and not only had I not seen any in a long time, but the price is pretty lofty, and I am kind of low on funds these last few months. But a great deal came up… In my opinion at least. Not a steal by any means, but such a great price for these–what I can now comfortably say now that I have them–extremely rare and undervalued cards. Unbelievable, truly confusing to try to understand how mint copies of these limited to 5000 cards go for less than the majority of english E series holos in PSA 9/10, how they go for less than modern PSA 10’s. It is shocking indeed. Gen 2 starters are just underrated!
I usually buy raw, but these came up graded and for very reasonable prices. Like, raw prices. In fact, I have a weird auction story. So–as I said just a moment ago–these don’t come up often. Well, some time ago I see that an abroad seller listed all 3 individually on auction, claiming they were mint. They seemed great, so I thought I’d follow the auction and maybe bid if the price seemed right. They blew away my expectations, and they sold for about $400 a piece average. That’s really high for raw (this is ebay). I’d have been willing to pay that if need be when I could, I thought, but not now, even with legit fomo over these rare cards. But then within a week of that, a seller pops up with the 2 missing ones I needed, both graded, and 25% less than those raw copes! I was beside myself. “Well, guess I’ll have to scramble and trade something to pay for these”, says myself, in my usual self affirming inner monologue that justifies such decisions. And so I asked the seller if he’d go even lower if I bought both, and he obliged. They are the Gatr and Meganium. The Typhlosion was the one I first obtained. And so I had some fun cracking!
I must pay ode to my latest beloveds, to these fine set pieces. Meganium… glistens in the sun, the quality of portrait only the great Himeno could do so perfectly. He glows and charges what I like to think is a mighty solarbeam, in the tropics. The flower radiates with passion, and shines brighter than on ordinary occasion. It is a spectacle for the passerby, sailing the coastline. Typloshion, he greets his enemy, with whom he is about to command a fire blast to, with a stature of malevolence, hidden behind what ostensibly seems to be, in fact, benevolence. For he is powerful, he is great, he is majestic. This is the most fabulous illustration among the three, for its sheer composition, its originality, and its luster. It has to be my favorite of the three, which says a lot, because unlike the gen 1 trio, these are far closer to each other in appreciable quality, for me. And Feraligatr, looking just like the Blastoise. Quality Sugiyama, the towering void in which the Pokemon roars, the isolation perfect for its illustrious depiction. Charming vintage CG, you know me. Glorious! His background is mighty fine, the green mist. It definitely sucks you into its jaws. But his energy is water, and he means no harm to the water people.
All these cards, like Venusaur, Charizard, and Blastoise, do that jazzy thing that make you pleased they exist in holographic. Wondrous, deep, synergetic. Fine, fine!
And so now, my binder page, one of the greatest ever, is complete! I’m reeling!
The birds do everything for me that the others do. Legends. And to be all done by thee pencil man, Kimura?! Stop it, I gush. I’m a sucker for Articuno, my favorite of the three, so there is a bit of a bias for me. But it is indeed backed by an icy, divine rendering of the beast. And everything looks good in blue. Kimura is a genius.
And that is just the beginning of this collection story. As I promised Mr. Pulp, I wanted to share a little bit about my latest PSA sub. Unfortunately, I did get one of those pesky, unfair graders down there. I really only generally send in mint cards, as I hope to land 9’s for the PC, and some 8’s/10’s to cover the costs. But I got nailed with about about ten 8’s where I was fully expecting 9’s. We’re talking print lines here, a micro nick on a back edge there. Extremely harsh, even considering some of what I subbed were very hard-to-grade cards. Some Slow’s, some other WOTC grade goals. My biggest and loftiest one missed the mark for me to land the full set in a complete 9. I do now have half of them, and a few more that I will be cracking and resubbing, for they are pack fresh with only print lines–not enough of them to warrant or justify a silly 8. However, overall the return was still largely as expected, and I got a great hull. At my next Slow family milestone, I will share these. The sub was for 3 specific collection goals. The slows, and 2 subsets. I cannot share those 2 subsets, because the other of the 2 wasn’t sent in complete. I never got a chance to acquire a few left in mint condition over the last couple years. But I am submitting again soon, so maybe next year I can have a party with that.
Does that mean I have nothing left to share? No!
Ole Imakuni masterpiece, my baby. He made the journey. He’s home safe. In a far more suitable and appealing piece of plastic. The grade he deserves. Very happy to have him back. I was a nervous wreck cracking him out of this bulky, stupid slab. Boy, was it cumbersome.
voila!
Family photo time!
I mean, how great do these look together?! And before anyone may think that a special Porygon is missing, well, it is. My shadowless Porygon is still yet to be graded, as that was part of a big sub I was not ready to make before the shutdown, and I still did not want to pay the prices available at the time of this last sub. Soon he will join his brethren. The Imakuni firered leafgreen Porygon in reverse is the best card of the EX era man! These other 2 were not part of this sub–they have been part of my collection for a while now.
And speaking of collection bits from before, that recent PWCC haul I got? BAM!
I had all these raw to be graded haha. When they sell for nearly the cost of grading, I don’t see any reason to grade myself, which is my preferred method for PC. Oh, what can I say about the trainers that I haven’t said already? They are very special to me, for my remembrance of the games. They are pillars in the collection. I am very fond of these. Blaine and Erika, the favorites. Both in terms of association with the games, but also their fiery and foresty cards. Sugimori treats =)
This was pretty crazy here, huh? Well, I have one more thing I wanted to share. My good friend, kromaticlanturn, he gifted me something very special. Something I am looking for the perfect ocean blue frame for. Participants and audience of the last art contest know what this is. And I garnish it with the above Misty, and one of the blunders from this last grading sub. Will crack and regrade, but alas! Was hoping to pair these fine wines together to showcase my wonderful gift! Look at that Misty’s Duck looking in awe at his friend!
I will cherish it forever. It looks SO good in person. He did such a great job. I was rooting for him the whole time! Thanks kromatic!
Now, haha, now, I might be done for a little while 'til I might realize the remaining goals. But anything can happen!
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