kbobam

Wow! They could have just sold the box for that! But seriously, is there something in the group that looks like it might be a 'hidden treasure' or what?

Appreciate the compliment. I don't encourage anyone to see what I'm seeing, since 'that way madness lies', but thanks very much! ( :

Pat reminded me of something. Way before I'd thought about marbles, there were psychedelic 'super-balls' in gumball machines at the grocery store. I thought they were the 'coolest', and used a lot of 'allowance' as a young boy collecting them. So just maybe if I were 'Sybil' and Joanne Woodward was my psychiatrist, she'd suggest that this was a better marble collector reason than the one I've given previously. In spite of my rolling smiley, it's probably true. ( :

While double-checking my list of words, I just learned that 'hokum' applies perfectly to the Who song I mentioned. ( : Hokum is a particular song type of American blues music - a humorous song which uses extended analogies or euphemistic terms to make sexual innuendos. ♪ There's no escape from the 'music' in the whole damn street! ♪

Thanks, you guys! Glad to know I have people behind me! Probably won't do anything too outrageous, but honest to God I just found an old box which among other things had a few old CDs in it. One of them is hits from 'The Who', I'm definitely going to play 'Squeeze Box' first, for the first time in I don't know how many years. I'm just bad-butt that way!

From a highly-respected source I just made up: "Anthropologists have an established technique for defining a society's characteristics by making cross-cultural comparisons based on concepts which have above-average numbers of synonymous words." (Sort of like how Eskimos have a gazillion subtly different words for 'snow'.) (Some people find the term 'Eskimo' offensive. Sorry. Didn't mean it to be.) Anyway..... I'm in an unusually good mood tonight. I feel like having some fun. Maybe even being a little 'bad' or 'naughty'. But I can't decide what kind of activity to 'engage' in! Help me out! Should it be: Hijinks, Shenanigans, Tomfoolery, Malarkey, Monkeyshines, Poppycock, Balderdash, Foolishness, Silliness, Hokum, Humbuggery, Folderol, Tommyrot, or Claptrap? Decisions, decisions! ( :

And only one of those fluoresces. Weird. Sometimes trying different lighting approaches really gets me going. What does this thing actually 'look like'? Is sunlight more 'real' than black light, or just what we're used to? If a tree falls... I'm going to shut up now and hopefully keep you all as friends!

Another one made more interesting by lack of symmetry! (Among other things, note 6 stripes on top, 7 on bottom.) Can we assume that the Vitro Cats and Whities were made such that one could find pretty much identical marbles in the three sizes listed? I've always enjoyed finding marbles that match one I already have, but in a different size. (One of the things I really liked about the salesman case!)

Thanks, Ron! Whoops. Had that plural wrong. The lower-case 'l's look like 'i's on my screen. Has to be my monitor. Couldn't possibly be my eyesight! Great video! Great marbles! And the terrific music in really excellent stereo is a wonderful bonus. ( :

Hey Mike! Outrageous video! I'm wondering about some of those larger marbles. Think I'm remembering some recent posts here where someone was asking about hand-mades pushing 3". It looks like there are some here that are doing that, based on how they look next to the smaller marbles. What do you think?

Interesting! These fit in with something I was thinking somewhere recently about liking simple 'minimalist' designs. More isn't always better. And thanks for mentioning Vacor. I haven't looked to see what they're doing for a long time. 120! You'd have to call that run 'limited'! ( :

'Respect' to Steph! I used to try buying with the 'fuzzy picture technique', but for me it always turned out there was a reason for the fuzziness. Ultimately, I think I'llhavethat1 has the right idea. 'Good transactions' are what it's all about. Everyone's happy. And wadely1212 brings up a good point. Even something that seems like a really big 'score' isn't always as satisfying as it looks. I remember one time Galen got a lot of flack for saying something along the lines of his 'enjoying the entire process'. I think there were some people who decided that enjoying the transactions had to mean that there was no real appreciation for the marbles. Didn't understand that. No connection at all, and there're so many different aspects to all this stuff, why not enjoy them all? (Just don't tell a widow who's trying to save her farm that you can't possibly give her more than $50 for a marble you already know you can sell for $2000. Then you're a piece of @#$%.)

And of course a warm welcome to '1 posts' Rafael! It seems like TMC has members from one edge of the USA to the other, but its reach farther away is limited. Our European, Australian, and other friends are of such high personal quality (you know who you are! ) that we can't get enough!

Hey, Ron! (Grüezi!) The site looks great! The overall style has a nice combination of 'serious' and 'outrageous' at the same time. May I ask you about some of the written German as far as marbles are concerned? I really only speak English, but enjoy dabbling in other languages. Could I trouble you for an English translation for the opening statement? Murmel, Märbel, Schusser, Glugger, Chlüre, Marmeli, Knicker, Glaskugel.... die Bezeichnungen im deutschen Sprachraum sind mannigfaltig und stehen als Synonym für ein Objekt, das seit Jahrzehnten die Augen sowohl von Kindern als auch von Erwachsenen leuchten lässt: Murmeln und ganz speziell GLASMURMELN ! Obviously, from the site name, that last word must be important! I'm also wondering what the difference is between 'murmel' and 'murmein'. Is there a simple answer for how to say 'marble' in German, or does it depend on how the word is used? Merci vilmal, Bob ( :

Totally new to me. Really neat! ( :

You're giving me too much credit. I just put pieces together visually the same way a child would. Granted, an extremely brilliant child... no no no, just kidding!

Think I'll stay crazy for at least one more day.

I have no idea why anything in this picture is there!

Just saw this life-changing commercial! And wanted to let all you out-of-state people know that you really have to move here! You can get a cyber-security degree from the University of Maryland and wind up working in a place that looks just like this! How cool is that?!!! It seems like every day I appreciate Steve's closing statement more and more. Hope he won't mind if I quote it here. knock off the b.s...its just too much

Hey Vicki! It made me sad to hear about your loss. It's bad enough to have someone steal your money, but when it's something that's an expression of you, it's just such a personal violation that it can't be described. The contrast of the black and white with the colors sounds wonderful. Hope you're re-building! (?)

Slingshots and marbles. Huh! Obviously a perfect combination, but hadn't thought about it. In New York City we didn't really have slingshots, since the ridiculous population density didn't allow for things that could be considered weapons. Even if you were only interested in target practice. But what a thought if you consider the wide-open spaces of the entire country! There must have been a gazillion marbles lost to this irresistible practice! ( :

I'm sure you're right!

Apparently these marbles have driven me out of my mind. Because here are my immediate questions. Given the shape of the 'canvas', are the straight lines actually curved and the curved lines actually straight? Are the marbles sitting in snow? And is that a miniature security tag on the one on the left?

You looked! I applaud your curiosity and sense of adventure! Here's a frame from the sit-com 'Super Fun Night'. (I really like the name of this show. It has no relevance whatsoever, but reminds me of Japanese television's over-excited titles.) This guy is doing a therapeutic exercise for a couple of people, They have to do one thing or the other depending upon which color marble they pick out of the bag. I really do apologize for being boring here, but having mentioned 'marbles on television' several times before, I feel an obligation to keep doing it for the record when it comes up. Because it's encouraging. Television executives aren't stupid. (Except for the 95% of the time when they're complete morons.) They wouldn't allow marbles to be mentioned at all unless their 'testing' showed that people have a positive response to them. So even though this has nothing to do with what we all enjoy here, it's still a good thing. ( :