For the holidays I find myself in Veritas99's neck of the woods and we decided to meet in order to compare arsenals, determine spheres of influence and establish potential trade agreements. It was not necessary to discuss financial matters as we are each happily driving off our respective fiscal cliffs acquiring Zeniths. We each brought some examples from our collections. For my part, I still find the orange deep diver outstanding, even more in person. I call dibs in no uncertain terms. The rectangular late pre-apocalypse piece is very compelling as well and all of Veritas99's pieces are in stupendous condition. A very excellent break from pre Christmas preparations, and always a privilege to meet another person who shares the madness.
Other than learning that he was the one who had bested me in a recent auction, it was great to finally meet Lou in person and see a tiny portion of his amazing collection. His newly acquired A 277 looks like it was made last week, not 40+ years ago, and the EPs only reaffirmed my need to get a 3019 in hand. While fun, I fear the meeting may have been dangerous for my bank account.
Aha... I thought I felt a disturbance in The Force. Well, as long as y'all stay north of the Mason-Dixon Line, we shouldn't have any trouble. Love the orange deep diver, but I think the A3736 compressor has nudged it's way onto the MMMD grail list.
Bad news, 3500, in DC we're about 90 miles into Dixie already, and planning our march to the sea - we're coming to liberate your Zeniths I recommend both. An A 3736 sits on the 'bay even as we banter: 181048588286 Unfortunately, the exchange I have had with the seller is the most incoherent I have had in a collecting career of multilingual misunderstandings and google mistranslations. Not only do I doubt the seller is a native speaker of German, I doubt he has taken his court-ordered medications in several weeks. Good luck!
Sent him a question re: shipping yesterday, but I have had no response yet from the Juwelier in question. It seems to be an actual jewelry store and they claim to speak English, so perhaps I'll try the old Telefon. And maybe the Difekt in the Chronographenfunktion will keep the price down...
So after he agreed to ship stateside I tried to explain to him he had to unblock US bidding on the listing. This is the reply, verbatim and in entirety: "Uhr ist angekommen. wiegt aber nur 45 Gramm. das ist dann ein Tausender mit allen zugedrückten Augen. Bitte Info." Can any of you familiar with the sprache decipher that for me? Did he think (can't imagine why) I was asking about shipping cost?
The Google says this is the translation: "Clock has arrived. but weighs just 45 grams which is then fed thousands with all oppressed eyes. Please info" Only barely more understandable than in German.
It's the "oppressed eyes" that got me. Damned haunting image. Too bad I can't figure out how it relates to this watch.
What it means is: "The watch has arrived and weighs only 45g. So that's a Grand (sic: 1000 €/$) and I've turned more than one blind eye here. Lemme know."
Well thank you for that Roger. Clarifies things but only a little. All I asked him to do was unblock US Bidding. Surely he cant be thick enough to be offering it to me for 1000 of any currency?
I've noticed in the Shipping & Handling section that he has excluded shipping to "Packstation"... but not to "United Stations of Amerika"... maybe I'm good.
If anyone needs any help with the lingo or on organizing something in general here, just pm me. Happy Christmas to all. Roger
It seems someone sober has started to answer the emails from the juwelier. That person has confirmed that there is no buy it now giveaway to be had.
He was probably referring to shipping issues. The Germans have some magic bureaucratic whack that descends on exports valued in excess of 1000 euros, leading to much understated value declarations. That, at least, was the explanation provided to me by the seller of my black Fernseher when he declared its value at 1000 euros and was afraid I'd be offended.