I went looking on Comic Link and *WHOA* I was stopped dead in my tracks. Issue #50 of Captain Marvel Adventures in NM+ condition. That's a 9.6 Golden Age comic. As a rule I don't divulge what I paid for a comic but in this instance I'm breaking my rule. I originally put in a bid of $530 and got back a response saying $555 was the minimum. Then I put in $555 and after a few more moments decided I was stupid for trying to penny pinch on such a deal. If I let this one by I would regret it for years to come so I went with the asking price of $600. Ironically, earlier this year I had lost an auction on a 9.2 of issue #50 which sold for $455 and in hindsight it turned out to be a blessing.

This purchase manages to do a lot of things for my collection.

1. It is my first 9.6 grade CMA. It's also a MONSTER 2100 registry points which easily breaks my previous record of 1100

2. With this comic I am now over half way to reaching the registry point total of the current number one CMA set. Just 18019 more points to go.

3. I particularly enjoy when I buy a comic that is shared with the number one set and my grade is higher. In this case my 9.6 is much higher than the 9.0 of the number one set.

4. Because this one issue has so a high registry point value I now have a higher average registry point per comic than the number one set. His is 471 per comic and mine now jumped from 441 to 479.

5. I am now in the second year of my ten year plan to take the top spot in CMA. I have a specific target registry point goal per year and with this comic I have now far exceeded my goal for the year and it's only May. I will buy one maybe two more comics this year.

6. For whatever reason issues 50, 51 and 52 are very heavily graded and I now have one of each; a 9.6, 9.4 and 9.4. Now I can ignore those three issues which just liter the internet. Now when I say heavily graded I'm talking about dozens as opposed to hundreds or thousands in the case of silver age and beyond. In the case of issue 50 there are 49 graded copies and two 9.6's. I've seen other CMA issue with three or less graded copies so 49 is a huge amount relatively speaking.

7. I am now back in the top 500. Given that this has drained my budget and then some we'll see how long I last. It's going to be at least three or four months before I buy something else unless a "can't miss" deal comes along.