record time for me to acquire a limited edition mint product

As a sign of providence, I happened to have the rare day off of work on the same day as the anticipated Standing Liberty design Gold quarter ounce coin's release.

I spent the prior hour before the 12:00 start time to review my US Mint account, make sure my billing card number was right and my current address/PO Box was also listed.

After this, I simply found busy work around the house to kill the final 40 minutes or so until the frenzy started. I set the timer on my phone just in case...walked the dog, took out some chicken to thaw for dinner, picked a few ripe tomatoes, collected the eggs from the chickens and emptied the dishwasher......and still 18 minutes left !!

Okay, so I logged in early and visited some of the mint's resource pages...products...news releases and events...finally, down to the final 2 to 3 minutes !!

I clicked on the "What's New" link, opened the SLQ 1/4 oz AU page and waited for the "remind me" button to change to "place order" or Add To Cart.

Twelve o'clock finally struck and my screen remained the same--I hit refresh and got the horror of "this page cannot be displayed". I re-logged into the website and after 5 tries I caught a volume gap and was directed to the Mint's Homepage. I opened the drop down and selected the Gold SLQ--the page opened on the first try !!--Now I'm cooking !!--NOT---

I add the item to my cart and proceed to checkout--"This Page Cannot Be displayed" again...crud !!--I return to the prior page and the coin is still in my Cart--sweet !!

Three more tries and the checkout page is in view! I won't drag the story through the next 7 or 8 mins of chaos--suffice it to say I had to enter my card number, match the "billing address" with the "shipping address" several times all typed out in the forms over and over and each time I got to "Place Order" the "This Page Can't Be Displayed" or some error I made in my hurried frustration prevented the final step--and when the page refreshed, all of my typed info had to be re-typed again !!

Finally on the 7th or 8th "Place Order" click, my confirmation number was done and order confirmed-SUCCESS!

Twelve minutes is not so much but with mega-dealers somehow scoring dozens of the "one per household" coins, I was sweating it there after a few minutes.

I had to work on the date of the release of the Mercury Dime Commem gold coin and was unable to order one during my half hour lunch break from 12 to 12:30--eventually buying an SP69 pre-slabbed for quite a markup at $219.

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