Before Third Party Grading

Here is a great classic from RWB across the river.......... Still laugh my assets off every time I read this.

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Before there was third party grading...

....numismology - was without form and void. Spirits moved within the firmament and the great Celator saw that all was whizzed and scrubbed and without spark of reason and devoid of the Great Light.
And the Celator said "Let there be slabs in my own image" and there were slabs. And He divided the slabbed from the bagged and that was the end of the first era.

And the Celator saw that the slabbed were without purpose and profit and not recombining into more profit, so the Celator said "There shall be multiple slabbers" and there were multiple slabbers filling the void of the light with their thousand points of glory. And the Celator saw that it was good. So ended the second era.

The thousand points of slabbers came and multiplied and so filled the firmament and the dark and the light they became as a plague upon the hosts of the Celator. And the Celator made a place for the slabbers and called it earth. He placed upon there all the slabbers who dwelt in the light and all the slabbers who dwelt in the darkenss. That was the morning and evening of the third era.

But the slabbers of the light and the slabbers of the darkness of earth fought great battles over dominion of the earth and the Celator saw that this was bad. And the Celator said "Let there be a Profit among Prophets of the earth." And there was a Great Profit of the earth and the Celator called it "Registry Set" as the first and greatest of all Prophet of the Firmament. And so ended the fourth era.

The Registry Set Prophet brought great and wonderful Profits to the slabbers of the light; but to the slabbers of the dark the Prophet brought only woe. And they were sore afraid and begged the great Celator to hear their plea. The slabbers of the dark created a great golden turkey which they calleth "E-Bay" as in the ancient languages meaning "blessed fraud" or" abode of snakes." But the Celator answered not their pleas and spurned their golden gift, and bid the armies of the slabbers of the light to destroy utterly the darkness of the E-Bay slabbers. Thus ended the fifth era.

But the slabbers of the light were not content. They sought not the wisdom of the Great Profit and yearned for more and prayed to the Celator to bring them a miracle. And the Celetor heard their pleas and lamentations and said, "For as much as I created you in my own image, and have given you dominion over the slabs of the light and the slabs of the darkness, and the Bayers-of-E and of all things numismalogical, I shall grant your prayer only this one final time and no more." And the Celator created a "Striking of the First" and a "Buyer of the Fool" and "a Buyer of the Gullible" and said, "Let there be pigeons to be plucked, and sheep to be shorn, and herds to be milked, and suckers to be shucked dry." And thus ended the sixth era.

Yet, uncontent were the slabbers of light. And they went out over the face of the earth and formulate and matriculate and postulate and marketate and brought forth every abonomation of Genuinessness and Falseness and of all the vermin of in between and stealith the evil of the slabbers of the darkness. And the minions of shorn sheep and dry herds and plucked fowl, shucked suckers called out in woe to the Great Celator: "Help us O great one.., for we suffer mightily and our Profits are gone and we shall surely die of thirst in the sea of slabs."

And the Celator heard their pleas; and shrugged his shoulders and sat in the great easy chair and read the Sunday Comics. Thus the Celator rested in the seventh era.