Ok I confess, I bought a couple of watches at Arno's event. Not too much buyers regret (yet)...

I bought the solid gold camaro 7228. I guess it was the world record price for a camaro for about 12 minutes, after which a beautiful steel 7220 NT sold for about 50% more, so the record didn't last long. The 7228 just looked amazing in the metal. I love the history of the gold 1158 Carrera but I don't love the case design. The camaro just seemed cooler, and (A LOT) cheaper. My other justification was it seems like a very very rare watch (but as I said elsewhere, rarity and value are different things). Anyway, pretty happy. Some pics when I get the chance.

I bid on a few other things, desperately trying to decide whether to go for one more crack at the transitional after being outbid, but then let it go. Maybe a mistake. Others went wildly out the range I considered reasonable. After a few more tries I succeeded with the Monaco 73633 B. Truly amazing condition and I loved the sleeve of the box as well. Very expensive compared to prices in the B.H. era (before haslinger), but sort of ok in the craziness of the auction room. Might not look so ok if prices go back to normal, but hey it is really an amazing piece, unlikely to be seen in this condition, so pretty happy.

So why entitle the post "A Tale of an Idiot?" ...Well, I found one of the first posts I ever made on onthedash, in 2004, where people where discussing the craziness of an 1163 GMT selling for above $2k, and I confessed to the forum that I was the guy that had pushed things to this stupid price. The confession was titled "A Tale of an Idiot", so I thought I'd use that title again for this post. It makes good reading, 2004 seems like a long, long time ago. It was the first Autavia I ever bought, first of quite a long line...

http://www.chronocentric.com/forums/heuer/index.cgi?page=1;md=read;id=2809