Well, it's been about 8 months since I logged into my PCF account. During that time, I had the opportunity to ponder what was important to me and the things in my life that made me happy. I learned that, in addition to family and friends, chipping enriches my life. However, while I do enjoy collecting, it's the people that keep me coming back. I've met a lot of friends in the chipping community, and even when I was out of the game, you still looked out for me. I appreciate that.
So what sparked the sudden return? @navels, @colter ripton, and @CraigT78 are doing me a huge favor and putting me in touch with chips I desperately need for a personal chip project. What is this personal chip project? Well, PCF members who belong to my poker group have already read this story, but I'll repost here for the masses:
A story for all the chip nerds in this group (with language somewhat simplified for the non-collectors)...
Back in 2016, my wife and I lost our corgi, Lucky, to cancer. Little guy fought for almost 2 years, endured a ton of treatments and surgeries, and has been missed tremendously ever since. In order to memorialize Lucky, we decided that we wanted to create a custom clay poker chip set with his likeness. Custom sets are common for avid collectors, but they are typically created using molds (which compress the chip to create the indented design around the edge) that are "in production". My favorite mold is the Roman mold, mainly because the original chips used in the movie Rounders were created on this mold. Unfortunately, this mold was decommissioned years ago and there is no way to have a custom set built with it anymore. Not to be deterred, I spent 2 years scouring through garage sales and online listings in order to accumulate 4,000 Roman mold chips (created at some point in the past) that I would use to create my set. The downside to this approach is that I have no way to chose the chip base colors, spot colors, or spot patterns because the chips were already built. Nonetheless, I was able to pick through these 4,000 chips and find the right counts to use for each denomination (2,400 chips in total). It is far from perfect, but I have the mold I want and the denominations that I need to host my game, with a bank that is more than I'll ever need.
$0.25 x 200
$1 x 500
$5 x 1000
$25 x 400
$100 x 200
$500 x 80
$1000 x 20
Total = 2,400
After finding the chips, the next step was the label design. Clearly, I chose the Roman mold because of Rounders, so I also wanted to create the label using the same inspiration. Therefore, I commissioned legendary chip designer @Johnny5 to create a label that used the Rounders theme, but instead of a bear, he was able to build Lucky's likeness. The final mockup is below.
The next step is to send the chips away to have a deeper recess milled to accommodate the Lucky label. This will be done by @Gear in Canada because he has the machinery to do this automatically. This process will take a long time, but once the chips have been milled, he will apply a laminated label of Lucky onto the chips. The remaining steps will take a long time to complete, but I wanted to share the story with you as to where I am at in my chip journey to honor Lucky.
Thanks for reading!"
A few quick shoutouts:
@navels, @colter ripton, @CraigT78 - Thank you for sparking my desire to return by agreeing to send me the Roman mold blanks you found (at cost I might add). They will serve as the basis for the Lucky tournament set to accompany the cash set shown above. Your kindness means so much to me.
@Gear - For agreeing to take on my massive milling project
@Johnny5 - For doing amazing design work and putting up with my crazy ass
@inca911 - For agreeing to receive my chips and hold for Gear, saving me shipping costs to Canada
And everyone else who made this hobby just too damn special to walk away from completely.
Thank you!
Dan
P. S. You're stuck with me now, bitches
So what sparked the sudden return? @navels, @colter ripton, and @CraigT78 are doing me a huge favor and putting me in touch with chips I desperately need for a personal chip project. What is this personal chip project? Well, PCF members who belong to my poker group have already read this story, but I'll repost here for the masses:
A story for all the chip nerds in this group (with language somewhat simplified for the non-collectors)...
Back in 2016, my wife and I lost our corgi, Lucky, to cancer. Little guy fought for almost 2 years, endured a ton of treatments and surgeries, and has been missed tremendously ever since. In order to memorialize Lucky, we decided that we wanted to create a custom clay poker chip set with his likeness. Custom sets are common for avid collectors, but they are typically created using molds (which compress the chip to create the indented design around the edge) that are "in production". My favorite mold is the Roman mold, mainly because the original chips used in the movie Rounders were created on this mold. Unfortunately, this mold was decommissioned years ago and there is no way to have a custom set built with it anymore. Not to be deterred, I spent 2 years scouring through garage sales and online listings in order to accumulate 4,000 Roman mold chips (created at some point in the past) that I would use to create my set. The downside to this approach is that I have no way to chose the chip base colors, spot colors, or spot patterns because the chips were already built. Nonetheless, I was able to pick through these 4,000 chips and find the right counts to use for each denomination (2,400 chips in total). It is far from perfect, but I have the mold I want and the denominations that I need to host my game, with a bank that is more than I'll ever need.
$0.25 x 200
$1 x 500
$5 x 1000
$25 x 400
$100 x 200
$500 x 80
$1000 x 20
Total = 2,400
After finding the chips, the next step was the label design. Clearly, I chose the Roman mold because of Rounders, so I also wanted to create the label using the same inspiration. Therefore, I commissioned legendary chip designer @Johnny5 to create a label that used the Rounders theme, but instead of a bear, he was able to build Lucky's likeness. The final mockup is below.
The next step is to send the chips away to have a deeper recess milled to accommodate the Lucky label. This will be done by @Gear in Canada because he has the machinery to do this automatically. This process will take a long time, but once the chips have been milled, he will apply a laminated label of Lucky onto the chips. The remaining steps will take a long time to complete, but I wanted to share the story with you as to where I am at in my chip journey to honor Lucky.
Thanks for reading!"
A few quick shoutouts:
@navels, @colter ripton, @CraigT78 - Thank you for sparking my desire to return by agreeing to send me the Roman mold blanks you found (at cost I might add). They will serve as the basis for the Lucky tournament set to accompany the cash set shown above. Your kindness means so much to me.
@Gear - For agreeing to take on my massive milling project
@Johnny5 - For doing amazing design work and putting up with my crazy ass
@inca911 - For agreeing to receive my chips and hold for Gear, saving me shipping costs to Canada
And everyone else who made this hobby just too damn special to walk away from completely.
Thank you!
Dan
P. S. You're stuck with me now, bitches
