Marital Double Jeopardy

 Some years ago before the price of gold went ape I bought the little gem illustrated below. As you can see I am not a strictly military collector when it comes to medals. The medal below is the pride and joy of my collection. It is a unique 40 year service medal issued by the Milwaukee Electric Railway and Light Company and affiliated companies. I’m not going to bore you with it’s Milwaukee history which will be in a future edition of The Centinel , published by the Central States Numismatic Society. All that need be mentioned here is that this gold medal has 34 white diamonds mounted along the rim and a ruby at the top. As a married collector I pride myself on being honest with my wife about my purchases. I want her to know how much I paid for my items so that if I croak she will not be an easy target for the ever circling vultures out there. Normally when I show her my latest prize I get polite condescension but this time was very different. Her eyes got wide when she saw all the diamonds. “If you can afford all those diamonds then I should get a big diamond 20th anniversary ring” I couldn’t counter that one and she did save me a lot of time that I would have spent trying to figure out what I should get her for our 20th. Fortunately I also have a good friend who is a jeweler and also a coin dealer, Christopher’s of Iowa. My better half was able to find a ring she wanted and we had the stone upgraded all for a most reasonable price which I was able to pay for in a cash and gold coin trade combination deal. Now the only remaining question is, should I add the cost of the ring to my cost in the medal or does the expense of the ring get filed under M for marriage maintenance. I guess I know the answer to that one.