An interesting thread. I enjoy reading about the idiosyncratic nature of collector strategies and comparing them with my own (which have evolved significantly over time).
I have no wisdom or insight into the question beyond the personal experience that hard-held collecting strategies sometime become irrelevant when faced with a beautiful gun.  
FWIW, I think that if a person has more than two of something, that makes him a collector.
P.S. I've learned that very few things last as long as regret.
__________________
"Doubtless the good Lord could have made a better game bird than bobwhite, and better country to hunt him in...but equally doubtless, he never did." -- Guy de la Valdene (from A Handful of Feathers )
"'I promise you,' he said, 'on my word of honor, I won't die on the opening of the bird season.'" -- Robert Ruark (from The Old Man and the Boy)
|