9:18 am (PST): I’ve been trying for fifteen minutes to get into the US Mint website to order the Thomas Jefferson First Spouse gold coin.  Very very slow.  Most pages are not loading – I’m getting about 1 out of 10 browser windows actually serving a page.I tried calling the 800 number, but AT&T is giving me an error that says the call cannot go through.

I think that the demand today is crazy.I did actually get the first spouse coin page once… but it said it won’t be available until 12pm Aug 30th ET… of course, that was 15 minutes ago.  When I try to sign-in to the site, I get a page cannot load error.

I think the lightweight, low-end web infrastructure for the US Mint just gave up the ghost on this one.

 9:23 am PST: I’ve just managed to login… now trying to get back to the TJ first spouse page. Very slow, lots of page failures. But it feels like it’s getting better.

9:25 am PST: I’ve just managed to click “add to cart”. Let’s see if this goes through. My guess is that they started the rollout of the updated site configuration for the ordering at 12pm EST, but it took longer than expected to deploy. I don’t think the US Mint is set up for this type of “wire on” situation.

9:26am PST: I have two browser windows hitting the site now, which is helping. I’ve just clicked checkout. Since I have quick checkout configured, I’m hoping I’m close to home free.

9:29 pm PST: DRAT! The connection timed out. Lost my checkout. Trying to recover. I thought I was home free. Quick Checkout is failing… will try normal checkout.

9:31 am PST: Quick Checkout works again! I’m clicking “place order”… let’s hope this goes through. This is unbelievable.

9:33 am PST: Are you kidding me? The page is still loading. The place order has not completed. Do I stop? Do I try again? This is a surprising amount of suspense for a coin order…

9:34 am PST: The order went through. The coin is showing as backordered, but I have an order number. Crazy. I guess you have to be persistent these days to bag a first spouse coin.

Now, I have real work to do…