Ed has left the building!

Ed Roman is going the way of the dodo. Ed himself will apparently be starting up his own custom shop somewhere but the current store was bought out, lost the lease on their location, and is closing shop. While I was there, reps from Ibanez, Fender, etc. were taking inventory and figuring out what to ship back. This altered my strategy a bit. I wasn't happy with the wear on the Schecter anyway (I didn't bother to look very close when I wasn't planning on buying it).
As I ogled an expensive Ibanez, the Ibanez rep struck up a conversation with me. I told him that I wanted to get one but they were just a bit out of my price range. He said that I should talk to a salesman because they might cut me a deal under the circumstances. When I salesman approached, I pointed at a guitar already marked down to $460 (msrp is $599, lowest internet price is $450) and jokingly said "I'll give you $300 for that one." To my amazement, he replied "Let me see what I can do." He came back and said "The best I can do is $429."
Here is where it gets interesting. I thought he said $499 so I laughed and said "That's not much of a deal!" thinking the price had actually gone up. He went to check again and returned with an offer of $399. I think that is dealer cost or very close to it. Something clicked in my brain and I decided I had to have it. Of course I had to call Niki and make sure I would not forfeit my life by spending that much.
I pulled the guitar off the rack just in time as the Ibanez rep was removing all the guitars that were being returned. Both the rep and salesman told me that I should take good care of it because it is a limited edition (salesman told me only 40-50 were made and were never even put in the Ibanez catalogue)and will most likely be worth something in the future.
I present to you the Ibanez RGR521 GX2 "Grim Reaper"!