System stem bending

Okay, I won’t apologize for being in love with a System shape that was so popular it was discontinued in 2013 for being one of the six bottom-sellers. We’ve all seen what that eventually got us—the 2021 POY / 4AB (yes, I’m taking all the credit here—sorry to all the coat-tailers who thought it was their idea)! So when I saw this unusual Early Republic 309 on eBay, my heart began to go pitter-pat. I tried to get the guy to take a best offer, but no, he was firm and I waited two weeks, hoping to forget about it (I have a problem that is sometimes referred to as PAD). But no one bought it. It was relisted twice and in one of those addictive-compulsive moments, I paid the extra $10 I hadn’t been willing to pay before. Besides, it’s my birthday month and a fresh 309 seemed like just the way to celebrate (do I sound like I have a problem? don’t answer that). One of the things that drew me to the pipe was the unusual stamping, which I've seen somewhere before and if you remember where or it's your pipe that has this type of stamp, please email me or comment below! I thought maybe this was a stamp I hadn't seen before, an "XL309." We all know there's an XL339 of course and an XL307, but an XL309? If you click on the photo above and enlarge it, you'll see that it's not an "L" but an upside down 7 in front of the 309. And that's what I've seen somewhere before. I was hoping there was an "X" before it somehow (you know how bad eBay photos often are). But, no. It does have the MITROI stamp, thought, which in combination with the nickel-mount marks is rare enough to garner a little respect on my part, for sure. But the other thing is what really boggled my feeble gray cells: is this pipe rusticated? Is it standblasted? Or is it . . . (wait for it) a "rustiblast"?!!  You can see the horizontal rings cascading up and down the bowl. That says sandblast to me. But what about the vertical grooves? That looks like some kind of out-of-control wire-brush rustication. You can see it has gobs of lacquer on it, for sure. The bowl probably should've been tossed into the reject bin, although I'm glad it didn't. You can see it's been worked over quite a bit both by the craftsmen in the St. Stephen's Green factory and the previous owner(s).  The obverse has a noticeable concave scoop in it, visible not only from the side but from the rim as well (the rim isn't out of round--it's the bowl!). Of course on nearly every sandblast bowl you can find a slightly deeper divot somewhere and many have a slightly concave line somewhere on the bowl.  The divot was where an imperfection has been removed and the concave line is simply part of being a…