I still have plenty of mailings to scan, organize and thank publicly, and I need to get to those. But let me jump on the recent bat around posed by Chris at Nacho Grande about the most difficult set to complete.
If you spent any time on my Want lists (both A&G and regular), there are plenty of sets sitting on there for most of the 5 years of this blog, and any of them could get the title. But on many of those sets, it's not that they are difficult to complete, but that the building has stalled. Mostly for financial reasons, but also for time reasons. My 1964 Topps build is stalled because I have not had a chance to hit a card show in quite some time, stopping me from visiting one really good vintage seller and a couple pretty decent suppliers. My 2008 UD is just needing time on COMC, Sportlots or JustCommons to fill. Ditto for the numerous A&G mini sets (both insert and the 2010 minis), Gypsy Queen, Stadium Club, Cooperstown and even the 1977 Topps Star Wars sets. Sure, some of the prices can be a bit silly, but the cards are available. It's just the due diligence to actively search them out.
"So is it left at Piccadilly Square?"
The 2013 Heritage could almost fit the bill. There are a couple cards that sell for a crazy price I can't seem to fathom (looking at you any card with Mike Trout on it). But again, there are still other cards on my list that with time and effort, could be deleted from the want list. It's effort, but not crazy effort. It's more a changing of the mind set to know that my actions will definitely achieve results, instead of the gambler mindset. We all know what that is.
But when I thought a little more, a simple 5 card set jumped into my head, and I would have to put this as a difficult set to complete. "Five cards", you ask. Now we know there is something seriously wrong with you. How hard can a 5 card set be to complete? Are they made of gold and diamonds?
Not quite. But they brighten the outdoors.
2011 Allen and Ginter Flora of the World. I don't remember which card I first pulled from a blaster. I think it was the Alyssum at the bottom. I thought this was different and unique - cards you can plant and grow flowers from. I wonder if anyone actually did it. I would have if I had a dupe, but these were difficult pulls. Online it says one per hobby box. I can guarantee my one came from a blaster, so not sure how accurate those odds are.
Years back, though, it was hard to find these, and at a normal price point. I just checked ebay and some are listed pretty cheap. I remember finding 2 of them fast and inexpensively. The 4th took effort, but secured it at a price I could manage. It was the Mexican Hat card that proved elusive. Very few showed up online, and the couple that did were priced above the cost of a blaster. The usual drunken seller thoughts. I think it took a year, and a couple sniped losses, until I finally got my hands on one and I could put the set to rest.
Silly set? Sure. Small? You bet. Worth it? Totally. Difficult? I think so. Music video? Of course.
I few posts back, I made a statement about my last visit to my LCS, focusing on the word "last" and saying it was the subject of another post. One person caught that statement and commented that he thinks my vague phrasing may be that I have stopped going to that shop. Well, let's rip off the band aid and get to it.
Simba will make it hurt less. Hakuna Ma-up yours.
For those that haven't figured it out, I'm a pretty hard liberal. Not psycho left wing, but a far distance from moderate. Swing by my house sometime and check out my bumper sticker collection on the window in the office. Now my local LCS (5 locations with the main just 10 minutes from my house), the owner is pretty conservative. Dyed in the wool right wing. If you go to his shop, there are two TVs on. If Brian is not there, you usually have sports on. But when Brian is in the shop, it's Fox News all the time. Rarely you get a game, but that would only be on pack wars night and the insistence of the folks in the shop.
We all have our views and morals. We all vote for whom we want. That's what's this place is about. I would rag Brian about Trump, but currently he is the Cheeto in Charge (who knows how much longer), but it is what it is. Brian had no issues with my left views and I accepted his right. At times we would discuss some things where we had opposing views. I can honestly say it's always refreshing to hear new angles on subjects. It's important we listen, even if we don't agree and we do not change our position.
Anyway, a couple weeks back I stopped in the store after a doctor's appointment. It was National hockey card day for one thing. And since I am not buying 2017 flagship, I hoped someone has ripped boxes and cases, leaving the cards behind for the shop to resell. I was not let down.
I spent time digging through this commons box, pulling out White Sox and other binder cards. People were coming in and out (the store does good business) and Brian is always very personable. He knows all his regulars and semi regulars well and greets them warmly with more than card talk. One couple came in and made a comment they hadn't seen Brian in a while at the usual place they would run into him - Walmart. Brian's response:
"I don't shop there anymore. They started carrying that Black Lives Matters crap so I take my money elsewhere."
I was well in earshot to hear this, and while we have differences, that statement cut me to the core. I took his statement two ways. First, I see that as him not really understanding what BLM is all about and the reason it has formed. But as I thought more, and factored in his noticeable love of all things Drumpf, I felt a tinge that his statement was mildly racist.
To this moment, and beyond, I don't think of him as a racist person. I probably never will. But there was too much in what he said and how he said it that shook my own morality. "He has a good point", I thought. "If you don't like the world direction a shop, company or corporation has, you have the right to take your business elsewhere". He has that right. You have that right. And I have that right. So I collected up what I had, paid and haven't gone back.
Brian not shopping at Walmart is a blip on their radar, just as I not shopping at his card store will do nothing to hurt his business. If you average it out, I maybe spend $50-75 a month at his shop. My wallet will not be missed when the quarterly totals are figured. But I cannot in my right mind fail to speak with my pocket in the same way he does, or the rest of us should do.
The one thing: I can afford this luxury. Sure, Brian has 5 shops in the area, and the two nearest to my house are his. But I am fortunate in this blog community to have so many shops to visit. Off the top of my head I can count 6 shops within an hour from me, plus darn near weekly card shows I can attend. Many of you barely have one of either shop or show. So this financial protest doesn't hurt me, but if I was to stop shopping at Jewel, I need my groceries from somewhere, and there's always Tony's, Mariano's, Aldi, Caputo's, Ultra Foods.....you get the idea.
If anyone is in town and wants to go, I will go. But I am making a conscious effort to give my business to another establishment. And if they all support Drumpf, there's always the internet.
Ok - enough of that. What was my last purchase? For starters, I pulled the complete series 1 White Sox set. I need an extra Eaton for the player collection if anyone has a dupe. Also in the commons box I found these:
Buybacks for the frankenset. Gem mint - I should get them graded.
Double play cards. I like finding that Pedroia for this image because it shows that even the '87 Topps design is better than this year's, mainly because the image it's cut off by the horrible layout. Who is Peterson doubling off? I know it's a Cub from the weeds in the background, but I would have to squint to see the name. Or to even know that Jace was soaring over someone. Dustim? Oh yeah - there is another player in the frame for sure.
Three throwbacks? Is that all in the base set? I really should stop complaining and be thankful I don't have to add too many to the binder.
Someone asked for the '65 vintage box, and I was able to hit it before they put it back. Every vintage was a dollar or less. Wood goes to a soon to start PC. I picked up a few more White Sox for the 1965 set than just these two.
Last, I showed the Stengel already, but no one will complain for another view. And yup, TTM autograph for a dollar on some loved vintage. I almost passed, but I can think of a Cardinal fan who is quite happy about one of the Final Four teams that would not refuse this card.
I apologize if I got too political and thank you if you read this far. I'll do my best to only talk about cute, fun things in the future.
Every Thursday, I post a card showing a ballplayer wearing a throwback uniform from my collection. Hopefully, he will be wearing it well, with proper pants blousing. The picture may be from the front of the card, or the back. Enjoy the uniforms from years past.
I'm not sure how many of you are as eager about April 14th as myself and Junior Junkie are, but that is the date MST3K returns to Netflix via a crowd funded production. I watch the hell out of the shows on YouTube (they are real easy to find), and you honestly need to watch one if you haven't. Manos is a classic, as is Mitchell. I really like Space Mutiny. Personally, my favorite is not a movie but the short Mr. B Natural. The upcoming Netflix series looks very promising, so I should finish up season 2 of The Man in the High Castle before the 14th rolls around.
PACKARD WINS THE SUPER BOWL!
But when new stuff appears on Netflix, old stuff rolls off. And this month. it's Firefly. Firefly has been a mainstay on Netflix for what seems a year now, but they are pulling it off April 1st. If you haven't watched it yet (and what the hell is wrong with you if you haven't), get on it. Or you can borrow my DVDs. As I have showcased in the past, Upper Deck put out a set for the show in 2015 - Firefly: The 'Verse. I have been about a dozen cards short of the set, and the boxes are on clearance over at DA Card World. Why not rip another, eh? You should get 3 hits from a box: an actor autograph, a manu-patch and usually an artist autograph.
I was able to complete the set with this box, so it's gone from my Want list. That is a very, very good thing. For those that cannot remember, here's a few of the cards I needed to finish the base set.
I particularly like the bottom card of Inara smacking Mal across the face. These three showcase the nice range of artists and styles that appear in the set. I got my fair share of serieled inserts (4) and green foil parallels (a dozen I think). But the hits. That's what you all care about. So enough dilly dallying. I am to misbehave.
The artist autograph is on a matte finish copy of a card they drew. Not a 1/1 sketch, just a card without the heavy shine. The artist is David Hindelang, who has done a lot of fine work for Iconograph Studios. The actor autograph is Isabella Hoffman, who played Regan Tam, the mother of River and Simon Tam who hide out on Serenity from the Alliance.
Box #3 ended up with 5 total hits, and I could not be happier. The manu-patch is of Preacher Book (RIP Ron Glass). It's ok - no biggie. Love the 1/1 sketch of Serenity mechanic Kaylee. I have a huge crush on Jewel (who doesn't), so this is a nice addition to the other sketch card I have of Mal. This sketch is unique, though - the card is specific that it would be a sketch of Kaylee - the artist did not write that in, and the numbering on the back is different from a standard 1/1. The artist is Scott Zirkel, who does art in his spare time according to his website. Some really nice work he did for the set, and hey - my card is at the lower left!!! Last is my 2nd printing plate, this of Inara getting the upper hand on Saffron.
Nice to have the base set complete. Now I don't have to get another box.
When you hit 50 (I'm talk to the yoots), you can look forward to it. The procedure? Nothing. You are knocked out for it. But the stuff you have to drink prior??? Midway through the first glass, you start thinking "ya know - detected early, there is a 65% survival rate".
I make light humor, but believe me - the testing is important. Colon cancer may be the actual reason my mother passed away, so yay genetics! It's just that the prep fluid tastes like drinking liquid Pixie sticks laced with battery acid.
Update #2. If you see your zipcode below, watch your mailbox:
All the Tis The Season mailings have left except 3. You two hosers up north I have not processed yet. Tomorrow. And Gavin, but I am waiting on an additional item, you 5th anniversary winner, you. There are a few others I need to envelope up. All in good time.
As is the rule, there has to be a card scanned.
I picked this Stengel up at my last visit to my LCS. Key word: last. It's a story for another post. But I couldn't pass up the sunset card of the Old Perfessor when it was all of a buck. 1965 was Casey's last year in baseball, retiring mid season of that year after breaking his hip at a friend's home.
Back to work tomorrow. All things considered, I actually would have rather been at my desk today.
So as many yesterday figured out with very little hints, it was the 5th anniversary of my little corner of stupidity. So the post yesterday was some fun...
...that I almost forgot about. See, I actually started that post a year ago. It would have been the 4th anniversary post. But life got in the way and I had to shelve it. Yesterday, my mind goes "oh yeah - when is the blog anniversary? HOLY SHIT - TODAY!". So I put the finishing touches on the post and clicked submit.
Hurry up, it's getting late!
My goal was to put people on a little bit of a hunt, and the whole wording of the post should have clued you off. If not, the images posted would have. For those with eagle eyes, the first image was that of the Nazi enigma machine. And the second was Jim Carrey as the Riddler, or more exactly Edward Nigma: E. Nigma. Those should have been enough to let you know it was just just a post gone haywire, but a coded post. A simple cipher, really. I didn't want to get too crazy with how the words were encoded. But with any cipher, one must have the key. The title and the video should have made that obvious - five. So if you went to a website for a shift cipher, and entered the text with the shift of 5, this is what you would have read:
So today's date has a lot of importance throughout history. Some of it has to deal with amazing things. It's the wedding anniversary for Franklin Delano and Eleanor Roosevelt. The Brtish evacuated Boston in the Revolutionary War. On this day, the National Association of Professional Baseball Players was founded, as was the Camp Fire Girls. Almost a hundred years apart, the first submarine stays under water on this date for almost two hours and IBM releases DOS three.three. The first is little cause for joy when forty years later German U-boats killed over six hundred people in numerous years during the war today.
Word processor from hell
For those celebrating birthdays today, you have Hank Bauer, Shemp Howard, golfer Bobby Jones, Nat King Cole, Mia Hamm, actors John Boyaga and Kurt Russell, and Jophn Wayne Gacy. Deaths included Ray Meyer, Alex Chilton, Amos Alonzo Stagg and St. Patrick. Now you know why today is St. Patrick's Day.
And today is also the fifth birthday of this little corner of my baseball collection stupidity on the internet. After being a lurker for about six or seven months, I decided that I enjoy writing (somewhat) and I just hoped I could carve out a little spot for me. Maybe someone would read it, and maybe it would get ignored. But as I have said in the past, readership doesn't matter. I truly thank you that come here when I write, to read my plodding posts and comment. I hope somewhere you enjoy it, if only to think "hell - just how does he think he's funny?"
IT'S BLOGTIME!
So being my anniversary, we need to have a contest, right? How about you send a message to the Gmail address heroesgiveaways? I've been sitting on a nice autograph I pulled from a box of Archives Signatures, so the winner will get a one out of five signature of Doc Gooden. I think I'll add more to just that prize, based on how this contest is responded to, mainly because if you get involved, you will probably hate me.
There is a long line, folks. Take a number.
If you are thinking a simple email would get you into the contest, you don't know me so well. An email to that address would have gotten you an automatic return that read:
If you got this far, you are pretty smart. That being said, if you paid
any attention, this is a contest, and to get this far took a little bit
of work, so just emailing here is not enough.
But
this 2nd part is the last part, I swear. The winner of the 5th
anniversary contest is the first person that leaves a comment on a
specific post. What post you ask???? You have to figure it out. I will
give you a few hints.
The post was in 2013.
For a one month time span (yes - one month), every music video at the
end of the posts all tied together. There was a specific theme/subject
that tied them together. If you are not sure what that theme is, think
about the post that got you to email here.
Now,
ONE VIDEO on ONE POST during that month lacks the theme. That is the
post you need to leave a comment on. Call me an asshole. Call me a
genius. Leave your recipe for hummus. Doesn't matter what you say. First
person to leave a comment wins.
I have
verified all the videos work, so if you find the right time frame, you
can play them all, jam out, and then figure out the odd song out.
Yes
- I am this sick. And for being this mean, I need so much more than a
Doc Gooden encased autograph. I'll work on it. For all I know, no one
will ever receive this automatic email.
I'm an ass - you all know that!!! Well, Gavin over at Baseball Card Breakdown must have been very bored, because the number of posts he commented was straight insane. Yet, as of this morning, he had not hit the specific post. About an hour later, though, he found it. In an email conversation, I mentioned that sheer will got it, but did he know what was different about that post. Just a few minutes later, he hit in on the head. First, the post is question is this one:
I had to clear the video at the end of another post, but only because it was deleted from YT, and I could not figure out just what the video was. But it did not change the outcome, as it was a video that I think showed an image of the theme. This was the exact post that was different in that month time frame than the others. If you view the posts from Road trip thru Catching up before I head out, all posts (with a video embedded) have a common theme. That theme? The word Buckingham.
In the videos, you either have Fleetwood Mac, with member Lindsey Buckingham, or a solo Lindsey. You have a couple songs by The Buckinghams. Two videos feature Buckingham Fountain in Chicago (the title video for Married With Children and a random fountain video). There is even a video of Ozzy performing for the Queen at Buckingham Palace. The "One more" post, though, has a song from the band XTC singing about the Statue of Liberty. Now, XTC is from England, but nowhere near London. Plus, it is a song making reference to an American icon.
Well done Gavin. I like that you actually found the tie in and didn't just hammer away until you stumbled on the correct place. Here's what your prize looks like:
It's been in the box since I pulled it, so any imperfections is the dirty scanner. And since you did figure out the true connection in the posts, I'll include a bonus. I hope you get something good out of it.
So there you go folks. Welcome to the start of the 2nd five years. It's gotta get better, right?
