Rhymin' and Stealin' (minus the rhymin')

When it comes to blogging, I try not to borrow too much from what others are doing, or have already done. I mean certain things like card show recaps, COMC shipments, trades, etc. are universal, but as far as series' go, I really do try not to step on the toes of others. That being said, with my health thing still negatively impacting my attempts to blog, I'm gonna break my rule for today's post and steal borrow someone else's series; or rather two people's series', Bo's roundups, and Nick's cool pickups. Hopefully neither gent will mind. 

I don't think the items in this post will have quite the same wow factor as can routinely be seen in the two series' that I'm ripping off, but nonetheless, these are some of the things that have made their way South over the last few months; all of which I think are pretty neat.

Since I'm thieving one of his series', I might as well start off with a couple of cards that I got from Bo, he of the extremely prolific, Baseball Cards Come to Life!. Bo got a shit-ton of Long John Silver's cards a few months ago, and in his usual fashion, then asked if anyone was interested in the myriad of duplicates. I probably should've looked at the checklist before claiming any, but instead just went by what I could see in the post. The two guys that stood out, at least for me, were Gregg Jefferies and...

Apologies for the dust on the scanner tray, it'll appear a few more times in this post.

... Eric Davis. Having never owned any cards from this set before, I didn't realize until they arrived that each player in the set has two cards; so instead of claiming two cards, I had apparently claimed four. I really like the color-matching borders on these. The photos are pretty good too. I don't think we ever ate at Long John Silver's when I was growing up. The only two seafood places I can recall going to (aside from one not so great trip to Red Lobster), were Skipper's, and the place that used to be in the food court at the Lloyd Center mall, whose name I can no longer remember. So, aside from seeing a few of these on the blogs over the years, most of this set is pretty new to me; which is kind of neat. 

The Tony Pena up top came along for the ride too. I guess all I had to do to get that one was to comment on how how cool of an image it was. I'll have to remember that the next time Bo shows off a Mickey Mantle 😉

As always, many thanks to Bo!

It seems like there's been a lot of Venezuelans showing up on the blogs on recent years. Did that in any way contribute to me getting my first two? Most likely. If I wasn't always seeing them on the blogs, I'd never even think to look for them. Back-wise, 1966 might just be the most uninteresting year for the Venezuelans, but it also looks like it might be the most affordable set for those cards too. Correlation? Who knows. I just know that I got these two, both of guys who I collect because of their ties to Portland, for a lot less than I would've thought.

It's been a while since I last got an E-Xceptional. Pre-boom, they could be found in dollar (or less) boxes at shows, and I used to buy every one that I came across. They've gone up a bit in recent years though, but even so, I didn't mind splurging a bit for a Grant Hill; which I didn't have any other copies of (I've got 3-4 copies for a few guys in this set). And as usual, the scanner doesn't do this card justice. I should've just went the photograph route. It's amazing how flat the lenticular background looks here.

I got these two Giants, my first two '64 Giants by the way, at the same time as the Venezuelans up above. Having never handled one of these before, I always thought they'd be much thinner than they actually are. That was a pleasant surprise. I didn't realize it until I was cropping the scan, but it looks like there's some weird Siamese Twins action going on here. Would this be the ultimate switch-hitter?

A few people have already posted their gets from Kerry's, from Cards on Cards, semi-recent giveaway that featured some of his off-condition cards. Buck Williams is one of my Blazers childhood heroes, and up to this point I had had zero luck in my attempts to get his '86 Fleer (a set I'm not overly fond of), so I was kind of excited to see it amongst the offerings. There is a bit of edge wear, but I was expecting much worse. I thought it might end up being a filler, but this copy will do just fine for Buck's collection. Thanks, Kerry!

It had been quite a while since I last participated in one of Matt's (of Diamond Jesters fame) Time Traveling Trades, mostly because there isn't usually much there for me, but I knew I had to try and get this card as soon as I saw it. Prior to seeing it, I was completely unaware of the various playing card sets that were put out by Brown & Bigelow in 1953. As much as I like the image of Lou Gehrig, the ad for Filson's Cities Service (which apparently was part of an oil and gas conglomerate) is what hooked me. From what I've read, it seems that anyone could order decks with their company name printed on them. I don't know how many different companies ordered these, but there's a part of me that now wants example from as many different ones as I can find.

The other selling point for me was that this is a coupon card, and not just some random jack of spades or whatever. I couldn't find any information on the coupon cards, but it looks like they might be a bit scarcer than the regulars cards; presumably because most of them ended up getting turned in for decks.

I probably (unintentionally) saddled Matt with more stuff that he'll never be able to move, but I'm really glad that I was able to get this card. Thanks to Matt for the trade (and to John for sending it in).

This 1958 Kane Products Lucille Ball isn't exactly new to me, as I got it sometime last year, or possibly the year before, but until just recently it had, unbeknownst to me, been sitting under a couple of postcards probably since right after I got it -- so I'll call it "newly uncovered". I really like this set, and had wanted this particular card for a number of years prior to getting it. There's still a few more on my wantlist, but this had been numero uno.

It's gonna be slow going, but I'm still all in on the SLU cards. Right now, I'm just trying to pick up the cheapies whenever I can. If I remember correctly, these two were around $1.50 apiece.

Here was another longtime want, and probably my favorite card in this post. Despite being well over a hundred years old, cards from the Ogden's set are still fairly plentiful, it's just a matter of trying to find copies that aren't overpriced just for the sake of their age. Wilma Neruda was a world-class violinist whose prime came, unfortunately, just a little too early to have been recorded for posterity. Being a fan of the violin, I can appreciate the card just because of her reputation alone, but the primary reason I've wanted it so long is because she was mentioned in A Study in Scarlet. I know from past posts that there doesn't seem to be many Sherlock Holmes fans amongst blog readers, but I've been so since early childhood. I have a few cards to celebrate said fandom, this now being the best. 

I've had pretty good luck so far in being able to get both cards at the same time for the players in the 1990 SLU football set. I think these two Bo's might be two of the more expensive cards in the set, so to get them for less than five bucks shipped seemed like a pretty good deal. At some point I'll need another pair for my Bo binder, but I'd rather seek out more needs from this set before spending too much time looking for another cheap pair of these.

As far as player collections go, Sal Maglie is probably one of the ones that I add to the most infrequently. Not by choice mind you, it just seems to work out that way. Knowing that, it always feels like a cause for celebration when I do get something new. Despite my liking them quite a bit, I never really think to seek out exhibits; they just seem to continually be flying under my radar. The only reason I ended up with this one is because I noticed it amongst a seller's other items on eBay. It was one of those times where I had won something else (not shown in this post), and just wanted to see if I could take advantage of their really good combined shipping discount -- and as Sal can attest, I did! I appreciate to that this card comes from the '47-66 release, so the odds are fairly good that he might've still been playing when it was made. At least that's what I'm choosing to believe.

A few other notes:

#1: Almost all of my various minor and slightly less minor health issues seem to have recently decided to band together and create a Super Friends of suck. I don't mention this to seek any sympathy (please don't do that), so much as I am to explain the few and far between posts, as well as the fewer and further in-between comments left on the posts of others. I've got ideas galore right now for all three of my blogs, but trying to execute any of them is proving to be rather difficult. This post alone, which let's be honest, is pretty crappy, has taken me almost five hours to complete (one hour each morning for the last five days), so the prospect of me getting to any of what I hope would be some non-throwaway posts doesn't seem very likely for the time being. 

#2: I finally got around to requesting a shipment from COMC back on January 29th. At the time, the estimated shipping date was 2/26, which seemed a bit far out there given that I waited until after the Black Friday and Christmas rushes, but what are gonna do, right? Anyway, I checked the counter a few times during that period to see how many orders were still ahead of mine, and after seeing that said counter had hardly moved by the middle of February, I realized that my order was probably gonna end of being late. And I was right. 2/26 came and went with no shipment being sent, and no word from COMC. A few days later, just about the time I was thinking I should send them an email, they sent me one instead. It was a generic "we're so sorry about the delay" message, which apparently has been caused by "extraordinarily high demand", and to show how regretful they are, I was given a $5 discount off of my next order, but only if I use it before the end of May. Wow! That's some consolation. It wouldn't even cover the shipping cost. Old COMC probably would've refunded the shipping cost for my delayed shipment, or at the very least, added a few bucks credit to my account to use whenever. New COMC gives me a shitty discount that expires just about the time I'll be getting my original shipment. The best part of this too is that after the my original ship date came and went, I was given a new estimation of 4/4, and as of this morning that's already been pushed back to 4/11. Had I known that this was gonna be such a problem for them, I would've just waited until after the next Black Friday sale to have my shit sent. I really miss pre-boom COMC.

#3: I have had a lot of trouble with the TCDB since around Christmas, namely with the pop-up ads that, well, pop-up at the most inopportune times. I've had two instances where I was out and about and tried to use my phone to see a couple of my checklists, only to have one of those GD ads take over the whole screen and then freeze my phone. So that, combined with the already annoying process of having to click on 5-6 things/pages just to get to my checklists on there has prompted me to start moving all of my checklists over to pages on this blog. Only two screens will have to be clicked to get to them here, and I don't have to worry about any more ads fucking up my phone. I actually started doing this back in January, but like everything else computer related, it's been slow going. So far, I've managed to complete three pages, and figure that I've got 4-5 more to do. I am primarily doing this for myself, but I guess it'll work out well for the occasional person who asks what I collect as well (a few folks were kind enough to do back around Christmas). And, because these will mostly be for me, I will be leaving them up permanently this time. This is probably gonna come across as a not-so-subtle attempt to get everyone to look at my wantlists, but I can assure you that it isn't, in fact, I'm only mentioning it because I was amused to see, while adding to one of the current pages the other day, that that particular page had an obscene amount of views; more than could ever possibly be coming from real people. I don't know which word or combination of words is doing it, but obviously something in that page has obviously attracted the bots en masse. I must admit that I'm mildly curious as to what it is that they've found so appealing, but not enough to try and look into it any further.

I guess that it'll do it for now, as I don't want to be working on this post for a sixth day... five has been ridiculous enough as is!

A Post post (Part 1)

For someone whose generally as unfocused in all aspects of their life as I am, I've been surprisingly focused when it comes to card collecting the last few months.

I think I'm past the days of being distracted by shiny objects, and aside from a handful of guys, player collecting hasn't been doing much for me, so I'm pretty much left with just sets to focus on. And that's what I've been doing.

One of my primary focuses has been on the '61-63 Post sets. I've acquire maybe 30 across the three sets since October, and while most of them have just been commons, they've all been new to me, and even more importantly; each one of them is one card closer to completing their respective sets.

Not wanting to bombard folks with too many cards in one post (like I used to do), I thought I'd break the Post's into two posts, '61 and '62 today, and then, since there's more of them, give the 63's there own post next weekend.

Don Cardwell played on a lot of bad teams and more often than not, finished seasons with a losing record. In fact, all but three of his fourteen seasons were finished with a losing record. His first winning season would come in 1961 when he went 15-14 for a Cubs team that finished 64-90-2.

I generally strive for a bit better condition on my Post cards than this, but for less than two bucks I couldn't not get Saint Ron. Of course, one of the nicest things about Post cards is that they are one of the few types of cards that you can trim; and not be called all kinds of bad names my folks on the internet. And for the record, I did clean these edges up a bit before it went into the binder.

I've got a few more 61's sitting in my COMC account, but it'll be a while before I get those. I've done a bit better with the 62's though...

Usually overshadowed by brother Ken, Clete still had more than a respectable career; and one that most guys going into the pros would love to have. He also ended up with one more ring than his brother, though I'm sure playing for the Yankees played a bit of a part in that.

The good folks of Post wound up being a bit off with their prediction. Early finished the '62 season with a record of 7-15, which left him sitting at 299 wins. #300 would come the following season (his last). Between his gout and the mileage that he had incurred, those last two seasons sound like they were an absolute slog to get through. Of course, if he hadn't lost a few seasons to the war, he probably would've reached 300 a few years earlier, and most likely would've been retired before this set was released.

This card isn't a short print, but does tend to sell for a bit more than your average card in the set. Don't ask me why though. It's not a HOF bump, because there are a number of those from the set that sell for less. And to my knowledge, there aren't a lot of rabid Early Wynn collectors out there. I guess if anyone knows what's what, I'd love to hear about it.

After a poor start to the '62 season, Willie was traded to Cleveland after just 11 games. He put up serviceable numbers with the Indians, but still started the next season in the minors. He got called back up but struggled mightily during limited playing time, and would be done in the majors by seasons end.

1962 saw Albie set personal bests in games played (which naturally led to bests in plate appearances and at-bats), runs scored, doubles, and triples.

Harmon might just be the most common HOFer from this set, and is therefor often the cheapest. I probably could've held out for a nicer copy (I did clean this one up a bit though), but this one came in a small lot. I have no doubt a better one will probably be gotten in another lot (there's one in practically every '62 Post lot that ever shows up on eBay) at some point, and when it is, this one will be given away to whoever needs it.

Joe is one of only 18 players to hit four home runs in a single game, which he did against Brooklyn in 1954. I tend not to have a great memory when it comes to watched sporting events, but I do vividly recall watching Mike Cameron accomplish this feat back in '02. Of course, that game was also memorable because Seattle scored ten runs in the first inning, with four of those runs being a pair of back-to-back home runs by Bret Boone and Mike Cameron.

It's nice to have the both of the Boyer boys out of the way, at least for '62. I've noticed a big push in recent years for Ken to make the HOF. Admittedly, I'm terrible at figuring out who should and who shouldn't be enshrined, but with that being said, I've looked at his numbers on multiple occasions and am not seeing what the pro-Ken crowd is. I do see a really good player, just not one whose career screams HOF.

Despite my recent focus on set collecting, there are occasions where it's very difficult not to add certain cards to player collections instead. This is one of those instances. It's not terribly expensive, so I can get another one at some point, but the temptation to add it to Dick's pages was very strong.

I mentioned at the beginning of the post that I have some more Post's sitting in my COMC account, which were gotten during the recent Black Friday sales. I saw a number of a people lamenting online this year over the lack of deals during the sales, which is funny, I did quite well as far as finding things that I thought were good prices go. I'm not gonna try to bullshit anyone by saying that this years offerings were as good as they were ten years ago (those days are not coming back), but all-in-all I did pretty well. The lack of free shipping this year was kind of a letdown though. I was still gonna have my stuff shipped after the sales ended, but after thinking about it some, I figured I might as well wait until after the new year to do so. At least that way I'll be able to avoid the rush, and possibly be able to add a few more cheapies to the shipment in the meantime.

Bo: Then and Now

It's a trivial thing, I know, but still, I kind of envy other bloggers who've kept track of how many mailing they've received from other people. I suppose I might've done so had I A). Thought I'd ever be blogging for so long, and B). Thought anyone would ever actually send me anything. But I didn't, so I haven't.

Again though, it's hardly even worth mentioning, but it would be nice to have a list with some numbers that I could quote when posting about a mailing from someone; especially today's someone.

I may not have a list to tell me how many envelopes I've received over the years from, Bo, from Baseball Cards Come to Life!, but if I did, he'd probably be at, or very near, the top of said list. Heck, I've even sent enough in return that his address is one of a few that I actually have memorized. As a quick aside, it's funny to think that when I was a kid, I could, and did, remember dozens of telephone numbers, as well as numerous physical addresses -- and today, I can't remember any phone numbers (or at least any that are more than three numbers), and have maybe four addresses in my mental rolodex; ironically all belonging to folks that I've never even met, or spoken to on the telephone. Odd times for sure. Anyway, back to Bo...

He was kind enough to send an envelope earlier this year, which I still hadn't covered on here, and now just a few weeks ago another one arrived --which I guess was all the incentive I needed to finally give some public thanks. 

Most of the cards from the oldest envelope were claimed from Bo's trade bait posts, including the Vida Blue/Gene Tenace rookie up top. And while I've never been, and never will be, "rookie card guy", I still appreciate being able to add that one to the Gene Tenace pages. I don't know if I'll ever be willing to splurge for the OPC version.

One of the few exceptions to the above 'claims' statement, was these two. I really can't remember why Dick and Wes were in here, which I suppose is why I shouldn't be waiting so long to do these kind of posts. As the young radicals might say, I need to "do better". I do collect Dick Groat though, and rarely ever add any cards to that collection, so... any Dick is good Dick 🙈🙉🙊.

As far Wes goes, I still don't know what to do with him. I'm sure that I'll figure out something at some point though.

I believe that this was my third copy of Boog's '64, and while I hadn't planned on doing a page's worth of this particular card, it's awfully tempting for me to want to do so whenever I see a one whole row filled with any of the same card. The presentation of the League Leaders card is very interesting with Harmon looking directly into the camera, and Boog and Reggie looking in opposite directions below him. 

Catfish is another one of the early 70's A's guys that I collect for reasons that are still unknown to me. And even though I haven't put much effort into it lately, nor have I even tried to figure out how many more I need, I am still attempting to collect all of the action cards from the '71 set. 

There's a part of me that wants to collect all of the late 80's/early 90's magazine cards. There's also a part of me that wants to add Gregg Jefferies to my list of player collections. Thankfully, I've been able to resist both wants... so far!

We never ate a lot of frozen pizza's when I was growing up, and on the rare occasion that we did, it was usually Tony's. I do remember when this set came out though, but I didn't like Tombstone enough to try to get my mom to get one so that I could get any of the cards. It is nice looking design though, despite the lack of logos.

I do collect Jamie, but I don't really want every single card of his right now, and I never remember to look for any of his more interesting cards; which leaves me with not much of a collection. I'm pretty sure that this one was just a tossed in extra, and it was much appreciated!

That takes care of the old envelope.

I knew that Bo had a few cards set aside for me, but didn't think he'd mail the two that I knew about, so I was a tad curious to find out what would be padding out this newest unexpected envelope...

Bo sent me an email a few weeks ago to let me know that he had a few extra Posts available. Leo here ended up being my only need (at least in the condition that I'm striving for with my Posts). I could've swore that I already had this one, but after checking my list, and double-checking in their binder, it turned out that I didn't. I guess I had just seen it enough times online that I thought that I already gotten it. I've been focusing on my Jell-O and Post sets quite a bit lately (you'll be hearing about this in the very near future), so it was really nice to be able to mark another '62 off of the list.

I'm really surprised that there weren't more takers on Bo's recent OPC trade bait post. People are always goin' on about OPC this and OPC that, but when someone comes along and offers up a bunch of 70's OPC for trade, it's radio silence. Were I working on any of those sets, or even a team collector, I would've been all over those extras -- as it stands though, Gene was the only card suited to my interests. It probably won't happen very often, but this an instance where I was able to get the OPC version before the Topps.

1991 Upper Deck might be the best football set, photo-wise, ever. And I'm probably wrong, but it also feels like it was the last football set to have multiple shots of blood spattered/smeared jerseys. I'm guessing that this wasn't Dennis' blood, and judging by those eyes, he was looking to shed some more. 

I didn't think I needed this card, and I see that my list on TCDB says that I already have one, and was apparently wanting another? I haven't gotten into the Reggie Roby/Dennis Smith binder yet, so I either wanted an upgrade, or something went awry when I was making that list. If it turns out that I didn't need an upgrade, it won't be the end of the world, as there's certainly worse cards to have two copies of.

The next three cards were very unexpected, especially coming from Bo. He obviously took a few minutes to look at my TCDB want list too, which was nice of him to do. I had (or still have, I think I forgot to go mark these off) four cards from the Pacific Lucy set on there, including this one, which just so happens to be Aaron Spelling's only real card. 

Most of the time when I add cards like these to my want list, it's because I want them for a themed page, and often times, said cards are the only examples for certain people, in this case; Bob Jellison and Elizabeth Patterson respectively. Unfortunately for me, it's been so long since I added these two to the list that now I can't remember which pages I wanted them for. I have no doubt that it'll come back to me, I just need to take a few minutes and figure it out (probably by looking through their list of credits). I also think that the timing of this envelope was a bit curious, as I was just finishing up Lucille Ball's autobiography, Love, Lucy, when these arrived. A very enjoyable book, by the way.

I know that we're a few days past Thanksgiving, but nevertheless, I'm thankful to Bo for all of our interactions, and envelopes sent, over the years. I'm also thankful to him for being so supportive of all of my various blogging endeavours. He's one of the few people that reads, or at least scrolls through, all three of my blogs; and I always appreciate his doing so.

I was planning to try and get caught up with the last two old envelopes from bloggers (Jeff and Fuji) before the end of the year, but another one just arrived from Tom a few weeks ago. There's at least two other posts that I really want to do as well, so I don't know, trying to squeeze in five posts during December will be quite the feat (for me). I think it'll be a Christmas miracle if I do.

Old habits die hard

A lot of good things have been showing up on eBay lately (non-sport autographs and hard to find cards for my Portland Beavers collection) and I've been having some success with my bidding, which has been both good and bad. Good from a collecting standpoint, but very bad from a financial standpoint. I've mentioned it before, but with very little money to play with these days, usually if I win something on eBay of any real cost, it means that I need to sell something else to cover that won item. This may sound sucky to some, but I have a lot of unwanted things, so this cycle just acts as a motivator for me to get rid of said unwanted things.

This routine has also made me reevaluate a lot of my stuff, finding out that I no longer care about certain things that I had been fond of, and conversely, finding out that I still care about certain things that I previously hadn't. Such was the case when it came time to put up my various Post Cereal cards. I had already pulled out various cards for player collections, but was still left with a decent sized chunk of 61's and 62's, and a much smaller selection of 63's. There was a small amount of '63 Jell-O's that also needed to be dealt with.

I had decided a couple of years ago now that set collecting was no longer for me, and even though I still felt a little something for the Post (and Jell-O) cards, they were still added to one of my boxes of cards to sell. However, when it came time to list them, I found myself having trouble doing so, sort of.

Upon seeing again how many cards I had from '61 and '62, and still feeling some affinity for them, I decided that I just couldn't list them, and instead put them in a keepers box; thinking that maybe someday I'd give the sets another go. The same couldn't be said for my 63's (Post and Jello-O). Having only about 15 or so of each (after those that fit into player collections had been removed), I figured I was so far away on those that I might as well cut my losses and sell them. Which I did, and very quickly too. I want to say that that was back in February or March when I had been making a big push to list my abandoned set builds. 

Fast forwarding to last month, I started feeling like something was missing with my card collecting. Thankfully it didn't take long to realize what it was; I needed a set to build. This led me to getting out my stacks of '61 and '62 Posts, and deciding that someday was now, and that I was gonna start working on the sets again. 

The first step was to decide if I wanted to remove all the cards from player collections, and even though I didn't really want to, I did it anyway. The second step was to make checklists...

For 1961, I found that I had 57 of the 200 cards. Not bad, not bad at all. Above is what I figure are the best cards from those 57 (I haven't looked up short prints yet, so I may have one of those and not even know it). This set came in two different versions, the ones on boxes, and the ones you could get through the mail. Mine are all from boxes, and those will be the only kind that I'll be seeking out.

As far as the 1962 set goes, I've got 59 of the 200, and as you can see above, and below, I do have a few of the bigger names.

I can't remember if I ever mentioned it on here or not, but a few years ago (maybe five?), I accidently won an extra Clemente on a Sportlots auction. I wanna say it was around six or seven bucks, so it wasn't the end of the world, but was still something that I didn't really need. Since it is fairly nice, I took with me to a card show not long after getting it in hopes of either recouping my money, or at the very least, trading it. None of the dealers who regularly buy from people would even look it at the time. Later that day, since I was already there, I also took it to the card shop in Nashville, hoping that the owner would have some interest in it. He didn't. I was told, and I believed him, because he isn't the sort to mince words, that no one ever came in looking for Roberto Clemente or Post cards. Obviously the card world has changed a bit since then, and looking online now, it appears that there'd probably be more interest in it now than there was back when I got it. Ideally, I'd like to trade for another need, but given how poorly my attempts to pull off formal trades online have gone thus far, I'll probably just have to sell it, and then use that money for some set needs.

After bindering the the 62's, I found that the most cards I had for any one page was four. This by far was the better of the two. And what's more, I was able to add another card to it during the recent pre-Black Friday sale on COMC when I picked up Elston Howard (#8) for $1.48.

I realize too that I've stated many times here on the blog over the last couple of years that I was done with set collecting, forever, which now makes me look like a real hypocrite. Yep, I'm full of shit. But wait... it gets worse!

I've also decided to chase the 1962 Post Canadian set as well. And I'm doing so despite only having one card from it (I think that this is the third time that this Ernie has appeared on the blog). I really should think twice about this one, especially given what happened just a couple of weeks ago.

I found someone on the TCDB who had 19 of these up for trade, so I sent them a message to gauge their interest. It seemed high, so I went ahead and started trying to find things off of their wantlist. While doing so, I noticed that their profile said that they like doing bigger trades, so I decided to try and make it into a bigger trade. I spent a good three hours looking for things, and probably another hour just composing the trade, only for them to turn it down and say that they don't like to trade with my sort. Apparently, I didn't get the memo that asking about the condition of vintage cards that I can see is now a faux pas? I guess I'm that sort. It's ironic too because I was told by a fellow blogger some years ago, that I should try and avoid this person. Unfortunately, I saw that they've been trading with other bloggers recently, and that combined with their huge positive feedback rating made me ignore that old warning. Obviously I should've just listened to it and saved myself the four hours. Lesson learned though, don't ignore warnings from fellow bloggers; they usually know better -- especially when it comes to the TCDB. [I'd still try again if they ever changed their mind though]

And I may be the sort who asks questions about card conditions, but I'm not the sort who makes year-end lists for the blog. However, if I was, this would surely take the #1 spot for the biggest card related disappointment this year. It's been weeks, and I'm still pretty bummed out by it.

Oh, and about this whole deciding to 'start up some old sets again' thing, yeah, it gets even worse...

After bindering up the '61 and 62's, I got to thinking about 1963, you know, that I mentioned selling 15 or so cards from, yeah, that one. Digging through player collections yielded a couple of big names, although the Maris isn't ideal with that cut. Still an okay start though, I guess. None of the 15 cards that I sold would be overly difficult to get back, as I see a lot of them in almost every single lot currently on eBay. I guess I'm doing this one again, too. But wait, it gets worser (and yes, I know, that's not a word)...

I'm picking back up with the '63 Jell-O's too. This was what I still had left. The majority of the one's I sold were poorly cut, and were not SP's or HOFers, so with a little patience, those won't be too difficult reacquire.

A couple days after paging everything up, I remembered that I had overlooked at least one card, and after setting out to look for it, that one card ended up yielding four.

A couple more '63 Posts that I had held onto. Dick Groat came from my miniscule collection of his, and Maury came from a page of his stuff that I have. That page looks a lot less interesting now :(

To the '63 Jell-O's, I was able to add, Boog, who came from the Boog collection, and Curt, who came from a page of his stuff that I've got going.

And in case anyone is wondering, yes, I know, there are some expensive and hard to find cards in these sets; don't harsh my mellow. I'll deal with those later. I'm under no illusion that any of these sets will ever be completed, but since making this decision, that feeling of something missing that I mentioned earlier has dissipated, and I've really been enjoying the process so far; it feels like old times. Well, sort of, I don't feel like I absolutely have to complete the sets to enjoy them, like I used to.

The only real negative for me so far is that after looking at these sets online for the last couple of weeks, I've come to the conclusion that if I want to work on these, I'm gonna have to start going to shows again; because the online prices are just not very good anymore. That being said, I did get that Elston that I mentioned earlier, as well as a '61 Lee Walls (for 55¢) and a '61 Bobby Shantz ($1.34) during the COMC BF sale. Other than those though, the pickings were awfully slim on COMC, lots of beaters for way more than they should be. Sportlots and the Beckett Marketplace don't appear to be much of an option either. And eBay seems like it takes so much more effort these days, especially when trying to land set needs at reasonable prices. Having been away for so long now, I'm not sure if anyone who's setting up at the twice-a-month Nashville shows would be bringing any Post, so I think I'll just wait until the next big show in March. 

There used to be this couple that only set up at the big shows who only did vintage, and I remember them having many binders full of Post cards. And I guess even if they aren't going there anymore, with probably close to 800 tables, one would have to think that somebody would have some Post for sale, right?

There's no need to feel guilty

Did you ever go through your parents closet when you were a kid? 

Did you you ever sneak into your sister's room and read her diary?

Have you ever gone through someone's medicine cabinet while using their restroom? 

Have you ever gone through your significant others purse/wallet?

Do you go through your co-workers desks?

Have you ever house sat for someone, and spent part of that alone time rifling through everything they own?

If honest, most people would admit to doing at least one of these things in their lifetime. Whether it be simple curiosity, insecurity, the want to learn secrets, lack of trust issues, needing to gain power, or just to see how someone else lives; humans are prone to snooping (to snoop is human?), and will do so for a whole host of reasons.

I can honestly say that I've never done any of the above things, why not I couldn't possibly say for certain. Maybe I learned from an early age that one shouldn't be doing such things? Maybe I learned to respect other people's boundaries at an early age? Maybe I've just never cared what other people are doing when I'm not around? Or maybe... I'M NOT HUMAN... dun dun duuuun! 

Perhaps it's just a combination of all of the above? I certainly remember hearing friends talking about going through their parents closets looking for Christmas presents, and on occasion finding more than they bargained for. And we've all heard shock jocks giving away Papa Roach tickets to the caller who's found the most shocking thing in someone else's house. I''ll listen to such stories in small quantities, but have never been able to relate to them. I think that as a kid I just didn't care enough to snoop, and as an adult, I'm of the mindset that the less I know about most people, the better! Usually the more I learn about someone, the more disappointed I am in them. 

Now with all of that being said, I do have one juicy confession to make... I enjoy going through pockets! I know, I know, but before you judge me too harshly, hear me out. These pockets I speak of aren't just anybody's pockets, they're Julie's pockets, and they're not even real pockets, they're virtual Pockets! And what's more, she encourages the going through of her virtual pockets, and not just by me, but by all of her friends. Also, it's important to point out that those pockets are full of cards, so, you know, a fellow can only resist for so long.

I don't always find quite as many goodies as some of my fellow Pocket searchers, but I do usually come up with a few cards worth claiming...

We led off with Junior swingin' for the fences, and now we've got Junior tracking someone else's long-ball attempt.

I'm not quite as enamored with past greats on current cardboard as I used to be, but there are a few guys that I still don't mind being immortalized on a regular basis, and Lou is one of them. The A&G card is nice, if only because it's easy to date the photo to 1938 thanks to that great '39 World's Fair patch.

Dick Groat is someone that I'm really starting to collect hard (I don't ever have to worry about getting his rookie though), and I hadn't seen his Swell offering before, so this was kind of a must have.

I started collecting Vlad last year, and have stopped doing so this year. He's just got too many darn cards, and I don't need another huge collection of base cards from sets that I don't like (which a lot of his come from). I'll still keep the inserts and parallels, and will probably pick up some more if I ever start going to shows again, but no more base cards... unless they're really good looking like this one!

After finishing up my big sort last year, I found that I had close to half of this Kid Gloves insert set, all of which had been acquired via dime boxes, and because I had so many, I decided to passively try and complete it. And by passively I mean that I won't go out of my to look for them, but will grab them if they present themselves before me like Scott here did.

He might need to be replaced at some point, but until then I'm quite content with this lovely Hostess holding place in my humble, almost never talked about, Dagoberto Campaneris collection.

Remember what I said about Lou, yeah well, it applies to Don too.

Start with Junior, end with Junior, or rather two Juniors... sounds good to me! 2005 Donruss Greats is a set that ha apparently been flying under my radar, for these extras that Julie through in proved to be my introduction to the set. It's pretty neat that they included two of his three stops that year, and maybe they've got him as a White Sock too, I don't know I haven't looked yet. I really like the look of these, my scanner on the other hand didn't seem to care too much for them. They were also scanned out of order, which is bugging me something fierce now, but they've been put in the binder, and I'm not gonna go through the trouble to rescan them in the right order.

Many thanks to Julie for allowing me to be like everyone else and do some snooping, and what's more, for allowing me to do so and not feel guilty about it.