Just because

It was quite the festive day at the Night Owl household on Wednesday. First, a morning of Christmas shopping for my daughter, and then an evening of concert-going to see that same daughter in her school's Christmas play/musical (the highlight: all of the fourth, fifth and sixth graders in the chorus danced while standing in place during one song. You had to be there, but it was cute and cool).

Amid all the holly and jolly, I found myself at the card aisle in Target with only a few dollars to spare. Blasters were out (there were three of those Sweet Spot tins, but I'm not paying 30 bucks for that). And there remains just one 2008 set that I am actively collecting (Heritage). The Heritage box was front and center, right where it's been for weeks. But I ignored it. The doubles have been outrageous lately. You turn down someone enough times, Heritage, and they're going to stop asking you to the dance.

Instead, I picked up a pack each of three items that have interested me the most lately. One pack of Stadium Club, one pack of Timelines, and one pack of Wacky Pack Flashback 2. I read about the return of Wacky Pack stickers here, and I had to pick some up. As a kid, besides baseball cards, my brother and I collected Wacky Packs, which were basically the precursor to Garbage Pail Kids, etc.

So I left the store with three random packs. Just because.

And, we're going to see what's in each pack. Just because. My goal for each: the Jackie Robinson card for Stadium Club, any Dodger from Timeline, and the Topps "Beanball" 1973 wrapper spoof sticker from Wacky Packs. Let's see how I did:

I think this is the fourth pack of Stadium Club I've opened. Pretty meager, I know. But I've purchased only one blaster of ANYTHING since the start of November to save cash for Christmas. If I was going for blasters, I think I'd grab this first. Here we go:

Adrian Gonzalez, Padres. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Nick Blackburn, Twins. I've pulled this card once already. It's a decent shot.

Joba Chamberlain, Yankees. I've pulled this card once already, too. Geez. And there's Gonzalez again. Nice photo. I'm not sure what the woman is doing in the stands in the center of the photo. Either she's reacting to the play, or she has no idea what's going on.

Mickey Mantle, Yankees. Nice card, although I'm not in love with the whole colorizing thing. And this card means I'm not going to get Jackie now.

Jeff Niemann, Rays, first-day issue. You get so many cards of certain rookies that they don't seem like rookies anymore. Niemann's one of those guys.

Checklist. The entire set in one handy card, I think. And that signifies the end to this pack. Except for David Wright's whole education lecture. On to Timelines.

I've come to appreciate Timeline a lot more than I did when it first came out. I think it's because of all the various designs, the stadium shots on the backs of some cards, and the base cards are a lot more appealing than I originally thought. They look a lot better in person. But the short-printing fiasco means I'm not blasterizing any of this.

Derek Jeter, Yankees. Corner is dinged. Way to go, UD. It's not like anyone collects Jeter.

Torii Hunter, Angels. I like this card quite a bit. It's vibrant, and I love vibrant. I'm a vibrant-o-phile, or some other similar term that's not quite as creepy.

Chase Utley, Phillies. This is a pretty nice pack. I wonder if Utley knows Chad Billingsley. They can swap offseason rehab stories.

Phil Janish, Reds. This is one of the inserts, based on the '92 UD minor league design. I've opened exactly two packs of Timeline and this Janish card has been in both packs.

Jeff Keppinger, Reds. One of those SP die-cuts. Die-cuts were always too gimicky for my taste. I've learned not to hate them, but that's as far as I'm going.

Jay Bruce, Reds (what is with all the Reds! I guess that means no Dodgers). These are the cards with the stadium backs, which have been nicely featured on Cardboard Junkie. Here's the Bruce back photo:

The lights are on, but it's not a night card. And that's not a great representation of Great American Ballpark. A shot of the upper deck? Is that self-referential, UD?

So, two packs, no Dodgers. Oh-for-2, so far. Let's see what's wacky.

These are all reprints of stickers printed since the series began in 1973. I think my brother and I started collecting these in 1974. Topps is already ruining my nostalgia rush by advertising parallels and, ugh, printing plates on the pack. Let's see if Topps can make it up to me by getting me the Topps Beanball wrapper spoof.

This sticker is from the 1985 issue; you can see the year in the upper left corner. This is long past my sticker chasing days (I was chasing something else in 1985). I didn't know Wacky Packs did political humor. The write-up in the blue box is a reference to the Reagan adminstration classifying ketchup as a vegetable.

The Tricks parody is the back of the T-shirt sticker. It shows what a completed "orange border" puzzle is supposed to look like. There are also blue border puzzles, green border, yellow border, and who knows what else. And not all of the cards have puzzle pieces on the back. Topps will get your money any way it can.

This is from the original '73 set. I remember this one. Kids would slap these stickers on everything. Their bikes, skateboards. Teachers hated it when kids would put them on their textbooks.

The "Blunder" back shows a kind of billboard-style parody of Bazooka gum. Some of the backs have this, some have puzzle pieces.

I don't even understand some of the stickers. I'm not sure what kind of candy this references. I know there was candy you could buy that came in small plastic containers made to look like garbage cans. But I always thought that was an '80s thing. This says 1976.

YES!

Beanball! I realize that Topps is spoofing itself, but it's SO true! Topps IS stupid. All the cards ARE the same (if you're pulling endless Mantle cards and haunted by short-prints). And the gum DOES taste like cardboard. I love it! I'm making this my "card of the week" as soon as I'm done with this post. And I'm finding a place special for this sticker.

Woah! Nostalgia rush. I had this Gulp sticker as a kid. I'm not sure why they kept featuring apes. Maybe because "Planet of the Apes" was so big then?

Bottle caps are one my absolute favorite candies from the 1970s. The Quacker Oats sticker is from the original series and one of the more famous ones. I don't quite get the Screech tape one, (If they printed it 15 years later, they could have put Dustin Diamond on the sticker), but the cartoon girl is cute.

Three pretty interesting packs. It's nice to know you can still find some intriguing '08 cards with only two weeks to go in the year. And I received my Beanball sticker, so I'm happy. For today, anyway.