Well, happy birthday to me

Back in February, I received an email from Rod of Padrographs. We're both collecting the 1991 Pro Set MusiCards and I was inquiring about one of the cards he pulled, Patti LaBelle, as I needed that card.

Rod said he'd send one if he got a dupe and then wrote, "by the way, when's your birthday?"

I looked at it and thought that was an odd question from a fellow blogger. But it was nowhere near my birthday at the time and I sent him his answer and went on my way, never thinking about it again.

Well, now today is my birthday and I know exactly why Rod sent that email.

I have been digging out of a goodie package that he sent on the occasion of being one year older! Imagine that, a blogger sending me birthday gifts!

You already saw one of the Padrograph gifts that arrived earlier. That gift was sent to me by Ron Cey himself.

These presents were sent by Rod himself, but the contents inside were also very much about Ron Cey, too, my all-time favorite player.

Happy birthday to me.

This is an item from last year's Topps Archives Signature Series. You know, that weird set where you buy a box of just one card and hope it's Mike Trout and probably end up with Kelly Gruber (not that there's anything wrong with Kelly Gruber at all).

There have been several Cey signatures in the last couple years of the Signature Series. I haven't bothered going after any of them because I have a lot of signed Cey cards already, including the 1983 Topps card. But a certified signature is a certified signature and, yes, I want it. And so I have it.

Rod sent me the 1983 Topps Ron Cey sticker that I had blogged about recently as being the only Cey sticker I knew of that I needed. It's also the only sticker I've put on my Nebulous 9 list.

Rod also went a little overboard, as we often do.

This is a glossy photograph of Cey (duh) but it's not a 5-by-7 or 8-by-10. It's smaller, like a 3-by-5. I've never known team photo issues to be that small, but then I'm not all that up on team photo issues.

This is a Nike tag that went with something (a shoe box?) that is a miniature version of the Penguin Power poster that Rod sent me a few years ago. Where does he get this stuff?

And this -- oh, man, this -- is something I've wanted since I was a teen.

I've seen these 1976 Linnett Superstars advertised in hobby mail-order catalogs for a long time. I always thought they looked cool and probably drooled a little bit over the Dodgers advertised therein.

Once I found out that the "cards" were much larger than traditional trading cards, my interest faded a bit. But I still love the way they look and it's a dream realized that the Cey item is now mine.

This is the first time I've ever seen the back of one of these. They feature "Great Cars of the World." And I just did a quick online search of the Linnetts and now I really want all the Dodgers again. I need help.

This may look like an out-of-place photo of a very 1980-looking Cey on a 1973 Topps card. And you'd be right about that, but it's not a card. It's a magnet. The only person I know who has been making "magnet cards" is Gavin at Baseball Card Breakdown. But since both Gavin and Rod are Portlandians, maybe they've been swapping craft ideas.

And here are some ordinary, run-of-the-mill Ron Cey cards, which means they're not run-of-the-mill at all (well, maybe the Cubs one). That '74 Cey, which I never can get enough of, is a very fine-looking, healthy specimen.

OK, so that was the Ron Cey portion of the package. But that wasn't the entire assortment.

You saw the Ron Cey postcard at the top of the post? Well, I've been sent that particular postcard once before.

I can't say that for most of these though:

I hope you can read those very legible signatures because I don't feel like listing all of them. Those are postcards of Dodgers from the late '60s and early '70s for the most part. The Don Sutton postcard is amazing and getting a photo of Gene Michael in a Dodger uniform is a rarity. The Dick Allen photo has been seen before but is no less wonderful. I adore the Mudcat Grant postcard and the Jimmy Wynn postcard seems to come from another time and place.

You really get a good idea of why he was called "The Toy Cannon" in this shot. I believe that's Willie Crawford on deck.

The contents in this birthday package really scanned the range of my interests.

There were minis for my frankenset mission. Sadly, only the Hicks found a spot in the binder. (Victor Robles is a TBD, based on his career future). Ryu goes in the Dodger binder.

There were signatures of past Buffalo athletes. Check out that majestic scribble on the Thomas Vanek card. I don't know what it is, but it looks like the signature of a super-fast hockey skater. Very slashy.

There were Series 2 needs for my 1991 MusiCards completion quest, or one need, to be exact. Down to needing #289 and #309.

Rod also found the last card I needed to complete the U.K. version of the MusiCards set. I'm so happy that this is complete, almost a year-to-the-date of me opening a whole box of U.K. MusiCards and coming one Cliff Richard card short!

This is an unopened pack of 1995 Topps. I've professed an interest in this set and it's gotten me to close to 300 cards in the set.

I've cooled a bit on it recently though and haven't done much with it. The pack yielded only a few cards that I needed:

The Rojas is one of the CyberStats parallels.

These are those online-only 2019 Topps Total cards. Rod landed a few of them and sent me the Dodgers!

I'm glad to have them because there's no way I'm paying the prices charged for these. It's Topps Total! It's supposed to be like $1.99 for 20 cards!

Rod also sent a bunch of other Dodgers, several of which I needed. I do mostly collect cards you know.

But there's always room for an item like this:

Both Rod and I enjoy our reading material and this looks fascinating. The whole magazine. Talk about a different time and place!

Well, Rod, now I know why you asked when my birthday was. I'm a bit overwhelmed.

Thanks for thinking about me and wishing me a happy birthday in the best possible way.

I think I will now enjoy my birthday.