I just encountered one of the greatest frustrations of being a writer:
Discovering there's a hole in your story.
Now, I've been a writer for a two or three decades. I've dealt with story gaps many times. And they've been irksome many times. But the joy of blogging is that a lot of the writing rules that apply in my regular writing life don't apply here. I can start a sentence with "and" or "hey" if I want. I can curse if I want. I can call some baseball player a fat, worthless loser and not be required to support it.
But sometimes, even in blogging, there are standards.
I just spent a couple of hours scanning cards and writing up what I thought was a pretty cool post. Approximately an hour ago, I was ready to finally hit publish, when I decided to double-check my research one last time. The double-check was going very smoothly until I reached a particular year. And then I realized: I AM MISSING A CARD.
I don't mean "missing" in that I forgot to scan it or pull it from my collection. I mean "missing" in that I don't own it and now I have to order it and wait however many days it takes to get it.
Flipping fantastic.
So, you're not going to see that post for awhile.
What I have instead are a few cards that I ordered when I was ordering the other cards that make up the brunt of the post that I can't publish.
They're not part of any great theme or accomplishment. But they're each awesome in their own right. So enjoy. Even if I barely can right now:
This is the 657th card in my quest for the complete 1975 Topps mini set. Three more to go. During this quest, I realized how much these MVP cards go for in the set. We barely gave these things a thought in 1975. I will continue to think they are overpriced.
More discouragement. I absolutely had to obtain this card as it's a recent Ron Cey issue and there is A PENGUIN on the front of the card. It was only after it arrived that I discovered it says "Chicago" on it for NO REASON AT ALL. Why would you put "Chicago" arbitrarily on a card that has no logos and with a photo that obviously features Cey with the Los Angeles Dodgers? No one in Chicago gave him the Penguin nickname. This is beyond stupid.
This makes me hate Panini more than anything else it's done. I hope it never gets a license now.
Something much more pleasant. This is a refractor of Clayton Kershaw's card in Finest. This is why this year's Finest is tremendous. Look how bright and wonderful that is.
There are also many other kinds of refractors in Finest. Black refractors. Green refractors. But I'm happy with this one. It's what drew me to 2014 Finest in the first place.
Last card. It's the only card from this year's Gypsy Queen that I truly wanted. It might be a candidate for card of the year.
This was one of the happiest moments of the playoffs for the Dodgers in 2013. A crazy good, comical play by Carl Crawford that I still have recorded for when I need a laugh. Love the reactions in the background. The guy standing up looks like an Asian Greg Maddux.
So, there you are: four cards that weren't supposed to see the light of this blog tonight.
But sometimes that's what you have to do in writing. When the first idea doesn't work out, scramble to come up with something else.
There is one benefit of blogs over my writing job that hopefully will always remain:
No deadline.
Discovering there's a hole in your story.
Now, I've been a writer for a two or three decades. I've dealt with story gaps many times. And they've been irksome many times. But the joy of blogging is that a lot of the writing rules that apply in my regular writing life don't apply here. I can start a sentence with "and" or "hey" if I want. I can curse if I want. I can call some baseball player a fat, worthless loser and not be required to support it.
But sometimes, even in blogging, there are standards.
I just spent a couple of hours scanning cards and writing up what I thought was a pretty cool post. Approximately an hour ago, I was ready to finally hit publish, when I decided to double-check my research one last time. The double-check was going very smoothly until I reached a particular year. And then I realized: I AM MISSING A CARD.
I don't mean "missing" in that I forgot to scan it or pull it from my collection. I mean "missing" in that I don't own it and now I have to order it and wait however many days it takes to get it.
Flipping fantastic.
So, you're not going to see that post for awhile.
What I have instead are a few cards that I ordered when I was ordering the other cards that make up the brunt of the post that I can't publish.
They're not part of any great theme or accomplishment. But they're each awesome in their own right. So enjoy. Even if I barely can right now:
This is the 657th card in my quest for the complete 1975 Topps mini set. Three more to go. During this quest, I realized how much these MVP cards go for in the set. We barely gave these things a thought in 1975. I will continue to think they are overpriced.
More discouragement. I absolutely had to obtain this card as it's a recent Ron Cey issue and there is A PENGUIN on the front of the card. It was only after it arrived that I discovered it says "Chicago" on it for NO REASON AT ALL. Why would you put "Chicago" arbitrarily on a card that has no logos and with a photo that obviously features Cey with the Los Angeles Dodgers? No one in Chicago gave him the Penguin nickname. This is beyond stupid.
This makes me hate Panini more than anything else it's done. I hope it never gets a license now.
Something much more pleasant. This is a refractor of Clayton Kershaw's card in Finest. This is why this year's Finest is tremendous. Look how bright and wonderful that is.
There are also many other kinds of refractors in Finest. Black refractors. Green refractors. But I'm happy with this one. It's what drew me to 2014 Finest in the first place.
Last card. It's the only card from this year's Gypsy Queen that I truly wanted. It might be a candidate for card of the year.
This was one of the happiest moments of the playoffs for the Dodgers in 2013. A crazy good, comical play by Carl Crawford that I still have recorded for when I need a laugh. Love the reactions in the background. The guy standing up looks like an Asian Greg Maddux.
So, there you are: four cards that weren't supposed to see the light of this blog tonight.
But sometimes that's what you have to do in writing. When the first idea doesn't work out, scramble to come up with something else.
There is one benefit of blogs over my writing job that hopefully will always remain:
No deadline.
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