Welcome back ...

... to that same old place that you laughed about.

I'm not sure what it says about card blogging that it took a pandemic to send a whole bunch of former bloggers back to their roots and resurrect their long-dormant blogs, but I'm not going to question the why and how when some old friends are back in town.

Just in the last couple of months I've noticed the return of Cardpocalypse, The Diamond King, Waxaholic, Orioles Card "O" the Day, Can't Have Too Many Cards, Lifetime Topps Project, Snagging Cardboard, Horizontal Heroes and ... what's this? ... even SewingMachineGuy On Cards!

Can Beardy be far behind? Dinged Corners? Treasure Never Buried? My goodness, blogs aren't dead! Again!

But some would say a card blog hasn't truly returned until they send you cards. Or at least I'm saying that because I need to form a post theme around some cards I received.

Maybe The Angels, In Order and ARPSmith's Sportscard Obsession haven't been absent as long as some of the blogs that I mentioned above, but their disappearance was noted, and it's good now to have received cards from both of them recently as added proof of their existence.

Both of their sendings had something in common, too:

Fleer!!!!

1980s Fleer!!!!

That means STICKERS!!!!!!

These are the last three stickers that I needed to finish off the ones from 1989 Fleer. Tom of Angels In Order is one of the premier sticker collectors that I know so he arrived back just in time.

I wonder what some of those long-gone bloggers think when they come back and see 1980s Fleer want lists on my blog. "What has happened to Night Owl? Is this what blogging has become?"

Yes. I am not ashamed to beg for 1980s Fleer. You don't expect me to buy those things with my own money, do you?

Here are some 1983 Fleer wants that arrived with those stickers. The Hammaker picture is most appropriate considering what he did in the All-Star Game that year. Yup, you think about what you did, Atlee, ruining the National League's dynasty in the Mid-Summer Classic forever.

This is an ideal segue way to the envelope from Adam of ARPSmith's Sportscard Obsession, since he's a known Giants fan and he "gifts" people with cards like this:

OK, OK, yes, Will The Shrill was on my 1989 Fleer want list, but this is why I never really wanted to collect 1989 Fleer in the first place. I have to put dudes like this on my wants.

At least he wasn't the last card I needed. It's embarrassing pleading for guys like him.

The rest of the package was much more welcome. Look at that star power from 1985 Fleer.

I would like to get my 1982, 1983, 1985 and 1989 Fleer sets all finished off this year. I think the '85 Fleer set will be the most fun to put into a binder. While I have no allegiance to this set (I was barely collecting then), it's quickly moving into my top five of '80s Fleer sets, which is tough to do because of the collecting attachment I have to '81, '82 and '84.

This was the best part of the card selection. Adam said he's just finished off the 1977 Topps football set and I was so, so envious when I read that. I know I'm going to get this set done by the end of the year but I'm getting so excited and anxious about this thing.

You should see how my eyes light up when I see those All-Pro banners. Just glorious cards in a glorious set.

It looks like Adam has been opening some of those Topps tins that people were going goofy over a couple of months ago.

When I found out the only thing special about the tins were some chromed-up inserts, I lost interest. Topps has gone overboard with chrome this year, extending it into things like this and into -- gah! -- Allen & Ginter. This is not a new practice for Topps (see: Heritage, Stadium Club, and T206 back in the day), but I think doing stuff like this kills interest in the Chrome set.

This was my favorite baseball card that Adam sent. Insert cards from the early 2000s are sometimes elusive and there are many that I've never seen. It's nice to get my hands on them.

Then there's stuff like this. I can't imagine anyone over the age of 25 being excited about getting a Panini Donruss card with "Cody Love" on it. I'm too old to know the nickname reference or even care. But a variation is a variation and there are binder pages to fill.

Finally, a Fathead!

These things still exist? I thought they disappeared with The Diamond King and Waxaholic!

So, returning card bloggers, yeah, we still do some of the same things we always did, like these trade posts. I see most of you have picked up where you left off rather easily so no worries there.

Mostly I want to say welcome back. And for somebody as old as I am, that means playing this song, because that's all that's been going through my head since I started this post.