Bracing

I am going to a card show this weekend.

At least I think I am. When you've gone without something for so long that was such a regular routine there's a tendency to think it's never going to happen again. Like growing apart from a best friend.

But that's what the calendar says. There's a card show to go to for the first time in almost two years.

Will I remember what to do?

Or, more to the point, will what I remember doing work anymore?

I don't know what to expect. I don't know whether to anticipate crowds (ick), bros and briefcases (double ick), higher prices (help!) or the same old routine from 2006-19.

I plan to do the same stuff I always do. I'm going to leave at the same time, bring the same amount of money, find the same tables. If I show up and it's all gone, well, I've figured out how to buy cards other ways in the last two years anyway.

I'm pretty excited, but I don't have a lot else to say. There are want lists to refine and I need to distract myself with yard work, the job and watching games on TV so I don't freak out.

So, to tide you over, here are a few cards from my most recent Sportlots order that didn't fit into any of the themes on previous posts.

A Donruss short-print from 2015, I believe, of the forgotten Yasiel Puig. Remember those days? I went to card shows then.

A couple of Laughlin World Series cards, one from 1970 and one from 1971. I want all of these. I don't think getting them card-by-card is the way to proceed, but I'll figure out a better way at some point.

Some 2018 Topps '83 All-Stars from the Update set, I think. It's getting to be a long time ago. It seems like I spend too much time tracking down inserts from 3, 4, 5 years ago. It's a bad habit. But going outside to light up feels so good.

 

I think I saw this card on Baseball Every Night, that's where I see all of the Dodger Darryl Strawberrys that I don't have. It's frustrating to find an early '90s Dodger that's eluded me but at least this one is never getting away.

I want to discover things like this at the card show. I'm hoping what I want will be stuff that the investment types never even think to grab. I hear how vintage cards are becoming increasingly pricey due to the boom and that concerns me most of all, but I haven't seen it myself yet and I have enough interests that I can always pivot to something else.

I think.

Who knows.

I haven't been to a card show in almost two years.