Night Owl Cards

  It's Thanksgiving week and I don't know how much I'm going to address the holiday the next few days, so I'll do it here with this post.   I've mentioned before that I'm not a super social person, probably a given for someone who is a writer and into blogging. I'm not out in the community and although I've lived in the same spot for almost 30 years, there are plenty of people in town who have no idea who I am. The interaction I get from, say a store clerk, is the same as if I was someone stopping by while driving through from Kansas.   That's on me as much as anyone else and often why I'm not thought of in real life the way others are. I'm too reserved.   That's why I'm thankful to be thought of here. It happens all the time. People find cards and then they think, "hey, maybe night owl can use these." That's great. Not only does it make me feel good, but I don't have to spend a bunch on product all the time to boost...

  I went to a card show yesterday. You'll get the whole rundown tomorrow, but right now I'm in "now where do I put all this?" mode. This happens every show and Saturday's haul was a little bulkier than usual. So I need to clear out some space for all the new acquisitions by finally showing off a few cards that have been cooling their jets for too long on valuable real estate. All of these are PWE sends and all were Dodgers needs. Let's get to it. These are two Stadium Club inserts from last year. Will Smith seems to looking up at Mookie wondering "what's he so happy about?" I think I received these from reader Dave, or maybe Dana? Sorry, it's been awhile. I know they came with a nice card and there were a few other cards that I had previously and have already filed. But these are most welcome, even though Stadium Club inserts are totally unnecessary. More MOOKIE! I'm doing pretty well on the 1988 inserts for the team quest. This card show...

  I think I'm on record on my opinion of Panini as a baseball product. I've never had use for it, think its weak points are glaring and its strong points -- if there are any -- help convince only some collectors that it's worth buying. Panini's license with the MLB Players Association ran out at the end of 2022 and we all know it already doesn't have an MLB license. So Panini is out of the baseball card game and, well, let me take a moment to figure out how I still type while I'm standing and applauding. Panini's baseball cards were ugly, uninteresting, inept and inefficient. The only thing it did well, the 2013 Hometown Heroes product, disappeared after a year. The only other thing it did "well," Chronicles, is a mix of boring (see card above) and a whole lot of WTF. It's good WTF, for the most part, but it actively defies you to complete it, which is the opposite of what I'm trying to do here. Panini's baseball inserts got a lot of pr...

  I made one of my six-times-a-year visits to Walmart on Sunday. I'd like it to be less than that, but I've documented the pitfalls of living in a semi-populated area many times. I tell myself at least it's not as often as 10 years ago when I was making once-a-week trips to find cards. But speaking of that, I was there to get a couple household items, a combination of which you can only find there , or by ordering online and waiting two weeks for them to arrive in the mail. I naturally ambled over to the card kiosk section to take the edge off. It's really a candy-and-such kiosk but do I see any of that other stuff? No. It's funny how Walmart has suddenly become the place to go for cards now. Target has been a disaster since mid-2020. But Walmart, which had been a card desert for at least five years, has rebounded a bit. There, I found blasters of Allen & Ginter, Heritage, Stadium Club, Bowman Platinum and various Panini things that didn't register. I felt l...

  The majority of my card-sends these days are via the once-shunned, plain, white envelope. The size of the packages are smaller, and now that we've dispelled with that long-held fallacy that you're asking for trouble sending cards in a PWE, it's the more logical, and cheaper, option. I still do send out larger stuff in sturdier envelopes and I receive cards in those yellow 5-by-7s or 7-by-9s, too. But those padded envelopes are no guarantee because just last week ... ... the dreaded bullet hole again. That's some distasteful arrival, especially for 5 dollars and 30-something cents. The last time this happened to me was almost 10 years ago now (wow, I've been doing this too long). So I guess I can handle once-every-10-years, but it's still a shock when it happens. It makes me not want to send another PWE ever.   This envelope also arrived with the corner torn -- and the innards sticking out! Just not a good sign for the contents within.   But I'm pleased to...