Night Owl Cards

    One of my "unwritten" vows to myself in writing this blog is to try to make each post relatively original. I know not all of them are. I have specific blog series so each of those have a theme. And anything that is a "look at the new cards I got" can be lumped together as the same idea. But I try to make those trade posts and "got cards" posts as creative as I can. I've been trying to do that for years. I don't know why I'm so hell-bent on this -- other bloggers repeat stuff all the time -- but the thought of repeating a subject without knowing I'm repeating it, which I'm sure I've done, has been one of my worst blogging fears. Well, welcome to my nightmare. I made the same post within a year back in March and I'm just realizing it now.   It dawned on me that I wrote about the same topic two different times in remarkably the same way when I was writing the latest edition of the 1975 Topps worst to best countdown. As I often ...

The spending moratorium has ended. Cash is flowing again. It's been a while since I had an August like that. It used to be a regular thing -- every August I knew money would be tight -- but the last few years we had somehow avoided it. Then, thanks mostly to pandemic-related bureaucracy, cash-strapped August made its triumphant return. But enough of that! Trading is back. Online card purchasing is resuming. And, most importantly, I've found monies for approaching card shows and post-office trips!   I'll be gathering together a couple of envelopes for sends this weekend. Meanwhile I have received a series of PWEs. Even with my professional writing talents, I have a difficult time devoting one post toward a PWE. So you're going to see a parade of them. Don't worry, it's a short parade, not one of those with 46 school bands, each one stopping in their tracks to play the The Muppet Show Theme.   I'll even put them in pyramid form for you.   First the latest Time...

Everyone knows what this is by now, but at the time that I pulled it out of the package, nobody had shown their Baseball Card Breakdown Tony Gwynn rip card on the blogs yet. So I took a casual look around the card, with mild interest, wondering how many 1989 Donruss Diamond King Gwynns Gavin must have. Then I flipped it over. Rip Card?!?!? Of a 1989 Fleer Padre? I don't care if it's 1 of 25 (ebay 1/1!), I am so going to rip this!! This is the easiest rip card decision ever (not that I have any experience with rip cards). When I first started ripping it, I thought I might be unearthing a black-border mini. But I quickly deduced that it was a magnet of some sort. My magnet is the best magnet. It's a splendid mini magnet of The Penguin. Here is a closer look. Cey is playing ball on starlit field, which makes this better than the best magnet. The rest of the items in Gavin's Holiday Giveway package where a little more regulation-sized. ...

This is one of my favorite custom cards in my collection. It achieves the three things that I look for in a custom card. But I'll get to that in a minute. This card was devised for me by Big D of the long defunct card blog, Hey That's Mine . He hasn't posted since 2012 and that just goes to show you how long custom cards have been around the card blog scene. Remember Goose Joak ? That blog was probably the first that I saw that regular cranked out custom cards. I believe that's all he did in terms of his blog. Not many of those custom cards actually became real cards if I recall correctly (although I do have a fine Alissa Milano custom created by Goose Joak). And that's why I have trouble paying attention to custom cards most of the time. I like my cards to be real, things I can actually hold in my hand. It's why I have so much trouble with digital "cards". They don't exist in reality. Custom cards that you can create online through photosho...

I passed up a card show yesterday to travel to see family in one of those remote outposts in New York, other than the one in which I live. Normally, I'd be quite upset about missing a card show. But after what work has foisted on me the last few days, I welcomed the chance to be out of contact for a few days -- or as out-of-contact as is possible in this modern existence (stupid smart phone). My sister-in-law helped make up for my card show absence with a couple of store packs. She likes to give gifts to family visitors and knows exactly what I want. Allen & Ginter and Stadium Club are as good as you can get, and they came from someone who doesn't follow baseball at all. The Allen & Ginter hanger pack didn't contain anything exciting. This was the best card in the pack. I also would have been pleased by the Clayton Kershaw By the Numbers insert if I didn't have it already. As is customary, there was one short-print in the pack. This was it: ...