Night Owl Cards

I come across a lot of names in my line of work. I'm not in the business of studying them. But like teachers, pediatricians and others who deal with kids with any frequency, I'm very aware of how parents name their children. I'm sure you know, but some of the names are bizarre. And the spellings? "Matisyn" is not "Madison" no matter how much you're trying and believe me you're trying because there is nothing that says "trying too hard" like "Matisyn". But even though odd spellings and names that seem like they originated from a different galaxy never fail to produce a chuckle in the newsroom, they are not the names that puzzle me the most. No, I reserve the most quizzical looks for what I call the indistinguishables. Other people would call them "gender neutral," but that phrase annoys me. The king (or queen) of indistinguishable names is "Taylor." It could be a boy's name. It could be a girl...

If you were collecting four years ago, you probably remember the Topps Million Card Giveaway promotion. In terms of a marketing ploy, I think it accomplished what it set out to do. It got people to talk about the promotion and Topps. For all of the glitches, hiccups and 1987 Bryan Clutterbuck cards, it was successful with collectors because of the allure of free cardboard. I visited the Million Card Giveaway site quite often that year and even though I moaned quite a bit about unlocking junk wax cards and free cards that weren't really free, I still have some cards that I won and ordered from that site. And some other cards that I won were sent to fellow collectors in exchange for cards that I wanted. In short, the Million Card Giveaway promo worked because it got me to pay attention to it. Since then, there have been similar online promotions each year. And I have paid a decreasing amount of attention to them as each year passed. I can't even tell you what a couple...

This is another one of those posts that is probably only of interest to me. And I don't have the time to do any real research that would make it interesting to others. Such is life. This blog really is about me, isn't it? Anyway, a week or two ago, Chris from View From The Skybox asked me a question that made me think something that I think all the time: "where do they come up with this stuff?" He wanted to know if cards 1-132 in the 1975 Topps mini set were more difficult to find than the other cards in the set. I told him "no," because they haven't been. But I have heard in the past that even though the 1975 Topps set was issued all at once and not series by series, cards 1-132 were printed in smaller quantities and considered short-prints. But I always looked at that statement quizzically. Because when I was collecting in 1975, that wasn't the case at all. I have excellent recollection of my first year of collecting cards and if I suspe...