I gotta keep better records

Just like last week when I forgot who sent me the box of cards (Thanks jaybarkerfan’s junk), I forgot who’s contest I won this card in.

Like I said, I gotta keep better records.  I remember there were other cards and it was first come, first serve.  There was a Frank Thomas jersey card that I would have taken but it was already gone.  So I grabbed this one to send out to my cousin, and I’m pretty sure he’ll send me a Sox relic back.  He does card shows in the Ashville area of North Carolina.  So any Braves hits I get, I send his way to sell in his shows.  Although he was a huge Dale Murphy fan growing up so he may keep this one for himself.  Who knows.  All I know is it’ll get exchanged for something for my collection.

I spent my ebay bucks as well, so I’ll have cards coming from that at a later date.  Not that I had a huge amount. $1 and some change.  But I spread it out and spent a few bucks of my own.

Card show pick-ups

Well, I guess since my internet is down, I’m guessing my modem is shot because everything else I’ve done, didn’t work.  I’m blaming my wife though, she was screwing around with the wifi, trying to change the password because our oldest daughter is grounded from her phone and internet.  Don’t even get me started there.  Have to change the password just because there is so many ways for her to connect to the internet anymore.  Comcast is coming tomorrow, so this will post then I guess.

*UPDATE – Had to replace my modem and my router.  Not sure how they both went out at once but they did.

I hit a card show last Sunday.  I’ve said the card shows around here are few and far in between and usually not very big.  I didn’t have a lot of cash so I was just planning on hitting a few cheap boxes and boost my White Sox cards.  Nothing special, basically just getting out of the house and spending some time with cards because I haven’t had the opportunity to do so in the past few months.

The first box I hit was $.10 or 11/$1.  First I hit these.

I was thinking I didn’t have any ‘81 Fleer so I grabbed them all.  Turns out I had 3 of them, oh well.  Since I had 13 and went ahead and grabbed another 9 Sox cards for the even $2.  They were just some assorted Sox, I think 1 Frank Thomas but most were 90’s stuff.  I didn’t bother scanning them.

I picked these up at the same table 4/$1.  He had some player boxes that I scanned real quick and saw Carlton Fisk so I grabbed a few.

The next table had a huge box from 1973-1976 for $.25.  I was pumped to see those and went through every card.  And all I got were these 3 cards.

I only had a few cards from 1973 and 1974 so I was hoping to get a bunch when I saw the box, I found 6 cards from 1973 but I already had 3 of them.  And then didn’t find anything in the 1974-1976.  That kind of sucked.  I have quite a few Sox from 1975 and maybe 5 or 6 from 1976 so I was hoping to booster those years and only came up with the above 3.

Also at the same table, he had player boxes as well.  But they were $1 a card.  I went through the Tom Seaver cards and pulled these.

I tried grabbing harder to find cards that way the $1 a card was worth it.  I ended up offering the $5 for these and asked to throw in the 1973 cards and he did.  So I spent a total of $8 and got 34 cards for my personal collections.  Not a bad day.  I didn’t get through all of the mall to see if there were more tables as the teenage girls and my wife were ready to go get something to eat.  But at least I got a few cards.  It was just nice getting out and browsing cards.  I don’t get to do that much because my LCS’s don’t have cheap boxes and most of my cards come from blasters and rack packs at Walmart.

Cheap ebay purchases

I picked up these cards awhile back on ebay but hadn’t gotten around to scanning or posting them.  They’ve been sitting on my TV for about a month or so, but here they are.  Finally.

Mark Buehrle – 2007 UD Spectrum jersey #’d 49/75

Brian Miller – 2005 Bowman’s Best green auto #’d 49/399

Always will take any Buehrle relics.  Brian Miller I’ve never heard of, but a cheap White Sox auto is why I got this.

Carlos Quentin – 2010 Topps Allen & Ginter’s relic

John Danks – 2010 Topps Allen & Ginter’s relic

Jermaine Dye – 2008 Topps Allen & Ginter’s relic

4 jerseys, 2 of those with pinstripes.  All starters.  And a rookie auto.  All for less than $9/shipped. The 2 2010’s are from the same seller, everything else was separate sellers.

Also won this about 2 weeks ago.  I actually forgot I had won it and the seller had sent an apology because he hadn’t shipped it yet, he said ebay wasn’t showing it as paid until he actually clicked on the link.  He issued a refund and sent the card before I responded.  I told him not to worry about it and sent him back his money.  We all make mistakes, I’ve made that one myself before.  And beside, I only paid .50.  And technically, I didn’t pay it, I used my ebay bucks.

I scanned some more stuff tonight that I picked up at the card show on Sunday.  Don’t get too excited, I spent even less there than I did on the above cards.  But at least I might post something once in awhile.

Sitting here, waiting

They posted for us to work today. Don't they realize that Michigan/Michigan State is on at noon.  And the plant manager and owner likes Michigan.  Don't they know Michigan football is more important than the nice cars and boats they have.  They really need to get their priorities straightened out.

I'm recording the game on my DVR and I'll watch it after I get home, showered and in my pj's.  Yes, I know it will still be early afternoon and I'll be in my pj's, don't judge me.  Their Michigan pj's if that helps any.

I can't help to follow the game on my phone via live updates.  For one, everybody will be coming to me the last 3 hours asking for the score.  And two, I can't sit here, knowing there is a game going on while I stand around and do nothing.  So I'll follow with my ESPN text scoring updates and I downloaded a CBS SPORTS app to try to follow live.  It has live audio but I won't be able to hear it in here without headphones, which are a safety issue so that won't happen either.

My buddy here brought his iPad but he has AT&T which gets no service in the building.  I saw the plant manager in the shipping office so I stopped by for a little chat, here's how that went.

Me- Hey buddy!
Pm-(without turning around) uh-oh, I don't like where this is heading.
Me-How about you hook me up with the wifi password so I can follow the game?
Pm-You know I can't give you that, I could get fired.
Me-How about I bring you my phone and you just type it in, then I still won't know what it is?
Pm-Yeah! Nice try.
Me-I think I'm going to be sick about 11:30

Then we started talking about our local high school that I graduated from and his kids go to.  We're undefeated.

So, here I sit.  7 minutes before game time.  Staring at my phone. Damn it!

Mixed bag

Just a quick post to let you know what’s going on.  Thank you all for the concern in my accident.  All is well, my car is drivable again, all I really had to replace was the windshield.  I won’t be around this weekend as the family and I are going camping.  I assume I’ll still be able to access your blogs through my phone, assuming I have cell coverage so I’ll try to keep up.  I haven’t gotten around to doing any posts that will post while I’m gone so you get nothing.  I’m mean like that.  No fantasy friday post tomorrow either, but just for those who do follow.  I won, FINALLY!!!  And I beat my brother, whom is also going camping with me so I’ll be sure to be rubbing it in.

I will also be recording the Michigan/Northwestern game and watching it Sunday night.  I will probably follow the game on Saturday as far as scores go, but we’ll see.  I was leery about Michigan after the first few games.  But they impressed me against Minnesota.  Now I realize it was Minnesota.  But they looked good and didn’t turn the ball over.  Denard made good throws, granted they were easy throws but I’ll take the positives where I can.  The defense looked great and they have been selling me a little more each game.  Now I don’t think we should be ranked #11 or #12 depending on your pole, but we are definitely better than I thought we would be.  And I have been saying since the beginning of the year, that I would love to see Devin and Denard in the backfield and how much trouble that would cause.  From what I hear, Devin is the better all-around QB.  He doesn’t have the running ability that Denard does but supposed to be better passer with good running and mobility.  When I saw both of them out there, I got excited.  The score didn’t excite me, the play calling and the very few mistakes excited me.  So yes, I’m pumped about my Wolverines.

And since I have been slacking, here’s some cards I got from “???”, yeah, I’m sorry, I don’t remember who I purchased them from.  But he sent me a box full of White Sox cards and I needed a lot of them.  But I’ll just show you the Paul Konerko’s that he added to that player collection.

Thanks whoever you are, with all those cards stuffed in the box it was like Christmas.  So, until I figure out who you were, I shall call you, Santa Claus.

Training the family

I’m starting to get my family trained, finally.  My wife went to Wally World and came back with a pack of cards for me.  She must have been jealous that my son brought me a pack home a few weeks ago.  It’s always nice when people think about you, and even better when that results in a pack of cards for me.  She picked up a pack of Topps series II

No White Sox.  But I know some don’t like the sideways cards because they don’t look right in binders, but mine aren’t in binders so I like them.  the photos are usually just better on them.  Here are the inserts.

Babe Ruth – Kimball (nice), Tigers gold (better than a Yankee’s gold, I guess), and as many Topps packs that I’ve bought this is my first blue diamond, or any diamond if there are other colors.  And Felix Hernandez isn’t a bad pick to start with.  I didn’t buy a lot of series II but a bunch of series I so maybe the diamond cards are only series II.  I haven’t taken the time to look, but that would explain the lack of these cards in all the series I packs I bought.

Big thanks to my baby, she rocks!!!  But I hope she realizes, that now I expect this all the time.

Trade with Blue Batting Helmet

I haven’t been around much, I know.  I have still been reading all your blogs, especially “Night Owl’s” to find out what his next set blog is going to be.  But I just haven’t been in a great mood to post about cards.  Partly because of my financial situation limiting me from purchasing new cards.  Which should be getting better in a month or so.  And partly because I had been working on my Google document lists, which, for the most part, are finished.  I got all the Sox cards listed finally.  So now all I have left is to add the duplicate Sox cards to the available for trade page.  I have also updated my collection numbers to the right there.  So those are now accurate.  Too see my collections or trade page check out the pages box at the bottom right.

Rob from “Blue Batting Helmet” blog contacted me about the few Cubs cards I had for a trade.  I had just started reading his blog a few weeks before he contacted me and was enjoying it.  He does do baseball card posts, and mostly baseball posts with other mixed in there as well.  It’s a nice mix of posts and very well written.  Kinda makes my blog look like crap, but hey, your reading it aren’t you?  Maybe not now.  Anyways, I had scanned these awhile ago and for some reason, I never noticed that I hadn’t posted them yet.  So here they are, finally.

Here are just a few of the White Sox cards from the stack he sent.  You all know how much I like the vintage look-a-likes.  The 1987 Topps Steve Carlton I had in my Diamond Giveaway so I don’t have to pay to get it shipped now, which is great because the shipping is a tad ridiculous on that site.  The 1982 Donruss I threw in there because I don’t have very many of those yet.  Rob had mentioned the 2 cards on top when talking about the trade, they are pretty cool especially since I like the movie “Eight Men Out.”  These cards show the actors portraying the players from the 1919 Black Sox Scandel in the movie.  One of my favorite baseball movies, along with “*61” about the Maris and Mantle HR chase.  I hope to come across more of those in the future, like I said, I like them.

These are the 3 cards he sent for my player collections.  I thought I had the Paul Konerko but it was a different year that I was thinking of.  I like the gold edges on this one.  The 2 Dave Dravecky’s were the first 2 of my DD collection.  So a big thanks to Rob for those.  I have a couple of his cards on my diamond giveaway site as well but I didn’t have these 2 yet.

So a big shout out to Rob for the great trade.  Be sure to check him out at “Blue Batting Helmet.”  He roots for the wrong Chicago team but he’s still a pretty cool guy.

Please teach your kids!!

I know this is a sports blog, but something happened this evening and I want everyone to make sure they are teaching their kids to ride their bike safely because I see kids crossing back and forth all the time.  And then this happened this evening.  I copy and pasted it from my personal/public blog.  Please read and teach your kids.

When I was growing up, I was taught to ride my bike with traffic and stay on the side of the road.  I see so many kids that wait for a car to pass them and then switch lanes and ride against traffic.  I always get pissed because it’s just unsafe.  And I get pissed at their parents for not caring enough to teach them right.

Tonight, I was coming home from picking my kids up.  I was doing about 50 mph as I came up on a kid on a bike.  I let go of the gas to let the car traveling towards me to pass him so I could merge over into his lane to pass the biker.  And no sooner then the car passed, the biker tried to cut across the lanes and I hit him.  I remember slamming on the brakes, and I remember seeing his clothes through the hole in my windshield right in front of me.  I got the car stopped and off the road and all I remember is my kids crying in the back seat.  I told them to stay there and got out and went to check on the kid in the street.  He was bleeding pretty good but not horribly bad.  I can still picture that color red on the pavement coming from his head.  It’s not the red you think it would be.  He got up and I told him to lay back down as I was trying to call 9-1-1.

In the end, they put him in an ambulance and took him away.  He was coherent and like I said, he stood up so I don’t think he was doing horribly bad for being hit by a car doing 40mph.

I still don’t know how I feel.  I feel bad for the kid, who come to find out, was 20 years old.  But on the other hand I’m pissed because he turned his bike right in front of me without even looking.  I feel bad for his parents, but on the other hand, I’m pissed they didn’t teach him any better.  So all in all, I feel like crap because I’m pissed at him and I feel bad for being pissed at him.  I thank God that it wasn’t truly a kid, because I’m still a little shaken by it.  I can’t imagine if I had hit a kid who was 10 or 12 years old.

I just hope my kids, who are asleep now, learned a lesson from this.  And I hope they aren’t scarred for life for what they saw.  Samantha had some trouble going to sleep, and she was coughing from all the crying she had done.  But I won’t be able to get the image of them looking at me with that scared/crying look when I went back to check on them after checking on the biker.  Those looks will haunt my dreams for awhile.