Night Owl Cards

  The other day I received one of those pink postage-due-your-cards-are-waiting-for-you-way-down-at-the-post-office slips.   I always go and pay the postage because CARDS, and even being down to one vehicle -- that also needs work done kind of immediately -- wasn't going to stop me. It was a little surprising how much "postage due" has gone up for simple PWE, but after seeing the contents, I was happy I made the effort.   The cards arrived from reader Casey, all 13 of them stuffed into that one envelope, and some required extra protection, too. But this wasn't 1991 Donruss, or even the average modern cards I usually receive. Certainly worth the cost.     I'll start with one of the many parallels in products these days. This is one of the acceptable ones because it involves color, and also I'm always grateful when someone sends me an Ohtani card.     My first team logo border parallel. I've seen plenty of these online over the last couple of years but n...

Earlier this week I went to the DMV to upgrade my driver's license. When it arrives in a couple of weeks, for the first time in quite awhile, I will be able to drive in and out of Canada again. Happy Canada Day, Canada! Watch out! I'm coming back! Per usual when you re-up your license, you must have your picture taken. It never goes well. For anybody. I don't know how they do it, producing a terrible photo of absolutely every single person every single time. Is it the camera? The lighting? DMV demons? The picture-taker always asks "is this one OK?" and shows the photo, which then causes me to go into shock, more so this time because I haven't had a haircut in four months on top of looking five years older plus the usual DMV sorcery. I go through the five stages of grief in about 15 seconds before stopping myself from saying, "It's not going to get any better." Finally, I respond: "Yeah." It makes me think of baseball player...

Are you starting to feel like I don't have any time for you? Sorry about that. It's true. I don't have any time for you. But you've figured that out already. Perhaps it's me cutting down to posting four days a week (from a former twice-a-day poster). Perhaps it's no card packages from me for weeks. Perhaps it's the lack of in-depth content or unusually short posts, at least by customary NOC standards. As usual it's not me, it's the job. Work. Eat. Sleep. That's about all I've accomplished recently. I'm hoping to shake myself out of my stupor at least somewhat after this weekend, because, thank the sports gods, THIS IS THE LAST WEEKEND OF HIGH SCHOOL SPORTS UNTIL WHATEVER TOO EARLY TIME THEY DECIDE TO START THEM UP AGAIN!!!!! I know there will be a time when they decide it's an excellent idea to play high school sports around the calendar with absolutely no break at all. I see them inching closer toward that ridiculous bri...