Night Owl Cards

When I was a kid, I drew a line on the breakfast table between the cereals that were edible and the cereals that clearly were not. On the side of "fun to eat" was Cap'n Crunch, the Monster Trio (Count Chocula, Frankenberry and Boo Berry), Corn Pops, Sugar Smacks (dig 'em), Magically Delicious Lucky Charms, Coo-Coo For Cocoa Puffs, and Fruity and Cocoa Pebbles. On the side of "that's not food" were dreaded concoctions like Product 19, Rice Krispies, Corn Flakes and Wheaties. Wheaties was the worst. I refused to eat it. My brother, though, was a cereal nut. He'd eat just about every brand. He'd willingly get up at 7 a.m. (this is when he was a teenager, mind you) and also willingly pour a big bowl of Product 19. It was sad. He'd also eat Wheaties. And claim to like it. I figured it had to be because of the athletes. Bruce Jenner was on the Wheaties box at that time and it was a huge deal. General Mills had worked long and hard ...

Back in the feverish, exciting early days of Topps Lineage, before we realized that the '75 minis were the only thing worth pursuing from the set and that we may have witnessed the worst card backs ever created, I grabbed a bunch of Lineage from a card shop in Buffalo and pulled this autograph redemption. As I mentioned on this post , this redemption could be very good or very bad. Very good because Randy Jackson was a third baseman for the Dodgers in the mid-to-late '50s. Very bad because Jackson was also a third baseman for the Cubs in the early '50s. I was rooting for a Jackson autograph featuring him as a Dodger, because I can count the number of Dodger hits I've pulled in my life on the hand of Mordecai "Three-Finger" Brown. But I knew in the back of my mind that Jackson would appear as a Cub because: 1. The old-timer autos in Lineage are on the '52 Topps design and Jackson was a Cub in the '52 Topps set. 2. I'm just not that lucky. ...

We've all heard some version of the question posed in the post title before: Does it get any better? Does it get any better than two weeks off in July? Does it get any better than a day with your kids at the park? Does it get any better than playoff baseball? Does it get any better than beat-up vintage? The implication, for whatever question you are asking, is this: No, it definitely does not get any better. Case closed. But thanks to a terrific card package from Chris at Project '62 (at least I think the blog is still functional), I have a chance to consider whether there actually is anything better than awesome, semi-beat-up vintage Dodgers. After viewing the package, I pondered it for awhile, and I have to admit that, yes, there are just a few things better than awesome, unbelievable, semi-beat-up vintage. I will reveal those things while showing the cards from Chris. First, my daughter and wife are better than awesome beat-up vintage. Yes, I wen...

My recent vow to make every trade its own post has been a welcome challenge. It's forced me to find something unique about the cards, or at least one card, and write about it. I like that. It's good for me. Like peas and cauliflower and (*gag, wretch*) beets. But it's also causing issues. I'm in major backlog mode. Both physically and mentally. The mental part is that I've got a crapload of ideas from these cards and they're all lined up waiting for their stories to be told. But I have zero time. Zer-O. You don't know how often I wish I was independently wealthy. Not because of the money. But because of the TIME. I need to become a college student again. The physical part is there are cards from trades stacked up all over in the living room waiting, just waiting for somebody, anybody to, for the love of god,   DO SOMETHING . The line of card stacks is getting longer and longer and longer. I can I hear the stacks crabbing about the stac...

This is a long-delayed revealing of cards I received from Chris of Project '62 a few weeks ago. The plan was not to post these until I got a package off to him. Easy enough. I had the package sealed and ready to go. But then I screwed up the zip code on the package, then I forgot to include a couple of cards, then life stuff happened, then a dinosaur broke into my house and ate all my packaging tape. Meanwhile, the package sat there through it all, groaning like a child with nothing to do. Finally, it has something to do. It is out the door. And I can finally show the great cards that I received. This trade came about because Chris had some 2010 Heritage Dodgers for me. I'm no fan of the set, but I've got to have those Dodgers. So we'll do this quick and painless like: There you are. Fake vintage. Just playin' vintage. Fascinating, huh? Why are we still buying this stuff? But, to my surprise, there were much better cards in store. Real vintage. Dodger vin...