Night Owl Cards

  Twelve days ago I wrote a post about my thoughts on the 2024 Heritage minis after receiving a bunch of the cards from Johnny's Trading Spot. I said that I didn't plan to collect the set. Even though it's a tribute to my most favorite set of all-time, the 1975 Topps mini test set, I didn't feel enthusiasm for it, mostly because trying to collect the main Heritage set was tough enough and I didn't want to repeat the exact same exacting task. Well, sometimes when you have written a popular blog for a long time, you don't get to do what you had planned. Sometimes your reputation precedes you. I am known for loving the 1975 set and the mini set, therefore it follows for many that I should love the 2024 Heritage set and the mini set. Who cares what I wrote!   So two days after that post , I received the following from reader Grant:   A day after receiving that, I received the following from former blogger Greg/grogg:   And the day after THAT, I received the followin...

  By my quick calculating card blogging is at its lowest point in terms of frequency and number since my first few months of blogging. I counted about 12 card blogs now that write at least 5 days a week. Then there are around 50 card blogs that write less than that -- a few times a week, once a week, a couple times a month. So that's maybe 65 blogs that write about cards at least once a month. The amount of former card bloggers that I know is five times that amount. This means interaction is down and that's a bummer, but the good part is everyone -- card bloggers and former card bloggers and definitely non-card bloggers -- still collect cards. And they also (*phew*) still remember who I am.   I received a major reminder of that last week and I'm still getting to that later in the week, but here is an appetizer:   These are 1975 buybacks -- all needs -- from Cardboard Catastrophes (who is still blogging, thankfully).    Jeffrey's a Yankees fan, and he guessed th...

When I was putting together yesterday's Never Have I Ever" post , I started to accumulate more "nevers" then I thought I would and before things got out of hand, I ended the post. Safe to say, there's plenty in this hobby I still haven't done. And likely will never do. But one thing I had intended to add to the "never have I evers" is contained in the photo above. Never Have I Ever: purchased a penny sleeve. Not one. I have stacks, as you can see, of penny sleeves at my disposal, stored in an old 1975 Topps box. There are also packaged sleeves (you can see one behind the box) that I've received as a gift. I never expect to run out and I never expect to buy any. Also, I have never bought a team bag, top-loader, card-saver, one-touch or screw-down. I've accumulated enough over the life of this blog that my inventory should last me forever. That's what a decade-plus of blogging and trading will do. When I started this blog, I had...

For the second time in the life of this blog, I enjoyed a nice meal over cards with a fellow collector. I've chatted over Buffalo wings with Angus of Dawg Day Cards several times after card shows as we relived the glory of our cardboard conquests. Yesterday was a little less heroic. Just a pleasant meal at a local Irish restaurant with another guy named Greg, who wrote a couple of card blogs years ago -- Lake Effect Baseball Cards and Nearly Mint -- but I've also known for a long time on Twitter. Greg was accompanied by his wife, Megan, who I was also familiar with from Twitter. It's always cool to see people in the flesh who you've communicated with so many times only online. You know their interests and hopes, aggravations and joys, yet you've never talked face-to-face. I finally got to do that with Greg. Back in the old days, he would write about his pursuit of the 2008 Topps framed silk cards and it was interesting to hear that he's still at ...

Eight years ago, when I was in full miinnnnnniiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii mode, collecting the 1975 Topps mini set and actually putting miinnnnnniiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii in the title of blog posts multiple time just to annoy my readers, Topps issued a set called Lineage in which it created an insert set modeled after those same 1975 Topps minis. I went bananas for it and I completed the full 200-card mini insert set. This was full-on mini overload because I was accumulating both the original '75 minis and the 2011 Lineage minis at the same time. It's a wonder I made it through the entire period without being thrown into the funny farm. That was an exciting time, filled with fun, colorful mini-sized cards to collect. But one colorful mini-sized card that I didn't get behind at the time were the Lineage mini relic cards that were parallels of the '75 Lineage mini cards. I've never been a relic collector and these cards offended my sensibilities as a '75 m...