Night Owl Cards

   The last three weeks I've averaged three posts a week, which is an all-time production low on Night Owl Cards.   I'm OK with it, which is not something I could say for the majority of the time I've been running this blog. But it's not like I have a choice. So I've accepted it, with the hope that I'll return to at least 5 posts a week, but not expecting that to happen.   Some of the old "requirements" of this blog remain in place though, clinging to the "old ways." One of those is "blog about every card package you have received from others." But when you cut down on blogging time, the cards pile up.   Another requirement is "keep the card room relatively orderly." My card room isn't immaculate, I don't think anybody's should be. But I've got the neatness gene and I can't handle cards piling on top of cards, potentially falling on the floor, so the cat will think it's a new play thing and bop them...

  Apologies for the negative self-talk in the blog title here. This isn't about you, it's all me, and I need to work on that. But I thought if I wrote things out I'd finally get myself into gear. I've needed a few binders and the pages that go with them for several months now. The completed -- or about to be completed -- sets are piling up. I don't like stashing complete sets in boxes, that's a terrible fate for something so carefully crafted. So they are stacked and waiting all around the card room, and, yes, a couple are in boxes as a last resort. In stacks are my complete 2024 Heritage set and my soon-to-be-complete 2024 Topps flagship set. Another stack contains what I have for 1987 Fleer. It's a long way from completion, but it's there, quietly telling me that a binder is needed for that, too. Two sets that should be in binders are now in boxes -- the almost complete 2024 Heritage minis set and the getting-there 1985 Donruss set. These guys need to ...

  International Trading Card Day was yesterday. It used to be called "National Trading Card Day," and it probably should be "international," but the cynic in me considers it another money hungry ploy. But no matter, I don't observe the holiday anyway. It's not a personal choice or anything. I just don't have any established card shops near me. If I did, I could go to the shop, nose around in discount boxes or blasters, or whatever people who live near real cities get to do, and then pick up a Topps' Trading Card Day pack. Fortunately, I have a blog with connections. Adam from Thoughts and Sox went to Dodger Stadium last month to watch his Red Sox play the Dodgers (I saw that game on TV, the Dodgers put up a bunch of runs but then had to hold on through their dumb bullpen to win 9-6). It happened to be Baseball Card Day at the ballpark and the giveaway was the Trading Card Day "preview" set that MLB teams give away to spectators.   Since th...

Here is another tale about my want list. It's a pretty thorough list. Maybe not as thorough as some, but more complete than others. Like I said a few posts ago, I don't have a lot of enthusiasm for updating it with all the parallel nonsense of 2014. But there is the other end of the spectrum, too. You won't find on my want list any cards from earlier than 1952. Why is that? Well, frankly, five-plus years into this blog, I'm still not over the fact that people send me cards. And it's that part of me that thinks it's a little presumptuous to even be listing 1952 and 1953 Topps, let alone stuff from what I consider to be the prehistoric era of cards. So, there isn't a want list for something like 1950 Bowman. Do I like 1950 Bowman? Sure! It's got Brooklyn Dodgers in it, don't it? But, really, nobody's going to send me those kind of cards. I received one surprise from Dave of Tribe Cards way way back when he sent me a 1950 Bowman ...

The trouble with trying to make a trade post more than a trade post is I always end up with leftover cards that don't fit into whatever topic I am addressing. They are square pegs (no, I never watched the show) that are significant on their own but are unable to conform to the latest discussion on this blog. To go along with that, there have been an abundance of one-card plain white envelope packages arriving -- what folks are calling PWE bombs -- but it's difficult to write one-card posts all the time. These are all items that are more than worthy of showing and I definitely don't want to ignore the fact that someone sent them to me. So let's have a look at what has been messing up my card desk and undermining my 2013 mission to stay on top of card clutter. I'd recommend not clicking away to something else. There's some good and varied stuff here. This is yet another card from Jaybarkerfan's Junk . It is my first relic card of former Dodgers s...