The Harrowing Adventures of a Nerd Week Contest Winner!

A winner is me..

The prize for winning The Junior Junkie’s Nerd Week Contest arrived yesterday, and I nearly paid for it with my life!  That’s an exaggeration, but the box was huge (over $18 to ship!), and I was on my way out, so I stupidly decided to carry it over to the parents’ place with me.  Conditions were also way worse than I was expecting, and my main shoes are super old generic Shape-Ups types with no traction left on them.

Basically, it was a recipe for disaster, and, long story short, disaster indeed struck.  I ended up crashing and burning pretty bad on hidden ice patch close to halfway between here and there.  I hit the back of my head on the sidewalk, but I popped back up pretty quickly without difficulty, no wooziness or anything that would indicate being concussed.  A couple of folks I had passed a short ways back quickly came to my assistance helped me get my bearings and everything I dropped.  Very grateful to them for that.

The pain was mostly gone within a couple of blocks of continuing on my way, and any lingering head pain has minimal and infrequent, though I will get checked out if the random, brief little twinges of discomfort persist.  I finally managed to make it over to the parents’ place without further incident, and after getting cleaned up, I was finally ready to cut the tape and dig into the box!

The box in question..

And so I dug, and dug, and dug some more!  There was a LOT more in there than the DVD.  Are you ready to be as blown away by the thought and effort and generosity that went into this amazing prize package as we (the parents were very impressed too) were?

The note..

Here’s the handwritten note TJ sent, congratulating me and running down the contents.

The original prize..

Of course, the DVD was in there.  Say what you will about Family Guy in general, but the Star Wars specials are always straight up inspired.  Gonna enjoy this. 🙂

Are you ready for some football?!

I’m taking this back to the parents’ place next time I’m over, because it is small and plushy and can safely be thrown around over there during the rare lulls when we aren’t skewering anything and everything on TV MST3K-style or talking about generally geeky and/or nerdy things when dad, my little brother, and me are all there at the same time.

Original art by Jason Goad..

I love art.  I am an artist (allegedly), after all.  But I can’t afford much original art beyond relatively cheap sketch cards very often, so this is was a super awesome thing to find in the box!  It’s a fantastic piece and I absolutely love it! 😀

A trio of CDs..

Styx and The Who will definitely get some airplay around here, and I’m not quite as down on Dane Cook as most, so I’ll be giving that a listen at some point as well.

Under the CDs, you can sorta see the corner of one of the pair of monstrously huge Pinnacle screwdown holders.  I swear I took a picture of them along with everything else, but I can’t find it.  Anyway, they are so ridiculously thick and heavy that they might legitimately be able to stop a bullet.

St. Joseph’s Prosperity Bean..

I didn’t know what this was because I’m a lazy millennial, but mom seemed to recognize it and thought it was pretty cool.  I read a little bit about them when I got back to my place.  Very interesting, and I will be keeping it on me.

Mardi Gras beads!

I’ve always wanted to go to Mardi Gras (because I’m sure my antisocial arse being around hundreds of thousands of loud, crazy, drunk people for an extended period of time would go just peachy), but thanks to TJ, a little bit Mardi Gras has come to the frozen wastes of the Midwest.  He notes they’re the real deal in the above letter, so I can’t help but wonder what he had to do to acquire them…

Anyway, I’m just glad he sent beads and not the terrifying New Orleans Pelicans King Cake Baby.

The last thing you see before you die..

There aren’t enough NOPE gifs in the world… My apologies for the impending nightmares, ladies and gentlemen.  We should probably just move on with a quickness.

Various Asian candies..

There were four different things in pouches, and my trying them out went badly.  I definitely haven’t acquired these tastes yet.  The Lychee was the best in a walk, and it kinda tasted like accidentally getting fruit-scented soap in your mouth.  But the experience was still worth the while and very much-appreciated.

You know, we’ve gotten this far and haven’t even made it to the cards yet!

Ah, there we go..

But they were there, and they were many.  I tore off the old shipping labels on the outer boxes before I took the pictures, just to be safe.

So many cards!

The top box had tons of Ryne Sandbergs, Mark Graces, and a random assortment of other Cubbies.  The bottom had miscellaneous non-sport stuff and some unopened junkwax era packs, most of which I will be drawing on the backs of at later dates.  Twas also home to the blue and silver beads.

The completely full box was bananas, with large amounts of 2012 Panini Golden Age, 2011 Panini Americana, and 2012 Topps Summer Olympics, as well as some Goodwin Champions, Allen & Ginter inserts, more random non-sport and entertainment cards,  and the occasional hockey card.

The big pack sittling in the middle of everything is a pack of 1986 Donruss All-Stars, which may be posted on A Pack to be Named Later at some point, and the rest will get a post of their own here once I’ve scanned some of them.

Since around half of the set was there, I’m definitely going to chase the Summer Olympics set now.  The other big stacks didn’t have enough for me to justify it, but I’m keeping a Single Page of both Goodwin Champions and Golden Age, as well as the vintage-ish Star Wars cards, and probably a fair amount of other things.

My canvas..

Finally, this card not part of the prize package.  This card is for a commission.  On the back of this 1989 Topps Traded Ken Griffey Sr. card, I will be drawing Ken Griffey Jr. from his RC, the very next card in the same set.  I loved the idea and will get to work on it as soon as my body stops being so creaky and achy.

For this commission I was paid $12, and even the money was worth mentioning.  Check it out!

$2 bill!

Yes, that is a two-dollar bill.  I’m pretty sure haven’t seen one of those since back in the late-1990s when I got one back as change at one of the last card shows held at the local mall.

The flipside..

Easily the coolest looking piece of US currency that still spends.

There you have it.  This has to be in the running for the single greatest card blog prize package ever made.  The amount of time, thought, effort, and money that must have went into this making it possible boggles the mind.  I know TJ puts a ton of effort into his collection and his posts, so maybe it comes as no surprise he’d go all-out on a prize package, but I am still beyond honored and humbled to be its recipient.

Thank you, TJ!  And thanks to everyone for stopping by!

It was worth the pain…

 

Fail.

 

Just when I think I’m back in, they pull me out. On January 2^nd, my computer got attacked, for all intents and purposes, was destroyed. Fortunately, I was able to get my parents old computer a few days later, to get me by until I can get myself a new computer. After a few more days, I was finally able to get back online. The reason it took so long… may have been accidentally self-inflicted, but that’s neither here nor there.

So I was all ready to jump back into blogging regularly after finally getting back online (something like 11 or 12 days ago at this point), when I discovered that all the old scans of mine leftover on this computer, and the more recent ones I saved the emails to… I can’t edit them into smaller chunks on this computer. Not in any way that I can remember anyway. So I’m still not back yet I guess, and won’t be for at least a little while longer. I saw a pretty good computer (with glorious hi-def monitor included!) that I can afford by February if it or something like it is still available at that price, or deity of your choosing-willing, less.

But cards?! It’ll be a loooong time before I can afford anything very meaningful on that front again. A couple cheap packs here & there perhaps, and maybe I can squeeze in a group break or two, and the rare (yet somehow disgustingly not rare enough) visit to eBay, but I’m cutting my card spending by at least half. Video games have been loudly calling my name again, so I’m looking at a PS3, and I could use a laptop too. In other words, the ol’ budget’s gonna be tighter than an analogy I’m too distracted to make. Fortunately, I still have loads of cards to get rid of, and will still have way too many even after all the trades I’ve let my end down on for way too long are at long last taken care of.

As far as the blog goes, I’m not back, but I’m not entirely gone either. I have something like a three post buffer from before my old computer got torn a new one, and just enough edited down to size scans handy for a couple more if I get a minute. You’ll start seeing all that jazz soon. Until then, I’m Pro Bowl Shufflin’ outta here.

To Hawaii and beyond!

Blogger’s Saving Throw

SOMEDAY I will complete the 500 Home Run Club post, but that is not tonight.  Tonight we take it easy, take it slow.  Yeah, we’re just gonna touch on a few pressing issues, just for the sake of doing a post.

• First thing first.  I mentioned it on twitter, and it’s half the reason I haven’t felt like blogging for the past few days.  It kinda bummed me out.  My Allen & Ginter cards fell on the floor a few days ago.  Fortunately, relatively few were damaged, and only a half dozen severely so.  Unfortunately, most of the severely damaged ones were intended for Night Owl.  I’m really really sorry, but a few of the A&G meant for you are pretty much ruined.  The bat card, the SP, and the base Dodgers are undamaged, but I think most of the regular base have had it.  Again, I am really sorry about this.

• Moving on, I’ve wasted a s***load of money on several 2009 Topps Chrome fat/rack pack things.  They have seven cards and one or (usually, judging by my packs) two parallels or inserts per pack for $5.  As of right now, I’ve sworn off of them.  Here is what I have of them to trade.  Take note, most of the first two packs, typed up in a recent post, fell in a separate incident and were damaged beyond saving, and a select few already have potential homes.  Anyway, here is what is available.

Base-

1, A-Rod, 9 Mike Lowell, 12 Stephen Drew, 25 Garrett Atkins, 27 Francisco Liriano, 62 Chase Utley, 69 Max Scherzer, 94 Joe Mauer, 196 Rickie Weeks, 113 Magglio Ordonez, 124  Joe Nathan, 132 Derek Lowe, 142 Yovani Gallardo, 178 Scott Lewis Indians RC, 179 George Kotteras Red Sox RC, 190 Andrew Bailey A’s RC, 194 Elvis Andrus Rangers RC, 217 Brett Cecil Blue Jays RC, 218 Derek Holland Rangers RC

Refractors-

118 Andy Pettitte, 139 Ryan Howard

X-Fractors-

108 Howie Kendrick, 187 Jesse Chavez Pirates RC

• Here is a random pack break of ’09 Score football, for the heck (trying hard to cuss less) of it:

230 Hines Ward

193 Brandon Jacobs

119 Matt Schaub

154 Davone Bess

17 Martellus Bennett Young Stars

335 Devin Moore Seahawks RC

106 Donald Lee Glossy Parallel

Pretty cool looking cards.  I want to get all the Bears in this set, and Cutler if he isn’t in a Bears uniform.

• It’s a purely theoretical assumption, but hopefully asking here will be the simplest way.  I sent out packages to Baseball Dad, Indians, Baseball Cards, and Random Wax (Is this a name change alert? I haven’t been paying much attention for a few days…) and Heartbreaking Cards of Staggering Genius.  I believe they went out last Monday.  Have any of you gotten them?  And was there anything useful for the former two gentlemen?

• Oh, so you can see just how in over my head I am when it comes to trading, here’s my overall Trade/Send Stuff Queue and how far along everything is.  Note that the order of readiness doesn’t mean order it will be sent (aside from the first one), size of the package and my random sense of focus-ness will determine that:

Night Owl (EDIT: SENT!)

Dinged Corners (EDIT: SENT!!!!!!!!!!!  After this monster of a package, I had to go buy more cases to send cards in.  They’ve gone up in price… >.<)

Cardboard Junkie– Being a Lonestarr Special, I suppose this one is Nearly Ready.

Sooz– Nearly Ready, Jeter Sketch Card just needs finished.

Marie– Must Email; but all potential cards are organized.

Wicked Ortega– (EDIT: EMAILED)

Beardy– Must Email; but pretty much all potential cards are organized.

JD’s Daddy– (EDIT: This trade is ACTIVE.)

Wax Heaven– SASE About Ready, just need to finish Andrew Miller Sketch Card, which isn’t as far along as I thought or hoped. (SASE is for ’09 UD Football Heroes inserts, btw Mario)

Nachos Grande– Must Email and Organizing; slightly further along than ones below.

McCann Can Triple– Organizing.

White Sox Cards– Organizing.

Sharpe Since ’92– Early Stages.  Was it just for random A&G minis?  In any case, I must see what else I can offer.

Shot Not Taken– Where To Begin…

Wow, that is madness… I didn’t even realize I had that much stuff in the works.  And I bet that isn’t even one of the longest trade queues going.  Now if I only had an even remotely acceptable excuse for my slowness and/or laziness. *le sigh*

I guess that does it for now.  If I forgot to put anyone in the neverending conga line of trades/sends that should be there, let me know please, and I will correct it.  Back to looking over Night Owl‘s epic checklist.  His cards go out around Wednesday-ish.  The rest… I don’t know.  I’m sorry.

… Did I mention I’m sorry? 😦

The Lonestarr Personal Collection #3

Here is my epic Fukudome Japanese game-used ball card:

Exotic and Expensive... >.>

We don’t like to talk about how much I spent on this card… suffice to say, it’s the one time I really broke the bank on a card.   I love the card, but what I spent on it still makes me hurt a little inside whenever I think about it.  Let’s just “ooh” and “ahh” and comment it’s coolness and not dwell to deeply on the price, shall we?  That way I’ll feel less guilty for knowing better but getting it anyway.

Having a conscience sucks when it always feels guilty…