Garage Sale Day Gives Me Wings!

First of all, can I just say, "damn Yankees!"  What an ugly series that was for the Cubs - a blown save  one strike away from victory, a blow out, and a tough-to-swallow 18-inning loss.  It all mounted to a series sweep at the hands of former mate Starlin Castro and the evil empire.  Not to mention, the bullpen has been absolutely shredded by the super-duper long extra-inning affair, Brett Anderson's implosion as the fifth starter, and a plethora of short outings by the rest of the starting rotation.  Needless to say, it certainly wasn't a good weekend for the Cubs.

On the other hand, despite the three-day beating my favorite team endured, I had myself a pretty darn good weekend.  After all, the sun was shining, the rain stayed away, the birds were chirping and my absolute favorite day of the year just so happened to be this past Saturday.

That would be the community wide Garage Sale Day that my hometown holds every year.  As a kid, most of the rest of the neighborhood youths would count down the days until the arrival of Santa Claus and Christmas or eagerly cross off boxes on their calendar in anticipation of their next, upcoming birthday.  However, like usual, I was the odd one in my neighborhood; the day that I could not wait for, year in and year out, was the day when the fee for holding a garage sale was temporarily waived for the morning/afternoon and families across the town would open their garages to sell their used goods and trinkets.

Beanie babies, action figures, Hot Wheels cars... all of my favorite collectibles available for just pennies on the dollar.  Plus, you just never knew what you were going to find, courtesy of these random households.  It was like a day-long treasure hunt!

That enthusiasm has yet to die down, though my focus has shifted from vintage Transformers to cheap furniture, records and, of course, baseball cards and memorabilia.  Thus, after rushing through my morning workout and breakfast, my wife and I jumped in our car and began to peruse the neighborhood for good deals; luckily, she's as big of a fan of secondhand shopping as I am!  Last year, I was astounded to uncover a Keith Magnuson autographed card for three bucks - there was no way I was missing out on a minute of this event.

For what should be obvious reasons, the sign seen in the image above immediately caught my attention.  While I wasn't in the market for any more Cubs t-shirts (lord knows I have enough), where there's smoke there's fire - by that, I mean that if they have some type of sports memorabilia, it's quite likely that they will have other kinds.

And I wasn't wrong!

I should have taken a picture - this house was a vintage sports cards gold mine.  This person clearly sets up at card shows, though I don't recall seeing him at any of the local shows that I have attended - he had a couple of display cases of Cubs/White Sox/Bears/Blackhawks goodies from throughout the last 60 years, boxes full of All-Star laden grab bags, and a bunch of unopened product from the 80's/90's. I could have easily blown my entire GS Day budget at this one stop and spent the entire day gabbing with the seller, but the thrill of the treasure hunt was calling my name... or maybe it was my wife... I don't know.

In the end, after much hemming and hawing, I decided to limit myself to the two, vibrant, crisp-cornered, '59 Topps that you see above, which just so happens to be my favorite vintage set.

The contemplative Bill Henry is his only Cubs card and, thus, serves as a highly desired "Cubgrade" to the '67 Giants single in my Cubs All-Time Roster Collection binder.  The longtime, Major League reliever spent two seasons with the Cubbies (1958-59), near the beginning of his 16-year run, appearing in 109 games with 2.75 ERA as one of the only valuable arms in their woeful 50's bullpens.

In drafting this post, I've discovered that Mr. Henry turns out to be an interesting character.  For instance, he did not play baseball in high school and instead made a name on the sandlots as a softball star. Furthermore, long after his playing days, in 2007, his death was reported by a Florida newspaper.  However, he was still very much alive and, as it turned out, the man who had died had stolen the identity of the former professional athlete decades ago...  the dead man's own wife didn't even know better.  Instead of getting angry, the real Bill Henry phoned the grieving widow and offered his condolences - “I just hoped maybe it helped him in his career,” he said.

The other card I purchased featured Bob Will and I thought that it too would be a coveted Cubgrade.  Unfortunately, my scrambled mind got the names "Bob Will" and "Lee Walls" switched up and it didn't help that both men played the outfield during the same era.  So, if anyone has a stray Lee Walls from '59 available for swapping, I'd love to talk trade.

While the sad trombone music played in my head when I opened my binder and noticed to mix-up, I still can't be too upset about acquiring a 58-year old piece of cardboard in such pristine shape.  It gets extra bonus points for displaying the hats with white piping that the Cubs briefly employed in the preceding season.

Not a bad way to kick of the Garage Sale Day festivities, eh?  Unfortunately, that was the only location where I was fortunate enough to come across trading cards.  That said, there were still plenty of cool treasures to uncover, including one more purchase related to our nation's pastime:

The local storage locker place got in on the resale fun and filled their lot and building to the brim with unclaimed and unpaid for goods - they're loss is my gain.  Among the forgotten items for sale, there were several cardboard boxes that were filled to the brim with books of all sorts, many of which were related to Chicago sports.  Priced at a quarter a pop, I just couldn't help but pick up the above novelty - an account of the Cubs' 1989 season, told through the eyes of NL Rookie of the Year, Jerome Walton.

"The Boys of Zimmer" surprised everyone and won the NL East title that year, partly on the strength of the flashes in the pan that were Walton and Dwight Smith.  The team has long been a fascination of mine, owing to the fact that I was also born during that 1989 season and I absolutely wore out my VHS copy of their season recap that I bought from the local video store as a teen.

As far as this hastily put together (no doubt to capitalize on the surrounding hype) semi-biography goes, it's interesting to go back and read the optimism expressed in this youth movement and the confidence that Walton was just beginning a star-studded career.  Well, it didn't quite work out that way and it would take nine more years before that Cubs even made the postseason again.

As with most sports "biographies," the middle of the book contained a compendium of pictures from the subject's life.  My favorite of these snapshots was the image you see of Mr. Walton asking Santa Claus for a Cubs World Series win.  Mr. Claus did finally deliver on that request, it just took 27 years longer than Jerome wanted.

 That did it for my sports-themed purchases on the 2017 edition of Garage Sale Day; however, there were still a few other odds n' end finds that I couldn't help but pull the trigger on, like records:

That same storage unit sale had a nice stack of 45's to go through and I gladly took a few of them home with me, including the 5th Dimension single that you see here.  I've never seen the musical hair, but "Medley: Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In" is a phenomenal track with some tight vocal harmonies that truly make your hairs stand on end.  This was my favorite find from this stack of wax.


Another house had countless boxes strewn about their driveway which contained nothing but LP's - when I saw it, I almost began to salivate, subconsciously.  It appeared as though they had bought out a closing record shop with intent of selling on the second hand market - sadly, what was left about at their garage sale was almost assuredly the rejects.  After half an hour of digging through no-name dance remixes and the nadir of disco music, I was able to salvage one record of note:

"Video Killed the Radio Star" is a song that I will absolutely never skip when in it comes on and a tune that is near and dear to my heart as a former radio disc jockey.  However, I must admit, I've never even heard so much as a snippet of another song by the new wave group, the Buggles.  For a dollar, I was more than happy to rectify that fact.

I haven't put it on the turntable yet, but here's hoping that the rest of the album is at least half as good as it's most iconic single.

With that, it's time for me to reveal my favorite find from my own, personal Christmas.   It has absolutely nothing to do with any of my collecting habits, but it's something that I've irrationally desired for a long, long time:

Yup, for five bucks I purchased myself a full-size, Red Bull cooler - the same kind that you see at gas stations or bars.  I simply could not help myself.  *Please disregard the uncontrollable weeds*

Back when I was in college, while in the middle of a long run through the local neighborhood, I came across a stray one of these in a ditch.  I though to myself, "that would look awfully nice in a college apartment and I sure could use a cooler."  Plus, Red Bull is one of my favorite vices and I've always been attracted to their can design.  However, there was no way I'd be able to run with it and when I came back with my car, an hour or so later, some enterprising young fellow had beaten me to the punch.  I was thoroughly disappointed.

Now, six years later, I've finally righted the wrong.  After a little TLC, this piece is going to be a great conversation starter when the wife and I host parties and will eventually move into my "man cave," when we get the space.  My better half long ago resigned herself to the fact that I'm a giant man-child and has even suggested we turn it into a kegerator.  I knew I choose wisely.

 Here's something I definitely WON'T be doing with my prize.

That man-child can officially decree that Garage Sale Day 2017 was as an absolute success.  I was able to pick up some precious few vintage baseball cards, an intriguing book, some new additions to my vinyl collection and a giant Red Bull cooler.  Yea... I may be older, but Garage Sale Day still definitely brings out the kid in me.  Does anyone else's community put on such town-wide garage sale festivities?  If so, do you partake?  Have you ever found anything super cool?  Please feel free to tell your tale in the comment section below.

In the meantime, I'll just be over here in the corner, polishing my new cooler.

Resistance is Futile

I should never, ever go to Las Vegas.

This past weekend, I learned a little something about myself from my most recent trip to Dave and Busters.  Have you ever played those coin pusher games at a DB, Chuck E. Cheese's, county fair, etc.?  Well, they can be quite addicting in any form; however, when I discovered that the adult arcade had a new spin on the game, which featured trading cards as a reward, I was absolutely hooked.  The new-ish (it's been around since mid-summer) pusher is branded with the ever popular Star Trek franchise and, along with coins, pushes character cards as prizes.

Now, I'm not even a big fan of Star Trek.  I've seen maybe three or four episodes of the original television series, never seen a single movie (including the remakes), nor have I watched a single episode of the follow up series.  Personally, I was always more of a Star Wars guy and I only had room in my heart for one sci-fi universe.  Meanwhile, growing up, my better half was the exact opposite.

The wife is a minor Trekkie, as is a good portion of her family, as well.  So, when we were out celebrating her new job this past weekend, as we moseyed past the Starship Enterprise emblazoned coin pushers, she turned to me and said, "you better win me a Captain Piccard."  Okay then, I'd better "make it so!"

Then, forty-five minutes or so later, I still hadn't pushed a single, darn card down and I'd pumped more money into the machine than I care to admit.  I did get a whole bunch of points/tickets for use in the D&B store though, so there was that.  That said, I think my wife was even getting embarrassed at that point; but, I'll be damned if I'm not leaving there without a Captain Picard on her big night.  Resistance was futile.

Thus, why I should never go to Las Vegas, I'd come back destitute, wearing a barrel like in the old Loony Toons gags.


The image above was taken just as I was about to finally call it a loss and you can see just how tantalizingly close to the edge all of those cards are.  Even after all of that time wasted, I just couldn't help but allow myself one more attempt before I went on to play skee ball...

...and it finally worked out!  On my last attempt, I finally managed to dislodge a card and it just so happened to be the one and only Captain Picard, as expertly played by Sir Patrick Stewart during the Next Generation era.  Hot damn!  In the end, I think I ended up being happier about the triumph than my wife.

The first set of cards featured Trek legends from the 1960's TV series including Kirk, Spock, Scotty, and even the Tribbles.  Sometime, post-October, Next Gen cards were added, but I can't find how many there are in this second series.  Furthermore, each card is also available in a limited, foil-enhanced version, because the parallel scourge just cannot be stopped.

The cards themselves, aren't quite standard size - they're on a thicker than usual card stock (gotta be able to handle the fall, after all) and are about business card-sized.  Additionally, they are apparently redeemable for extra D&B tickets/points, as the bar-code on the back would indicate; however, after fighting with that machine more desperately then Captain Kirk battled the Gorn, I wasn't about to turn the Captain over for such frivolities.

As an added bonus, the Next Generation Captain wasn't the only card that bounced out on that last attempt.  While my wife got her favorite Star Trek character card, I was ecstatic to find that I was able to land mine as well - Sulu.  Again, I don't have much familiarity with the franchise, George Takei happens to be a personal favorite.  His cameos in shows like Psych, the Simpsons and American Dad are always hilarious and he's quite the amusing and outspoken follow on Twitter and Facebook too. 

Not to mention, his rise from a Japanese internment camp during WWII and his staunch advocacy for gay rights make him all the more fascinating and a-ok in my book.  Also, I had no idea that Sulu eventually went on to be the captain of the Enterprise.  See?  I really don't know much about Star Trek, at all.

In summation, it took me forty-five minutes and who knows how many swipes to win a pair of trading cards that are probably only worth a quarter a pop - this is why I should probably steer clear of those tempting slot machines in Las Vegas.  Nevertheless, I'm a happy camper with my George Takei oddball card.

Now - can we get a coin pusher with a baseball theme?  Please?

Instant Karma

The pack you see above provided me a couple of good karma rewards, but more on that later.

Today marked one of the rare weekend days where both my fiancee and I are free - working in retail means that she often gets stuck working at inconvenient times.  As such, we both feel like we have to make the most of the time that we have together.  Today, she got to choose how we spent our rarefied co-mingling hours.

We began the morning with the annual Independence Day parade... yes, I realize that it's only June 25th; but, for some strange reason that's how my community has always done it.  I was mostly indifferent on attending, however, she was surprisingly gung-ho on the idea.  From there, we went dress shopping at the local Burlington Coat Factory so that she could find a nice outfit for her friend's bridal shower tomorrow, in lieu of the car show I secretly wanted to attend.

I wasn't complaining though, it was just nice to spend a few casual hours together.  After finally settling on a nice little number, she actually decided that she'd like to go to the LCS in order to pick up some vintage Garbage Pail Kids.

Yup, that's right, she willingly opted to go card-hunting - I knew I picked a winner!

So, we rushed right on over there, before she could change her mind and luckily, they had a nice stash of old school GPK and Wacky Packages to keep her entertained.  Here are a few of the gems that she ended up walking away with:

The Ronald Reagan goofing was a no-brainer, seeing as she is all about political study.  Meanwhile, "Marc Spark" was selected, in her words, "in honor of the fourth of July."

Moving on, the Wacky Packages weren't exactly vintage; that said, she was still able to find a couple which struck her fancy:

My better half is a major Lady Gaga fan and about the most strong-willed feminist I've ever encountered (a label which I also wear proudly).   I always say, if you can't laugh at yourself, you shouldn't be laughing at anyone else; if you can't take the heat, stay out of the kitchen and all that cliched jazz.

Also, that one on the right is obviously a parallel of some sort, but neither her nor I could possibly care any less about that fact.

Anyway, as you can see, it was a pretty fruitful afternoon for her - she got to take in a parade on a beautiful summer day, came away with a cute outfit with minimal struggle and found herself a few new treasured collectibles.  Combine that with the fact that we're finally going to see Finding Dory tonight and she was in a pretty damn good mood.

Of course, there was no way I was leaving that shop without grabbing a little something for myself, so I selected my very first pack of Series 2 from the gravity feeder at the counter and we were on our merry way.  This impulse purchase then promptly rewarded me for letting my fiancee select the day's festivities:

Hey - it's great to see that my favorite insert set from Series 1 has carried over into the second edition.  Bricks, ivy and the iconic Wrigley Field marquee make for an unequivocally beautiful design.  Not to mention, I love the uniqueness of press conference shots on baseball cards - they're infinitely better than crappy Photoshop/airbrushing monstrosities.

Hot damn - it's a Cubs hot-pack!  No base Northsider base cards; however, both of the "special cards" contained within were Boys in Blue flavored.  I'll certainly be marking this down as a win.

It's kind of hard to tell from the picture, but that Cubs team card is some kind of rainbow foil parallel.  Now, I know I said I don't pay too much mind to parallels when discussing the Wacky Packs above, but this sure does look pretty.  The exuberant joy in the walk-off win celebration chosen for the photo sure doesn't hurt either.

So, there you have it - good karma immediately rewarded me for letting my fiancee take the reigns on our Saturday spent together.  That said, I think having a fiancee that willingly wanted to not only step into a card shop, but also wanted to do some shopping of her own is truly enough of a reward!

Mighty Morphin' Wrigley Roster Jenga

The other day, while perusing the card selection of my local Dollar Tree (which is something I've been doing more and more of lately), a particular pack of cards caught my attention.  Among the 5 card, sample packs of 2015 Donruss/Topps Series 2 and the incessant supply of football and baseball junk wax repacks was a non-sports product that I had never seen before, yet still appealed to my nostalgic yearnings:

While some kids my age were all gung-ho about the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, I was squarely in the corner of the Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers.  For those of you who don't know, the Power Rangers were a team of teenagers chosen by an alien force to protect the planet earth from whatever galactic villains attempted to invade it.

The show itself was culturally appropriated from Japan's long-running Super Sentai shows, which borrowed not only the concept and the costumes, but was often made up of mostly Japanese footage for action scenes.

When I was in elementary school, they started out as the Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers and the show was a cultural phenomenon for several years.  However, as ratings dipped, in order to spice things up, they adopted a new set of costumes (again, all borrowed from Sentai) and alternated actors every season in order to drive up interest.  Mighty Morphin' gave way to Zeo, which gave way to Turbo, which gave way to Space and so on and so forth.  By the end of that run, I was already on to bigger, more adult things (like baseball cards).

However, for a good five years there, I lived and breathed everything Power Rangers.  So, seeing this product on the shelves caused a little twinge in my heart and I couldn't help but sample a pack - I mean, it was only a buck after all.

The product itself is some sort of card game (like I'll ever learn to play it) in the vein of Pokemon and makes use of Rangers from every corner of Power Rangers lore.  Thus, I was really, really, really hoping to pull at least one card of the original show.

These two definitely were not.  I'd never heard of RPM Rangers, which means they came long after I or my little brother (who's interest went several years after mine ended) stopped paying attention.  I'm guessing they had something to do with cars, which was a theme already used for Turbo (and it's accompanying major motion picture) during my childhood.

However, green and blue are my two favorite colors, so they've got that going for them.

Furthermore, there's a lot going on in the design here - I have no idea what the numbers on the sides indicate, though I assume they're entirely related to the gameplay.  I guess there must be some sort of technological aspect to the game too, judging by the bar codes found on top.

The backs of these cards are all the same, featuring the over-arching Power Rangers combination mark over a "techy" red background.  Like it says, these are for a "action card game," so like playing cards, they have to have a boiler plate backside.

Megaforce is another season of which I am not the least bit familiar with.  However, the artwork is pretty cool - the lighting bolts on that red ranger are quite intense.

Ah - Zords.  Zords are the Power Rangers giant vehicles that combine to form a giant robot.  Think of them like human-operated versions of Transformers (esp. the Dinobots of Constructicons).  The Rangers would call on these bad boys when their evil opponents were enlarged to gigantic proportions.

Also, they called Zords in honor of the Rangers alien creator and guiding force, Zordon.

Again, I sound like a broken record here, but these don't look or sound the least bit familiar to me either.  That said, a "High Octane Megazord" sounds like something an RPM Ranger might pilot.  At this point, I was starting to worry that my nostalgic itch wasn't going to be truly scratched.

Ah ha - crisis averted!  Here we have two of the original five Mighty Morphn' Power Rangers, in all of their retro glory.

Zack the Black Ranger, who was coincidentally of African-American heritage (or not so coincidentally, the Yellow Ranger was also Asian...), was always the cool guy in group.  Meanwhile, I think every kid in my age bracket's first crush was Kimberly the Pink Ranger (played by Amy Jo Johnson).

Even better - Tommy the White Ranger!

Tommy originally joined the original five as the Green Ranger, after being created as an evil counterpart and then breaking free from his puppeteers.  Later, as his powers were wearing down, he was reborn as the White Ranger you see above.

Bottom line, Tommy was always the most popular Power Ranger, be it as Green or White; he was definitely my favorite too.  While, I definitely prefer his Green incarnation, this will do just fine.

Can you figure out which one is the real one and which is my Halloween costume from a 

of couple years ago?

Closing out this package of Power Rangers Action Card Game cards, we have the shiny foil version of the Red Mighty Morphin' Power Ranger.  So, after going half of the pack without pulling single Ranger I was slightly familiar with, I ended up with four.  Not bad (the collation though, might be).

What's really cool about this card is that, as you can see, he is wearing the same shield as the Green Ranger seen above.  However, Jason (the Red one) didn't normally do so.  In fact, Jason only wore that extra protection in one episode of the show, one that I can clearly remember, so I can attach this card to that specific memory.  How's that for nostalgia?

Plus, it's shiny and who doesn't like shiny, right?

All in all, that made for a pretty fun, warm and fuzzy pack ripping experience.  I have no idea what I'm going to do with these now, but that wasn't the point in buying them.  Sometimes, it's nice to just kick back, while letting your inner child break free and run wild.

Anyway, that's enough Rangers talk - this is a Cubs/baseball card blog after all.  Hopefully you all found this little tangent to be at least slightly entertaining.

Sacrificing a Card to the Spirits

*If all goes as planned, you should be reading this scheduled post while I'm taking in the spectacle of speed that is the Indy 500 time trials.  In the meantime, I thought you might find the ghostly story of my Saturday afternoon sorta interesting... it even has a cardboard tie-in!*

So, my fiancee and I rarely have weekends off together - such is the nature of one of us working a retail schedule and the other being a salaried employee.  Therefore, whenever we are blessed with this "nothing on the schedule" overlap, we feel obligated to do something fun and make the most of it.

While munching on our lunch, the lovely lady randomly exclaimed, "let's go to Bachelor's Grove!"  This was something quite unexpected and, frankly, it made my blood run cold for a second. 

You see, my hometown doesn't have much notable about it, it's pretty well blended into the blur of suburbia.  The only thing that might perk up a stranger's ear about the village is the fact that we play host to one of the most haunted cemeteries in North America:  Bachelor's Grove.

As you can see from the picture above, my initial fear did not prevent us from making our way to the quiet, secluded spot.  The little cemetery was first used in the 1840's, when the first settlers started moving through the area, gained heavy use during the building of the I&M Canal and saw active burials through the middle half of the previous century.  

In the year since, it's become a bustling hive of paranormal activity (and teenage mischief).  Some of it's most famous phenomena have included the disappearing caretaker's house, the moving headstone, the nearby lagoon being used by Al Capone as a body-dumping site, and the ghostly Model-T.  If you want more on the haunted history of the site, I highly recommend checking this link out.

Perhaps you've seen this famous ghostly image before?

The Model-T legend stems from the fact that the path that leads from the main road, into the woods and past the cemetery gate used to be the Midlothian Turnpike, but was bypassed at about the same time the cemetery ceased being active.

Seeing as we were walking down the former turnpike in the middle of the afternoon, I wasn't too scared to be paying a visit - I mean, it's a well-know fact that ghosts don't come out during the day time, right?  Although, once I remembered that last time I'd been there that my camera began behaving erratically, I did feel myself paying an awful lot of attention to my surroundings.

As a direct result of this, I noticed a rectangular, shiny object cast aside on the cracked blacktop being reclaimed by mother nature.  In the middle of a thatch of weeds, I found this little guy staring back at me:

Okay - this wasn't such a ghostly encounter.  I mean, it's not even a ghost-type Pokemon like Haunter or Ghastly.  In fact, this a Pokemon that I don't recognize at all - it clearly dates from after I stopped paying attention (which was shortly after the release of Gold and Silver for Gameboy Color).

Anyway, like I said, while it is a famous haunted location, it's notoriety makes it a breeding ground for teenage mischief.  Looks like one of those little hooligans left this game card behind... as they were running away from a ghastly ghoul or something, I'm sure.

Being the scavenger I am, I picked it up and carried it with me as a souvenir through the cemetery gates:

The fellow in the red shirt isn't a ghost... I don't think...

Much like the roadway, nature has reclaimed a lot of the grounds and what mother earth hasn't taken back, vandals have destroyed.  Beyond the legends and all that stuff, it's truly a shame that human beings' final resting places are being treated with such disrespect.

However, not all of the grove has been eroded away in this manner.  In fact, one headstone, in particular, has actually been treated with great reverence:

The unidentified infant daughter buried in this family plot has been largely left alone by the trouble-makers who frequent these parts.  As you can see from the picture above, the child has even been left a great many gifts from curious adventurers in search of thrills and chills.

Accordingly to local lore, anybody who leaves a gift for the infant daughter will be bestowed with good luck in the near future.  Therefore, baseballs, children's sunglasses, pens, beaded necklaces, etc. decorate this child's final resting place.  There was even a lucky penny key-chain that made it here all the way from Las Vegas, clearly placed there by someone trying to double-down on their good fortune.

I too felt compelled to leave something behind in honor of this forgotten child, not to mention the fact that I could always use some good luck.  After all, my future mother in law has described me as a real-life Charlie Brown.  Thinking I had nothing to offer besides pocket lint, I suddenly remembered my trading card discovery from minutes prior:

Kids dig Pokemon right?  Of course, this child passed long before they were in the target demographic and decades before the pocket monsters were dreamed up, but whatever.  It was all I had to offer up and I didn't want to be a jerk to a ghost; that's bad juju mcgumbo.

After wandering around the cemetery and the surrounding woods for another 45 minutes or so, I pleased (and slightly disappointed) to experience nothing out of the ordinary.  That is, except for the scraggy old man who had been leading a group through the grounds who, when finished approached me asking if I was looking for ghosts and then disappeared back through the now-empty location alone.  That was a tad weird.  Also, if you notice a mysterious figure or ghostly orbs in any of the above pictures, please point it out immediately.

Anyway, that's the story of how I sacrificed a Pokemon card to the spirit of an infant child in a haunted cemetery located in the backwoods of Midlothian.  How was your Saturday?

Others "Pail" in Comparison

My fiance is a wonderful person.

She tolerates my terrible, pun-filled jokes, got me on a healthier diet, is always there for me when I need a shoulder and doesn't complain (too much) when I inevitably drift over to the trading card section during our pilgrimages to Target.

This is why I put a ring on it.

The other night, we needed to make a quick stop to pick up a minuscule amount of groceries in order to last us through our next big shopping day.  Inevitably, I felt my body make a reflexive right turn as we approached the cash registers, right into my familiar haunt.  Not that this was a surprise to either of us; unlike the Spanish Inquisition, it was completely expected.

What wasn't expected was that my lovely fiance followed me, instead of turning to the magazine racks for entertainment.  Not only did she follow me, she was actually looking through the product on the racks!  What trickery is this?!

When I heard her whisper, "Would judge me if I bought some Garbage Pail Kids?" I not only did not judge her, I immediately jumped into making sure she got the best bang for her buck.

Is this a door that leads to joining me in the card-collecting hobby, left slightly ajar?  I must burst through this entryway like the Kool-Aid Man!

In the end, she walked away with the 20-card rack pack of their latest release, "American as Apple Pie in Your Face," that you see above and I was about as giddy as a school girl that she was buying cards.  Shall we see how she did in her very first pack-ripping experience?:

The bonus here for me (besides the fact that my gorgeous bride to me is opening cards) is that I've never so much touched a pack of Garbage Pail Kids, let alone ripped one open to see it's contents.  Even though these things have been around forever, this was an entirely new experience for me.

On to the cards:

These two near the top were amongst her favorite pulls.  Who doesn't love a good social commentary or a chance to pick on hipsters?  I personally hate anything having to do with zombies though (it's an odd phobia I've had ever since my father let me watch Night of the Living Dead as an impressionable youngin'), so I wasn't as keen as she was on Phony Phil.

With this next batch, you have to keep in mind that my lady is a huge political nerd and has even worked on a few local campaigns.  Thus, it was a foregone conclusion that these were going to be her favorites:

I must say, that Trump card (ha! "trump card") seems to be awfully accurate.  Additionally, the one to right of it isn't too far off the mark either - Jeb doesn't seem to be enjoying the campaign trail at all these days.

It should also be noted that the Jeb is some sort of parallel too.  I forget which kind, but it was something really gross; something to do with either urine or snot... I'm not exactly sure though.

All in all, if that had been all that she got out of this experience, I think that would have been enough to make her a fan.  That said, I definitely didn't expect what was sitting comfortably in the middle of the stack:

Are you freakin' kididng me?!  She pulled an autograph out of the very first pack of cards she's ever opened in her quarter-century spent on this earth!  On top of that, it's numbered /25 too.  What an out of this world development this was (There's one of those terrible puns I was alluding too earlier).

I didn't pull a signed card of any sort until last year... clearly she's got the golden touch,

Brent Engstrom is the artist behind all of the disturbing, amusing and satirical artwork found on the front of these cards.  I wish I could find the pack odds for his John Hancock, but I cannot locate them online and I've already disposed of the wrapper.  Regardless, it's still quite the card collecting baptism, is it not?

When I saw this fall out, I was crossing my fingers that some of that golden touch would be passed down onto my own rack pack.  Psssh, you didn't think I was walking out of that card aisle empty-handed, did you?

While still in the store, I had my better half randomly select a product for me to open with her; awww, it's like a "his and hers" card-buying experience.  Now, hopefully some of her beginner's luck applicable to the contents of my bounty too.  Perhaps I had my own mega mojo super hit waiting for me to set it free from this plastic pouch.

Not quite - however, it was far from a disappointment:

My very first pack-pulled card of Schwarbs and only my second overall!  Plus it's from my favorite insert set of the new year (big surprise, right?).  With his rapid ascension through the minors and his immediate success in the Majors, there aren't a lot of cards of his on the market and the ones that do exist command a premium.

You damn well better believe this one will be his representation in my CATRC.

As a bonus footnote, there was also this superb fielding shot of Angel Pagan, who spent parts of the 2006-07 campaigns in Chicago.  As such, this will slot nicely into my "Cubs of a Different Color" binder (future/former Cubs pictured on different teams).

Okay, it's official, I'm letting her pick out all of my packs from now on.  Clearly she's magic.

So, now I've got to make sure that I keep the momentum going here - I'll have to get her a few more packs of Garbage Pail Kids and keep this fire stoked.  Maybe I should just forgo the flowers and chocolate on Valentines Day and surprise her with a bouquet made of card packs?

Nahhhhh, I'm just kidding - she'd definitely not be cool with that.  But, not because she wants the cheesy teddy bear/candy/roses lovey-dovey treatment; no, it'd be because the only thing she wants is to spend the entire day wandering around the Chicago Auto Show.

Did I mention that she's wonderful?