Cubs from Garvey, Cey, Russell, and Lopes

I contacted Jim, from Garvey Cey Russell Lopes, about trading for a Starlin Castro 2013 Triple Play Panini Card.  He was more than happy to oblige and he sent along some other Cubs to keep Starlin company on the long trek to my humble man cave.

Here's the card that highlighted my trade request:

 I'm not collecting this year's Panini Triple Play set.  The main reason is because of the poor pack/box collation of last year's issue, but now that's a far second to some of the art work of this edition.  This caricature of Starlin reminds me of one of the characters from the cartoon Fat Albert.

A 2010 Upper Deck card of Jake Fox.  Built like a fire hydrant, Jake Fox could really mash when given consistent playing time.  It's just too bad that he couldn't field a position well enough to deserve that time.  I was a big Jake Fox supporter and this card is a nice walk down memory lane.

 I really like this 2010 Topps card of Blake DeWitt.  DeWitt didn't do much during his Cub tenure, but that is a pretty nice shot, so I'll give the card a little blog love.

1988 Topps - Dave Martinez - I always liked this card, because he's got the whole, "Seriously, you just called me out on that pitch" look.   Been there, although it may have been back in high school, done that.

Ryno!  A 1994 Score edition of him turning two.  A new score for this Sandberg collector!  (Sorry for the pun, sometimes I just can't help myself.)

Rick Wilkins was a bonus baby that played in Peoria, my hometown, and later hit 30 homers in 1993 for the Cubs.  Another quality shot from a talented camera man is featured on this '92 Upper Deck card.

Hey, another Keith Moreland card to add to my collection!  I never pictured Moreland, now the Cubs' radio color man, as one who would be asked to bunt, but this 1988 Fleer card certainly disproves my assumption.

If you'd like to see what I sent Jim in his package, including the coaster, just click on this link.
Thanks for another great trade, Jim!

My 1st TTM Success = Happiness!

On March 31st I posted how I was going send out my first TTM (through the mail) autograph request.  I deposited a well written letter, my card, and a SASE envelope into the mailbox on April 1st and this arrived in my mailbox today, only fifty-three days later:

Huh, I kind of knew what I was receiving from the Cubs, as I could feel a card within the unopened contents.  But what happened to my Self-Addressed-Stamped-Envelope?  It was inside and the card was sealed within.  Weird, why wouldn't he just dump it in the mail?  Why the new envelope?  I supplied more than enough postage, but apparently the Cubs' front office has their own way of doing things!

Oh, perhaps because "they" didn't want to worry about folding up the letter to fit in my smaller envelope.  Here's the letter that was inside.  It's a nice and quick read from Robin Lestina-Cikanek, from the Fan Services Department.  Thanks, Robin!

 Theo liked my nice words!  Here's the picture of the my friend and I dressed up in Theo-themed costumes that I enclosed with my autograph request that was mentioned in the post-script:

And, finally, here's my newly autographed Theo Epstein baseball card.  He even addressed it to me!

 Simply. Awesome.

The man crush continues to grow.

New pursuit: a 2013 Bowman FrankenSet!

I was on the fence as to what to set to build this year: Archives or Bowman.  Then Nachos Grande offered up a three-box team group break and I was able to snag the Cubs.  Score!  Well, the group break will allow me to cross Topps Archives off my list.  In my collecting world it makes little to no sense to build a set when you already have all of the Chicago Cubs.

2013 Bowman it is! 

I've never collected a Bowman set before, but I have dabbled a bit with Bowman and its parallels before.
Exhibit A: My Dillon Maples rainbow.

This all got me to thinking about one of my favorite bloggers: The Cardboard Junkie.  He's a very witty blogger who introduced me to the FrankenSet, "Think of it as a set built like Frankenstein's monster out of many different parts."

Huh, I'll do a FrankenSet of 2013 Bowman! This should be fun!

So I went to my LCS and purchased a jumbo pack and hobby pack to get started.  Here's some of the variety that I can expect, including the gold parallels:

Will Middlebrooks

 Bowman prospects, and my first two Cubs cards!  Gioskar Amaya (left) is playing for Low A Kane County and Christian Villanueva is in AA manning the hot corner. For what it's worth, Villanueva came over from Texas in the Dempster deal.

Ice parallels!  Man, I do love cards that shine and sparkle!

Ike Davis

International and State parallel cards that feature the flag of the nation/state the player originated from.  I just so happened to pull Yonder Alonso's base card in one pack and his Cuban flag parallel in the other.  Cool.  Obviously, the parallel flag card will go into my FrankenSet.

I was lucky enough to pull a chrome auto of Taijuan Walker out of my jumbo pack.  This one will go into a top loader, not my set, but it's always fun to pull an autographed card!

I know there are other differently colored "ice" cards, chrome refractors, and also a variety of differently colored bordered cards.  I haven't jotted down any rules yet, but I'm thinking of collecting the base set without parallels and then the FrankenSet would be nothing but parallels.

This should be a fun little project to keep me busy over the summer! 

Waffle Taco: You fly, I'll buy!

One of my teammates on my slow-pitch softball team was talking about an advertisement he saw for the waffle taco at Taco Bell.  Shortly thereafter I was disappointed to learn the waffle taco is not a nationwide item on Taco Bell's menu, because they are testing out in select locations on the west coast first.

Enter my sister.  Oddly enough, she was going to San Diego the next day for a little R&R.

I love trying new food items and I wanted a waffle taco in the worst way.

"You fly, I'll buy!"

A couple of days ago Jane, my sister, spammed my e-mail box with nine different pictures of her Taco Bell dining experience, which included the waffle taco.

She originally said she wasn't looking forward to the culinary experience, but after trying the waffle taco she came away surprisingly pleased with her predestined menu selection.

Well, Jane flew, so I guess I have to pick up the tab.  Totally worth it.

Price of a waffle taco: $0.89.  Living vicariously through my sister: priceless!

Thanks, Jane!

Lurking around on Listia

I've built up a nice stash of credits by "selling" off cards and collectibles that don't really have much importance to my collection.

Over the last month I've won five separate one-card listings and I'm pretty happy with the results.  I'm even happier that I have a ton of more credits to burn!

Ryne Sandberg 2002 American Pie - American Sluggers

 This card captures a young Ryno on some really thick card stock.  I like how he "pops" from the sepia toned ballpark behind him.  I could do without the stars and stripes border though.  Bleh.

The next card was a promotional giveaway and is number 15,138 out of 20,000.  Not exactly rare, but not an easy find either.  I'm always happy to add a new Kerry Wood to my personal collection.

Speaking of Kid K, how about a 2000 Pacific Vanguard card of the flamethrower?  The background looks black to me in person, but it appears navy blue in the camera shot.  I've always had trouble telling navy from black for some reason.  So it goes.

Another Ryno to even up the score!  A 1997 All-Star card from the 45 card All-Star set. 

 I apologize for the reflection of my hand and camera in the shot above, but I'm really happy to add another shiny Sandberg to the collection.  Nice!
 
Speaking of shiny.  Oooooh!  This 2004 Upper Deck Diamon ProSigs Hall of Famers card puts refractors to shame.  My only complaint is that it's more purple than blue, but the shininess certainly makes up for it!

 The back is a bit more toned down than the front, but how could it not be?  Oddly enough it captures Billy's last five years in the big leagues.  That's a little different.

Well, that's all I have time for as I'm off to search for more Cubs cards on Listia.   Thanks for visiting my blog!