House of Cards - Vacation Cardboard

While on vacation I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to seek out a couple of baseball card shops.  The second one, TnT Baseball Cards in Philadelphia, was less than impressive.  How unimpressed was I?  Well, I walked 1.2 miles from our hotel in 90 degree heat to visit the store and I didn't even bother to make a purchase for my troubles.  It was crowded and unorganized, there junkwax everywhere, and there were kids playing card games.  Not the place for me.

The first one?  It was set to close at 6:00pm and I walked in at 5:45.  I didn't leave until 7:15.  Yep, I had some fun and the owners were happy to stay open.  House of Cards in Silver Spring, Maryland, is supposedly the second oldest card shop in the country.   The owners are big on eBay, have their own Auction House, and possess a great variety of packs and cards in store.  Overall, it's a fun store.

Lucky for me they were having a moving sale and many items were 50% off and there were even some 75% off items. I've been looking for some 1969 Topps cards to pay back Jaybarkerfan's Junk and I hit gold.  I had Wes' list of cards stored as a bookmark, but my smartphone wasn't working properly.  Luckily the owners were more than happy to search the interwebs and print off a copy for me.  That's some good old fashioned customer service right there.  So, I picked up a healthy stack of '69 cards that were discounted 50% and one item for JediJeff out of the 75% off cabinet. 

I was supposed to meet up with JediJeff this week in Chicagoland while I was taking my Calculus BC refresher course, but I guess my reputation scared him off and he ran for the mountains.  No, seriously.  He's in Colorado. 

So, what did I find Jeff?  It's the Collectors Set of 110 cards from the Eight Men Out movie.  Nice!  I'm not sure how White Sox fans feel about the movie or the set, but Jeff will find this in his mailbox when he returns from his trip.

I did purchase some cards for myself.  I went straight to the sale box of vintage cards and found these beauties:

 This is the one Tommy John collection that I wanted for my collection.  Fifty cents?  Yes, please!

 Huh, I wonder why Tommy was on the disabled list in 1975?  I kid. I kid.

A couple of new vintage Billy Williams for my player collection!

 Here's a young Ron Santo and a slightly older one.  I miss Ron Santo. 

 My favorite card by far was this wrinkled 1959 high numbered Ernie Banks All-Star card.  I'd never seen this card before and now it's all mine!

 While the gentlemen behind the counter were ringing me up, I was flipping through the parallel box, which was also discounted... 

... and like magic an orange chrome Anthony Rizzo caught my eye.  I love how the outline of Anthony's head has an "electric" looking feel to it.  Sometimes my camera does cool things.

In summary, I found two card shops, and although one was a dude the House of Cards shop made up for it.  Thanks for stopping by today!