My Family Knows What I Like!

My birthday is the 22nd and my mother's is the 18th. My family has celebrated the two dates with one party ever since Past Me grew out of the "I have to have my own day" business a couple of decades go. We enjoyed a nice family meal on Saturday and afterwards we opened some present.

In no particular order here's some of my favorites . . .

I don't go on tumblr hardly ever, but when I do it's to check out the TOOTBLAN Tracker!

 TOOTBLAN stands for Thrown Out On the Bases Like a Nincompoop.  And now I have a new coffee mug!  Woo-hoo!  Simple pleasures for a simple man.   Thanks, Jane!

For the record, the Cubs were second in all of MLB last season in the number of times they made baserunning blunders with fifty-one. The Rays had fifty-two, while the average per team was just under 39, or about one per team for every four games played.  Dexter Fowler, the now former Cub, lead all of baseball with fifteen such blunders.  Ouch.
If you'd like to see a classic TOOTBLAN, then please watch the entire video below.  Total TOOTBLAN. SMH.

Hero Decks! 
I'm not sure how much use this deck of cards will get, because it will probably get split up into various Cubs binders in my collection. There are 54 cards in all, including two announcers (jokers).

 Ryne Sandberg and Kerry Wood for my player collections!

 Rizzo and The Hawk!

 Some of the boys from the 1969 squad, plus some other members of the Hall of Fame.

 Great set of cards!  You can check out HeroDecks.com to see if your favorite team has a deck, which includes nineteen baseball teams, football, college, hockey, and an "other" category.  Good stuff.

Woo-Hoo!  It looks like I have box busting to do!  Plus, my parents and sister both gave me gift certificates to my LCS.  Excellent!

Great movie about a legendary man.  I've seen it once and now I'll be able to watch it whenever I want.

In trade packages of cards I usually add a note on the back of expired sheets from my Cubs calendar.  

 I think I'll still do that, but I'll also add in team related ones from this calendar (which I won't write on). Look for these in my future trade packages!

I pride myself in my logic and game playing skills, but my mother and I got absolutely destroyed FOUR TIMES (out of four) when we teamed up to take on my sister and beautiful wife. 

 I'd like to blame alcohol or large quantities of cold medicine for my incredible streak of futility, but there were too many witnesses to use lame excuses. It was a bad gaming night. Very bad. 

Check this one out!  It's a 1956 Topps Boston Red Sox card with fuzzy-rounded corners and a nice crease in the bottom right corner.  Isn't vintage just absolutely wonderful?

 Did I mention how Karl Olson is fifth one in the back row on this card?  AND how it also has his autograph on the card?  How sweet is that!?! 

What's even better is I didn't even know this card existed.  I have a Karl Olson player collection and it wasn't even on my radar.  My family goes the extra mile!

Lastly, we have a photo of me from May pf 1979.  At only 18 months old I was already an Olympic Champ AND a Chicago Cubs fan.  How about that?

 The picture is 8"x10", is in a frame, and will hang on one of the man room walls. In some odd way, I feel it validates my Cubs fandom.  So cool and thoughtful. Thanks, Mom and Dad!

Thanks for stopping by and sharing in my birthday!