What I did while waiting on the plumber.

 I had my water heater replaced yesterday. Talk about putting a big hurt in the card budget for the next four or five, maybe 6 months. OUCHie! Now, I could have fixed my issue with the heater myself, but logic said replace the entire thing. I got 21 years out of it without a hint of problems. I could of replaced the thermostats and elements myself, but there is also an interior leak which I believe is just the gasket for one of the elements. However, I decided to call in a professional and replace the whole thing with hopes that I can get a couple of decades out of the new one. 

Next bad news: ComC finally responded to the BBB, and said tough they notified me in advance which I do not subscribe to their blog so that was LIE. The BBB asked if I was happy or not, I said nope, so they are still pushing the issue for me, we'll see how that goes.  I don't typically wish bad stuff on anyone, but I really hope ComC folds so hard the owner's never recover.

The next bad news: On Wednesday night, I got an e-mail from the post office saying they denied my claim because time had expired for filing the claim. No, that is not true, and it is all documented online, so immediately filed the appeal and stated time expired while it was under their review for several weeks on Wednesday night late, and when I woke up Thursday morning, that appeal was denied, and said I had to wait another 10 days for me to receive a letter in the mail with instructions to file another appeal. They never sent the first letter when I filed the claim, so I really don't expect them to send one now either, so I will wait the 10 days and file the 2nd appeal. I also reached out to my Senator as the PO is part of the federal government. We'll see what happens next.

Okay, with the sucky news out of the way for now let's get to some good stuff.

You may recall that I started the month of November sick again.... This time I went a bit nuts with online purchases. There will be a few posts of some of that stuff, but for today I am doing some Ebay wins. Christmas style.

I think I am down to needing just 4 more of the d/c ornaments for 2025.

My Braves from the Holiday set including the 4 parallels above too.

Another parallel lot. That purple Kurtz is numbered too!

Finishing up with an SP lot plus a couple gingerbread ornaments. I have more Ebay wins, but trying to keep the themes inline.

To answer what I did while the plumber was here. Of course I was messing with my baseball cards  DUH. LOL! Specifically I was adding set builds into TCDB. Which I have the November numbers to put out soon.

Later Gators!

More incoming goodies. Another double dip. Braves parallels and 3 kinds of Laughlin sets. Feats, Firsts, and Wildest.

 I got a package from Greg (Night Owl) wishing me Happy Thanksgiving with these hitching a ride with the note.

Greg hooked me up with some Braves parallels. You can see the note too, :)

I also got a package in from OCTer Kevin Webster who through some older Laughlin cards up on what we call a waiver in the group.

First I have to put this out there, the copyright date is misleading, as the weren't actually released. In fact one of these sets says 72' or 73', but wasn't actually released until 1976. 

I just mailed his return this weekend. I had to wait to get it in as the return came from an Ebay purchase.

Saturday Shadow Shots

 The weekend is upon us and it is time for another round of SHADOWS.

I see what I see and want to know what you see.

1) Pterodactyl

2) Alligator

3) I see a gymnast doing a full split (the hard way).

So....what do you see in the shadows?

What is my FINE? I am overdue.

 There is no fine, just lots and lots of posts lined up that have been in que for a couple of months now. After knocking out the first half of the Tampa show that I attended back in October I am feeling the need to drop a few incoming posts on you.

First up is a package that originated with our Canadian friend Angus. I say originated because he hand delivered it to the owner of "Too many Verlanders" who in turn mailed it to me, and threw in a few cards of his own. A double dip for me.

I needed these Elway, and pretty sure he knew this from checking TCDB. Finally added to the Elway collection and updated the data. That was the first time since I don't know Wes dropped a bunch on me. Thank you for extra extra surprise.

Now for the cards that actually came from Angus, who gave me a heads up in advance about sending some Opeechee cards.

Do I collect Star Wars cards? Why yes I do, and i did in fact need these. I wasn't expecting non sports cards, but they most certainly are appreciated. I really wasn't sure what Angus would be sending, maybe 80's or 90's OPC, I didn't have a clue. So these definitely caught me off guard, but before you fans of baseball cards get let down....

Yeah baby, a beautiful sweet playing days 1969 OPC Hank Aaron. You got to admit that was well worth the wait to see it last.

Thanks to both of you. Now that I got this finally posted I can work on a return (Greg, in case you forgot- I'll be (once I figure out what to send) dropping cards for Angus on you. 

Wacky Wednesday and some news about Greg Maddux

 The last 7 days flew by. Hump day once again and time for some interesting cards.

Courtesy of OPC and Pinnacle. 

Now for those of you that were lured in on the Greg Maddux announcement:

In case you didn't catch my scatter brains post: When I re-started my PC updating I fell short of my normal system. The largest portion of that was a 2 row box apx 1000 cards of Greg Maddux. Well, I have now updated and re-updated his numbers on my PC page. I added roughly 300 cards to the PC and 6 to the over all total Maddux unique cards. Now in addition to the Maddux dupes (technically most of the cards in the PC are dupes too) that I did a week or two ago I now have apx 600 or so MORE!

What do I do with this huge stack? I am thinking some kind of GIVEAWAY. 

WHAT DO YOU THINK? HOW SHOUDL I GIVE THEM AWAY?

Do 9 card scans again like the last giveaway????

Or one lump sum (however there are dupes within the dupes)???

Comment contest???

Let me know your thoughts below.

Have a great night!

What are the ODDS? round three and the grand totals.

 My daughter and grandson spent last night here and will be here again tonight, so knocking this right out.

Alrighty then. Here we go, there was a dup above so the total count for the game is 89 Braves. 

Braves needed: 16 = 18% (this is more in line with expectations).

Set potential: 29

PC potential: 28 (but doubtful any will make the cut).

Mini collections: 4

Outright waste: 10 plus 2 other wasted picks.

Total of all three BRAVES rounds combined stats:

Braves needs: 70/257 = 27% 

Set possibilities: 55

PC possibilities: 67 although most are unlikely.

Mini collection: 4

Nopes: 25 plus the actual pulled dupes.

I was surprised for the totals and I would call this a WIN even though I hold on to the initial regret that I had after buying them. $300.00 for 70 Braves needs that weren't high end, eh... Now yes there are tons more set/PC needs that more than make up the purchase price. There were a total of 844 cards minus the 257 Braves, so we have quite a bit to show off yet from that Tampa show. Those will wait until I get out a few other posts, and then I will kick start the Tampa posts again with the ACTUAL BRAVES cards that WERE needs.

Adios!

 

What are the ODDS? round two underway!

 Round two contains 71 cards 9technically there were 72, but I missed a dupe dupe). Categories in case you missed the previous segment.

Needed Braves team sets, Set builds, PC, Mini collections, and out right didn't need anywhere.

Let's see the cards in this round.

Okay there are the cards. Here are the end results:

Braves needs: 23/71= 32.4% (again much better than I had hoped for)

Set needs: 18/71= 25.3% (this number is POTENTIALLY as I still need to verify they are indeed needs).

PC guys: again Potential as we know how long it will be before I actually know. 23/71 providing they weren't set build needs first.  32.4%

Mini collections: none

Not useful cards: 5

OVERALL ROUND STATISTICS: useful cards 63/71 = 88.7%. Again not what I expected as when buying bulk is typically not that useful. I generally hope for a 25% for needs of some kind, but in reality is around 10%. It has been that way for decades. 

I'll finish up with round 3 tomorrow and sum up everything for the 3 rounds as well. Thursday I need to post some over due thanks for incoming cards which will probably continue on through next Monday and Tuesday as well. We'll see. I have gotten in a bunch of stuff on my own too, but those will have to wait until I wrap up the last Tampa show I went to with the Non-Braves cards that went straight to set build or PC stacks. There are 3 days worth of those with some great cards in there for sure. (and some duds). 

Have a great night everyone!

Scatter Brains

 Apparently, the break I took from updating my PC collection gave me scatter brains. I have dun dun it to myself this time. For those who are unsure of what I am talking about. I am constantly updating my PC's and it takes 2 full years to go from A to Z. I knew I was way ahead of the game at the end of summer, so I took a break which was perfect timing with me getting sick for the entire month of September. In October I resumed with the L's, and then moved to the M's this month. RED FLAG! OOPS, one big thing I forgot about was the Braves that I sorted out of my binders back in the beginning of the year. I would start each letter of the Update by going through those Braves boxes (out in my garage) pull those to start the letter update. 

TOTAL BRAIN FART HERE. Now for Lopez, not so much a big deal as I am no longer "tracking" him. Not listing them in TCDB, just boxing what I had. But, the M's..... Maddux, McCann, McGriff, Markakis, Mathews complete other story. McCann and McGriff not so much a big deal as I hadn't updated those yet (they would have been next week), but the other 3 oh boy. Especially Maddux as there was 1500 cards in those boxes for him alone. Oh boy. I started last night pulling the "potential" set build needs for all 5 of those guys plus Lopez. I have to check there first to see if any of them are needed there before resuming and correcting Maddux, Markakis, and Mathews. Yep glad I realized I was scatter brained before i got too far along with the update. I am so glad to have cleared the scatter Brains. I am back to excellence LOL!

I hope everyone's weekend was good.

 

Saturday Shadow Shots

 Hopefully by now everyone is beginning to get over the turkey lag. I finished bt leftovers yesterday, so today is a new beginning. Maybe some chili and grilled cheese sandwich, or maybe some fast food drive thru. LOL.

So here you are just aching to tell me what you see in the SHADOWS.

1) I see a cartoon horse or mule (some kind of animal) doing a run away from something while looking back.

2) I see Homer Simpson streaking full out running.

3) I think Rollie lost his mustache. I guess you could say he left everything on the field.

YOUR TURN.