I got hooked on Gypsy Queen...

After the group break last week, I was solidly hooked on Gypsy Queen. I wanted more... I know, I sound like an addict... I have admitted this... well, three boxes later I'm left with nearly a complete set and a nice stack of hits... I don't have video, because the shop owner wanted to watch and see what I got, so I opened them all there at the shop and he hooked me up with a bunch of supplies for spending so much money... So, first of all, let's go with the mini's:

The top scan shows the front of course... the Gonzalez and Bard are "leather" print cards #'ed out of /10. Then the Victor Martinez is sepia toned #'ed out of /99. Then there is the sweet 1/1 Print plate. I REALLY love the way they did the printing plates this year, they are very nice looking with the borders overlaid on the plate. Finally the bottom row are the "hobby exclusive" variant minis from the mini-boxes. Again, pretty nice. Next up is the bronze border parallels (needless to say I had much better luck with these than in the group break):

I'm a bit confused after going and looking at the sell sheet (which we know that Topps liberally deviated from). If you have any to trade, let me know. Since they do only go to card #100, I want to complete the entire set. For those in my break who got multiple cards of the same player, I'm definitely interested in trading for those duplicates. Finally, we have the hits which also turned out rather well for me:

Needless to say, much better than the group break. As for the relics, 3 HOF'ers and an MVP are nice, then the redemption auto for Frank Robinson to top it off. Cashner seemed to have signed about 10,000 of these cards because I've seen them pop up everywhere, including the group break. Neftali and Nolasco are solid auto's. Of course with only 9 hits in three boxes, I was short 3 hits, so I have mailed those UPC's off as well for redemption from Topps. We'll see how this goes. All hits and mini's are up for trade. I have a bunch of red-back mini's, and of course 9 mini's of the "insert" sets available as well. Not to mention that I have a BUNCH of duplicates at this point for trade of the base and (3) SP's for trade as well.

I'm a total of 36 SP's and 22 base cards from set completion, so if there is anyone out there looking to make a swap to clear out each other's needs, let me know.

Have a great Wednesday!

And now for something completely different!

So the wife and I traveled to Austin, TX this weekend and saw our favorite band, The Decemberists, in concert for the third time since we started dating. She had been a fan for a long time, but she had never seen them live until after we got together. We've now seen them here in Houston and traveled to Austin and New York City (where I later proposed) to see them. This show may very well have been the best, because they finally played our favorite song. A 9 minute sea shanty called "The Mariner's Revenge Song". No, this has nothing to do with that team from Seattle, but rather the old time pirate-y mariners... enjoy this interpretation...


And yes, I pre-posted this on Sunday and accidentally posted it live... then took it down... and then re-scheduled it for Tuesday... so, for most of you this will be "new" and for the rest you may have seen it briefly on Sunday... oops... they don't call me the dimwit for nothing!

Trade and Group Break Results from BA-Benny!

Mike from BA Benny and I have had all kinds of epic trades going back and forth between Houston and New York. Well, the cards shown below are the highlights of our latest trade! (Mike your cards are in the mail in the morning!)

That's a black border from this year of Keppinger numbered to 60, then an Oswalt jersey card and then the grand centerpiece of the trade, the Jason Castro signature from Razor, very nice! I threw in a few other cards from the trade. Hopefully Mike will enjoy the cards I'm sending his way as much as I'm enjoying mine! Thanks again Mike, another great trade!

Next up, a smattering of cards from his group break... one of the most awesome group breaks I've been a part of. Every time I refreshed my Google Reader, it seemed there was another video from Mike opening packs (of course except for that period of time his computer crashed, but not his fault... haha!) Thanks for the group break Mike, it was great!

I am fairly certain that I can say that I didn't have any of the above cards before this break! Great job Mike and can't wait for your next break!

Have a great week everyone!

2011 Topps Series 2 Want List

GREEN = PENDING TRADE


Base:
DONE!



Kimball Mini's:
83, 80, 76, 67, 58

SP Variations: Nolan Ryan

I will trade for ANY Astros base parallel.

Inserts:
Any Astros SILK card.
Any Nolan Ryan insert/auto/relic.
Jumbo Relic: T60JR-HP Hunter Pence
Nolan Ryan Glove Leather manufactured
Any other Astros featured in the manu-patches

Updated 11/27/2011

Product Review Time! Thanks to EasyCanvasPrints.com!

As some of you may have noticed recently, I gained an additional blog sponsor with EasyCanvasPrints.com!!!!!

My wife and I had been talking for a while about getting a canvas print from our wedding to adorn and empty wall in the home. Well, this opportunity was just too great to pass up! After a couple of e-mails we agreed to pay for some of the shipping in order to get the print size that we wanted. Also, I had to track down our wedding photographer to get better resolution prints to use, as the originals we had were too low res. Well, needless to say it turned out great.

First of all, I'll go over the website interface. It honestly couldn't have been easier to put together the print that we wanted. First we chose the 30"x40" size photo print because we wanted a larger than usual photo. Then, we chose the 1.5" thick border and the picture wrapped border. Again, every step was easily laid out and couldn't have been easier to select the options that we wanted. We went through our catalog of photos, several hundred and finally picked the one wanted and uploaded it. The final step was to crop and move it onto the template so it would be laid out exactly how we wanted it.

Overall, the design process was an A+.

Shipping was next. It was ordered on Tuesday the 26th, and promised by May 7th. However, they did an amazing job and our print shipped on Friday with expected FedEx delivery by the 2nd. FedEx outdid themselves and actually delivered it yesterday! We were out of town (in Austin at The Decemberists concert, it was awesome) but my in-laws stopped by our house and picked it up off our porch. The only think I wish I had done is set it up for "signature required delivery" but that's because I live in the ghetto and have had stuff stolen off our porch before! My mistake, not theirs. It all worked out though and when we got back in town this afternoon we had to stop by the in-laws' house to pick up our dog and package!

Upon opening up the box, we were pleasantly surprised to see exactly how much padding and shipping prep was done to insure there was no damage to the canvas print. First there was bundled butcher paper protecting all four corners, then there was bubble wrap encompassing the entire print, and finally there was saran-style plastic wrap enveloping the entire print. It was all done in such a way as to protect the product from pretty much any shipping obstacle.

Overall, shipping was another A+.

Finally, we get to the actual product. Here it is fresh out of the box:

And to give a bit of perspective, here's a picture of it with me standing next to it!

It came out great! It was solid and sturdy. The canvas stapled to the frame all around the inner frame and the resolution was amazing. Truly a great job by EasyCanvasPrints.com. If you ever have a need for a canvas print, I wouldn't hesitate for a second to head to their website and start my order. This is one site that definitely lives up to it's name!

For the actual product, my wife and I give it an A+. We are completely satisfied and grateful for the chance to work with this company and provide you readers the chance to see their work. Thanks again to the team at EasyCanvasPrints.com!!!

Local Card Shop Pick-Ups

I stopped by one of my local card shops today, Sports Collectibles of Houston and picked up a bunch of cards. Mainly autographs but also a couple of other cards as well... check them out!

Ok, so first if all we have a autographed 1962 Bobby Shantz Colt 45's card, then an autograph Milo Hamilton card (legendary announcer for the Astros, called Hank Aaron's record breaking homer), J.R. Richard auto (oh if he hadn't had the stroke, the Astros would have challenged for the playoffs with a rotation of Nolan, Niekro, Richard, et. al.) and J.R. Towles serial auto. Nice additions to my Astros auto group. Next up is the Enos Slaughter auto postcard, always awesome to pick up a reasonably priced HOF auto. If anyone is interested, the store has several more of these so e-mail me and I can pick one up for you and mail it to you for $10 shipped. Finally, a bit of trade bait for Rhubarb_Runner! Hope he needs this one, Kirby Puckett 2002 Topps Archives Reserve Best Years game used jersey card (hint of a pinstripe vertically on the far right). David, let me know if you're interested!

Next up:

Two more HOF'ers in Yount and Carlton for my 1978 set chase. And a Gino Cimoli 1963 base card. I got his cut signature in my Tri City Sports PL box breaks and I wanted to get one of his cards, lucky for me it was in the $0.50 box. He passed away this February, so I am glad I now have his auto and a card to put next to it.

Finally I bought a couple of packs of Heritage (although I hate having a stack of them now... but they were cheap and I got a hit!):

Definitely available for trade!

18 of the Gypsy Break packages went out today. I am waiting for addresses from Rod (Padres) and Colin (Mariners). I'll shoot them another e-mail but if any of you converse with them regularly, let them know I'm needing their addresses!

Speaking of Gypsy Queen... I wasn't going to buy any more, but after doing the group break... I'm HOOKED... must have more... so be prepared for something next week as I look to buy some more!!! I want the complete set!!!!

2011 Gypsy Queen Group Break!!!!! It's FINALLY HERE!!!!

Here's the video... all packages are ready to go, will probably get them mailed out Friday at the latest... enjoy...


So the positives: some pretty good hits... a printing plate, dual jersey/auto, sepia mini, couple of jersey swatches... LOTS of cards! 48 packs + 2 mini packs! Great design and execution of the set.

The negatives: Shorted 2 hits (as has been the case for most boxes of this set), HORRIBLE COLLATION!!! The bronze border parallels were horribly collated with sequentially numbered duplicates within the same box! I will be writing a nice long letter with the two UPC labels that I'll be sending to Topps for our 2 replacement cards.

The Walter Johnson cards when to the Twins and the George Sisler "St. Louis Browns" cards went to the Orioles, as those are the direct teams which those franchises moved to. The randomization of the Gypsy Queen cards are at the end of the video, in case any of you couldn't wait that long! I have 2 complete checklists and another with 3 of the 4 cards. First 3 people who e-mail me will get them.

I still need mailing addresses for Colin (Mariners) and Rod (Padres). E-mail them to me ASAP!

Overall, there were what I would consider two below average boxes. The collation on the inserts and the base cards was ridiculous, and you'll see when you get your cards that there are some players that got 4 base cards in the two boxes. No bueno. Hopefully you all enjoyed the break video and for those of you who got the good hits, congratulations! All teams' group break card totals have been updated on the sidebar. (I realized afterwords that I included the "bronze border parallels" as inserts in the total count, sorry guys!).

Hopefully this break, my first to host, won't be the last and I hope that all of you feel you got your money's worth! Thanks to each of you who participated!!!

The Dimwit is back...

Vacation was great... 7 day cruise through the Caribbean with stops in Honduras, Belize and Cozumel. I will tell you now, Honduras (specifically Roatan Island) sucks big time. Was not a fan. The tour guide pointed to a rusted out metal boat laying in the harbor and tried to tell me it has been there since the 1650's. I wanted to kick her in the face with a nice round house and tell her to shut her face, but the wife was there so I just laughed in her face and kept looking around at the rest of the island. Still can't figure out why Royal Caribbean (or any cruise line) decided to make it a port-of-call. Maybe we missed the good part.

Belize was nice, we zip lined through the tree canopies and got to walk around a bit. Got a cheap bottle of Captain Morgan Private Stock rum which will make for some nice Rum & Cokes to get me through the Astro games this season... Cozumel lived up to its reputation. A catamaran trip with snorkeling, kayaking and a private white beach was just what the doctor ordered.

Finally the last night of the trip, my wife and I sat down at 10:45pm with $160 bucks at the Three Card Poker table and walked away at 1:00am with $500. Sorry folks, but that will not be "bonus break money" but rather "supplement the personal collection" money. I've got my eyes on a decent condition Nolan Ryan rookie card and I want it!!! GIVE IT TO ME!!!! MY PRECIOUS!!!!!! Ok, I'll settle down now...

I should be picking up the Gypsy Queen boxes tomorrow provided my LCS has received their shipment. Thanks in advance to Houston Sports Connection for the boxes, I will of course pimp them to the brink of annoyance during the break, but you Houston area people need to get over there and shake hands with Howard. He give great deals to honest collectors and people who aren't looking to screw him over. He knows you can get better deals online, but will make the best deal he can within reason to get you the cards you want. I think he has an eBay store, but I don't have a link to it as of yet. I'll see if I can get that info from him so you all can take a look at what he's got posted.

Have a great week everyone... hope to have a video or two up soon!

Gotta love Wal-mart and their discount blasters - - 2011 Gypsy Queen GROUP BREAK BONUS!

Alright, here you go everyone... another bonus...

I wanted to scan this in just to show that it does in fact say "Astros" on the front. If it were a more desirable player, I'd make a bigger deal out of it. But I'm going to go ahead and cede it to the Rockies, since it is my break and I make the arbitrary rules. Plus Preston did far more in a Rockies uniform than in his half season with the Astros before moving onto the Cardinals to win the title with them!

I'll warn you all ahead of time, in reviewing the cards after breaking the box, the is quite a bit of corner damage throughout the packs, in fact almost every card has a small noticeable dent in the top left corner on the back. Sorry...

Seriously, this is the last post... vacation starts tomorrow and I still have to pack!!!!!

What? Where did this video come from?!?!?!

Oooooo... look what I found...



Ok, so maybe I wasn't done before I headed out for vacation...