Olympic Size Return

I apologize on here a lot.  I do it for a couple of reasons, one is because I'm a fairly apologetic person.  The other bigger reason though is because I value my readers, and I know what its like to fall in and out of habits.  A habit of a blogger not writing a couple days, sometimes becomes a week, then two, then three, then suddenly its a couple posts every 5-6 months.  A habit of a reader of blogs is similar.  If you don't see a blogger write for a while you either figure they are cutting back, or have given up.  Sometimes they will mention they are busy, but still if you are out of habit of reading a blog for a while, you don't seem to miss them when new ones come along.

Having said all that, I don't know if the analytical data is corrupted on Blogger, but I'm averaging some of my highest readership ever.  This at a time where I haven't wrote in almost a week.  Maybe if I keep my mouth shut I can double the readers, lol.  In all seriousness though, I'm not calling it fake readers, but I know my true viewers and to you all, I owe you a new blog or two.

I am in the process of sorting a big package of cards I got recently, and have been meaning to scan them and post them.  However it seems my sleep pattern tells me the best time to sleep is about the time that I do my blogging.  By the time I wake up, its overnight, and I'm not in the mood to scan, and the process is repeated.  Luckily today, I have so far changed that habit.  I'm also writing this earlier than normal in case it happens again.  I don't like pre writing blogs unless I must, but I have wrote drafts a couple times, and waited to post them.  In those instances, its less than an hour before I post them, so I'm not writing a weeks worth at once.  It make me feel my blog is a bit organic, and gives me a chance to write things happening at the precise moment I am typing them.  That's why you'll see me writing about things like the wrestling draft the other night, or if the Royals win or hit a home run or something.  I have nothing against those who do pre write blogs, because I know people are busy, and its easier, but it just isn't for me.

So enough with my ramblings, lets get to the post, and some scans.

As I mentioned earlier this month, my grandma passed away.  I was asked to be a pallbearer and it was something I've never had been asked to do before.  I didn't mind doing it, but it isn't something you really want to do.  As with most funerals, it was a very somber day, but it was nice seeing so many faces I hadn't seen in a while, too bad it was for an occasion such as this.  After the funeral a couple people mentioned something about a gathering on what would be my grandma's 90th birthday next month, and I hope that happens.

My sister came down for the funeral, and once it ended we took a ride around town, and she mentioned something about going to Savvy Seconds.  She doesn't get to go too often, and I haven't been in a while, so we decided to go.  I wasn't expecting to find anything as my mom just went a couple days earlier and didn't see anything.

But alas, something was there to be found.  Besides a Kerig coffee pod rack (holds the coffee) I found for my mom for 3 bucks (she now has two which are both filled), I found a page of trading cards.  This set me back an additional quarter.  Well, actually my sister spotted me since I didn't have change and didn't want change back.

Here are some Impel Olympic Trading Cards.  I remember Impel from making the 1991 WCW trading cards, and they also made cards for TV shows, but they also made these cards for the 1992 Summer Olympics.  I have seen them before, but never had any.  A quarter was a good price, but to be honest, if I didn't see Jim Courier or Shannon Miller I would have passed.  It's nothing personal against the rest, but I don't remember them.  Well, except for Michael Johnson, him, it was personal, I just never liked him.  I always liked Donovan Bailey more.  I always hated the hype that Johnson got, so whenever he lost I was happy.  I was also happy when Usain Bolt was dubbed the World's Fastest Man because Michael couldn't claim that title any longer.

Here are a few more that were included, and I even got a double of Denise Parker.  I wasn't sure how many cards were in the set, so once I got home I was hopeful I was well on my way of building a set.  Those dreams were dashed when I saw it was like 200 or more cards in the entire set.  That's fine because I didn't really need another set of cards I don't care too much about.  One day I would like to get some more Olympic cards, but just the ones I remember and like.  Each of the Dream Team players got cards, so I might search for them too.  If I see a pack of the 2016 Olympic cards, I might buy one, but I don't expect to, and even then it depends on the price.

The Olympics are about 2 weeks away, and unlike most years, I'm not as excited about it.  I do plan to watch some of it, but if I happen to miss some of it, I won't be too worried.  The only things I'm really interested in are Usain Bolt running (he's not 100% and I hear he's retiring next year), and Mizzou wrestler J'Den Cox.  He won't wrestle until the final days, so I have time to prepare for it.

If those cards weren't enough, there were a few other cards in the page that weren't Olympic.  In fact, they were football.  Again, unless it was someone I collected, I probably would have passed, but these cards alone were worth a quarter I thought, so it made the decision easier.

Now granted, I don't collect many Cowboys cards, but I don't have hardly any Troy Aikman cards, and I might not have ANY Michael Irvin cards, so those were all nice additions.  It's even more surprising in Irvin's case since I used to have a big binder full of Miami Hurricanes players.  The other card is of Steve Bono.  Sure he isn't the most memorable 49er's QB, but he will go into my collection solely on the fact he was also once a Kansas City Chief.

So I think a quarter was a nice deal.  I don't expect to find cards at Savvy Seconds so any time I do find some, I consider getting them.  I just visited again yesterday, and didn't see anything new.  However I was disappointed as I passed on a John Anderson CD and it was gone this time.  I did run into a friend who told me the Midway Antique Mall expanded and the new section is already full of booths.  It's been a while since I've gone, but knew it was open or about to open.  I plan on going there sometime in the next month, so if I do, expect some pictures.

When my sister visited the night before (she also attended my grandma's visitation), she had some stuff she's been holding for me for a while too.  I'll show a bit now, but go in depth in the next few posts.

Shortly after Roddy Piper passed away last year, my sister saw this at a checkout lane at a store. An item I don't collect is lighters, but this was pretty cool.  She's been meaning to bring it for a year now, but finally brought it down.  I CAME HERE TO CHEW BUBBLEGUM AND FLICK MY BIC.... AND I'M ALL OUT OF BUBBLEGUM!  I recently watched on of his final movies, one called The Masked Saint.  He had a small role as a wrestling promoter, and he did a good job.  He didn't really perform as Roddy Piper though, he was a little more subdued, but it worked for his character.  As for the movie, it was a nice clean film that was a religious themed movie about a wrestler who became a pastor.  It was based on a true story, but I read later that unlike the movie, he wasn't a pastor WHILE he was wrestling, he only started after he retired from the ring.  Overall, it was a nice movie, but I think I would have changed a few things in it myself.

In addition to the lighter, she also had some packs of the Dollar Store cards.  She was curious what was inside the packs, so she told me she opened them, but she did wrap them back up, so I will post them tomorrow.

Another package of cards she opened was one that had me excited.  She actually bought two packages, but she admitted she looked at them and combined them.  I was fine with that.

She was in St. Louis recently, and she asked if she should look out for anything.  I couldn't think of anything, so I teased her and said "discount Rams stuff".  She went to two or three stores and struck out on them, but she finally ended up at Savers and found these.  I've heard stories on finding good card deals at Saver's  but honestly forgot there was one in St. Louis.  I've never been, but always wanted to go.

I didn't hear from her until later that evening, and she called and said she found a couple packages of cards, and it was about 5 or 6 bucks total. Again she was curious, so she opened them.  She asked how she should repack them and I told her they could stay in the ziplocks as long as they don't get shuffled around or are rubber banded.  She named a lot of them off and was pretty excited about her findings.  Since this post is a bit long, and I'm still scanning these cards, I'll scatter the results over a few posts.  Let me say this, I'm not surprised at the amount of Cardinals that were included (since it was from St. Louis), but was surprised at what kind of Cardinals cards there were.  The majority is of the junk wax era, but there is some gems in here.  I thought I'd post it to motivate me to finish scanning and to give you a taste of what the next few posts could bring.

That will wrap it up for today, if you're reading this around midnight or later and it was just posted, it means I fell asleep again, but if its around 7 PM Central, it means I stayed awake.  Hopefully I've scanned more cards by then.  I'm tired as it is, but I have the air conditioner blasting since its 100 outside with a heat index of like 112 so I'm keeping cool.  If there is a heat wave in your parts, I hope you stay cool.  Thanks for reading and have a great weekend.