Sentimental Sundays: Spider-Man comic book collection

[This is a post I wrote in late 2020 that was forgotten about in my drafts. The thing was it just turned out kinda boring and some of the photos suck, so I wasn't compelled to post it. But what the heck, I already typed up the thing, so why not just publish it.]

For a couple years when I was a kid in the early 90s, I was an avid comic book collector, with most of my allowance money being split between cards and comics. Then I lost interest in both hobbies and boxed up everything in the garage. Jump to 2008 when I'm whittling down my possessions in anticipation of a move out of state, I pulled out my best/favorite 10% or so from each collection-- basically a shoebox and a binder of cards and one box of comics-- and jettisoned the rest on Craigslist for a few bucks.

Those keepers from my childhood comic collection had been missing for several years and I was starting to worry they disappeared somewhere along the line. But one happy moment during the otherwise exhausting recent move was that the box of comics turned up, tucked away out of sight in the back recesses of a big desk.

For this post I'm going to open up the box for the first time in over a decade and take a look at my treasure trove. I've got a rough idea of what's in there, but I don't doubt there will be a few surprises I forgot about.

Ok, ready? Let's open up the box!

Over half the contents are Spider-man comics. I think I'm going to split this into a couple posts. Today will cover the webslinger, and I'll do the non-Spidey comics in a future post.

Amazing Spider-Man #59, my oldest Spider-man (1968). Not a super notable issue, but it's the 1st cover appearances of Mary Jane. And though the Brainwasher might be a nobody of a villian, there's also a Kingpin cameo in there. Tried to get an idea of what this goes for on eBay and it looks like you can probably score it for twenty-something bucks, but if it's in solid condition it could creep into triple digits. 

The Amazing Spider-Man #177 (Feb 1978). Green Goblin was probably my favorite villain. It's funny that I was a Spiderman collector as a kid, but "got over it" and these days while I like him fine, I never bother to watch any of the movies. I saw much of one of the Tobey Maguire flicks once because somebody put it on at a party I was at, and we watched that Into the Spider-Verse animated one last year, but I think that's it. Maybe someday I'll crank them out, but I'm just not that into superhero movies. [2024 Update: I've been watching through the X-Men/Wolverine films with just a couple left until I wrap things up with Deadpool and Wolverine. After that, I'll likely hit the Avengers series.]

Now we're into the early/mid 80s. I thought the black suit was pretty cool. I was also a fan of the Hobgoblin as a bad guy. Looks like these issues aren't worth much today.

Got a little run of Amazing Spider-Man #298 thru 300, which are notable for being the start of Todd McFarlane's run, plus the earliest appearances of Venom.

And here are a few Amazing Spider-Man comics from the early 90s. I had a subscription for a year or two, though didn't keep all of them. 

Nice run of 30th Anniversary hologram covers.

Love the shiny foil covers.

Spectacular Spider-Man highlights.

And this pair closes out the post. I likely kept these issues because, again, I found Green Goblin and Hobgoblin to be among the more interesting villains.

Thanks for checking out my little collection of Spider-Man comics. Maybe I'll do a post on my non-Spider-man comics one of these days. Have a great week, guys.

Back into Beckett

I got a kick out of the Night Owl Cards post from last month titled Ego trip. Not only was it the high quality blogging that Greg's known for, but also there was a cool little easter egg in there for me. See, he was talking about his latest article to be published in Beckett, one showing off highlights from his impressive Dodgers collection, and a custom card I made for him made it in there.

"Hey, I made one of those cards!"

I printed 3 of these cards that Ron Cey was nice enough to sign and return through the mail. I surprised Night Owl with one, traded one to Stealing Home Oscar, and kept the above for myself. Not my best custom or anything, but I like the celebratory image even if it's not very sharp.

The iconic June 1990 Beckett with football/baseball Bo Jackson photo was the first one I bought as a kid. I feel like that transaction pinpoints the moment I officially became a full-fledged baseball card collector. "Alright, let's get serious about this stuff!"

This copy of the magazine is actually my second, picked up later. The original got cut up. I remember I had this 2-page Bo Jackson collage taped up in the little "card room" area of my bedroom.

(Ernest P. Worrell on a Todd Worrell card, lol!) I made a few "fun cards" like this back then, though never got around to mailing anything in for publication consideration.

I don't think I ever ponied up for a subscription, but seems like I would buy the new Beckett from the local card shop every month for the next 3 years, eventually cooling on the hobby for other teenage interests around mid 1993.

Jump a couple more years, and I ended up in a bookstore or something in 1995 and decided to buy a Beckett for old time's sake and take a curious check-in on the hobby and the prices for some of my inactive collection. I got rid of most of my old Becketts over the years, but saved this Kenny Lofton since it was the most recent one I owned and therefore had the most accurate price guide. (LOL)

So anyways, very cool for me to kinda sneak into Beckett, even if just in a tiny way. Me from 1990 got his mind blown, for sure. 

Now let's hit a few incoming cards I've been meaning to post about. Not many (ungraded) Topps baseball cards from 1990 sell for more than a buck each these days, but I've got a few to show off.

I love these "Kmart greenies" as I call them. The quirky blue gloves and fat trophy are just awesome. 1990 Topps Batting Leaders.. basically inserts only available through special Kmart rack-packs of '90 Topps. They're pretty rare, as far as Topps cards from 1990 go. The red ones from 1989 are ever rarer, but I prefer the green. Found an eBay seller with these 3 big names for a good price.

Little easter egg I noticed with these is that they're numbered by rank on the active career batting leaders (going into the 1990 season). So like, Boggs' .352 batting average earned him the #1 spot on the checklist, with Gwynn's .332 placing second (though Tony would pass Wade later in the decade, which I must point out as a Padres fan). I now have 6 of the 22 total Kmart greenies. Completing the set isn't a priority at the moment, but I'd at least like to keep an eye out for the rest of the guys I collect if I can find them for a decent price.

It's a sentimental "twofer" for me, being from the year I started collecting, plus I worked at Kmart for a year in high school.

I still have/use the mug I got the time I made employee of the month! Reads "Safety & Shortage Control" and pictures a dog giving double thumbs-up. I think it also came with $50 store credit or something like that. I wasn't collecting at the time, and I don't recall cards sold at the Kmart I worked, so that store credit didn't go to cards. But this was circa 1995, so hey, maybe I bought that Kenny Lofton Beckett with it? We had a pretty decent magazine selection; could have carried Beckett then.

More Topps cards from 1990 that manage to rise above the "junk" classification of the era. The same seller I got the 3 greenies from also had this pair (1990 Topps TV Glossy All-Star Set) cheap with combined shipping, so I added them to the order.

As far as non-normal backs go, these are pretty cool. MLB Service time isn't a stat you see listed on cards very often!

Now let's do a quick Topps Retired Triad. Got three 2005 Retired refractors lined up.

Paul O'Neill is better remembered as a Yankee, but cool to see him pictured with the Reds from the first half of his career. Teacher supply store billboard in the background gives the card some extra character.

Part of the Reds team that won the World Series in 1990, keeping with the loose theme of the post. And who did Cincinnati vanquish that October to claim their title?

...

Tony LaRussa lead the A's on an impressive run back then. Nice photo of the skipper helping out with defensive drills.

But really though, Mrg. LaRussa didn't really have any business in a set called 2005 Topps Retired Signature Edition. He was still active at the time, not retired. The year after this card came out, he won the World Series with the Cardinals. Crazy that he's active again now, keeping the White Sox in the thick of the pennant race this year. I can't think of any other cards in the three-year run of Topps Retired where the career stats on the back advanced after the card was made. (Bob Brenly has a 2005 Retired card, though 2004 was his last year of managing, so he came close. Brian Cashman got a card in 2005 Retired despite being an active front office person. I guess Topps Non-Active Player Signature Edition wasn't quite as catchy. Oh wait, I found another Retired card with old career stats: Grady Little was in 2005 Retired and then went on to manage the Dodgers for the 2006 and 2007 seasons. Oh, and one more: Jimmy Leyland has a 2005 Retired card and then managed the Tigers from 2006 through 2013.)

Jay Buhner closes out today's trio of recent pickups. A bigtime Buhner collector was liquidating some PC cards and actually had two of these refractors. I called dibs on this one because it had a more pleasing signature-- just enjoy it for a moment; beautiful, right?!-- and another buyer snagged the other, less beautiful one a little while later.

Fine career for Junior's bash brother in Seattle and cause of consternation for Frank Costanza.

That'll do it for this time. Thanks for reading!

Sentimental Sundays: my old t-shirt collection

One thing that kinda got dug up during the recent move was my t-shirt collection. Ok, I don't really have a t-shirt collection, per se, but I have a dozen or so old shirts that I don't wear anymore yet keep around for sentimental reasons, so I suppose that could be considered a t-shirt collection. I figured I'd take a few photos and get a Sentimental Sundays post out of them before sealing them back up in storage.

Back in July, posted an old photo of me wearing this shirt at Disneyland in that post about my old best friend Doug moving up to Portland. Quick update on Doug, he's settling in great. Happy to see him already hitting it off with a new ladyfriend. She seems cool, though I haven't met her yet.. damn covid putting a strain on get-togethers. (Doug's ex-wife unfriended me on Facebook soon after they split. WTF? I bit my tongue so many times to keep things cordial with that awful woman, not letting her estrange me from my friend like she did with his family,  and she proves herself to be a c*nt to the end. So glad I don't have to deal with her bullshit ever again.)

Here's another Ghostbusters shirt. This one is actually an old pajama top. Both these Ghostbusters shirts  glow in the dark , and I've now got them on display in my fledgling Glow-in-the-Dark Museum/Bathroom I've got going in the new house. I'll do a separate post on that one of these days where you'll get a look at them glowing.

In high school, Doug and I had a band called The Chifaros. And when I say we were a band, I mean we would just bullshit about all the cool/kooky things we wanted to do when we got our band off the ground, while in reality we only jammed music together once in a blue moon, with results that no one would ever want to listen to. But it was fun to dream. At some point I made this shirt with a photo that was slated to be an album cover, probably wearing it to school once or twice.

I've mentioned that I was into The Draw Squad with Capt. Mark Kistler (a PBS drawing show) in elementary school a couple times on the blog in the past, including the first Sentimental Sundays post and the story of my first TTM request. I'd still wear this shirt today if only it fit me!

Haha, despite all the baggage surrounding Michael Jackson's legacy, this shirt still makes me laugh. This one actually wasn't mine as a kid, but rather it belonged to Doug. I used to give him a hard time about it (this was circa Nevermind when Michael Jackson wasn't cool anymore-- Doug never wore it much since elementary school, but I think he occasionally wore it as PJs through middle school), and one day I talked him into giving the shirt to me to preserve it rather than let him get rid of it. I think I even wore it ironically once or twice before outgrowing it.

Another Michael Jackson shirt! This one was mine, but not from childhood-- it was a thriftstore find during high school. I actually wore it occasionally before it started getting too frayed around the collar. And it was only semi-ironic, more like an obscure Star Wars reference (well, from the mind of George Lucas). I saw Captain EO at Disneyland back in the day, so it was a nostalgic thing for me.

Oh man, this was my coolest shirt as a kid! I remember feeling like a badass when I'd wear it, lol. Not sure if T&C Surf Designs is remembered much today other than maybe for the old NES video game, but back in the day, at least in my So Cal neighborhood, they were among the most respected designer clothes on the schoolyard. See also Stussy, Quicksilver, Rusty, Billabong, and No Fear.

Here's the back. Beautiful, right?! I used this as a rag for a while after retiring it from my rotation, so it's got some stains now.

Mickey Mouse. Wore this one a lot in elementary school.

Name ironed onto the back! Gotta love it.

Hey, here's one that could legitimately have a place in a real t-shirt collection. This is an authentic Late Night with Conan O'Brien shirt that I got from an acquaintance who performed on the show. 

He was the drummer in Dig.

Closer look at the embroidery. I'd say I'm a fan of Conan, though it's been years since I've watched him with any regularity. But yeah, cool to have swag originating from his classic show.

This post is getting long, so we'll cut out with these few more old shirts of mine, each rich with memories.

Do you have any old clothes you don't wear anymore but can't bear to part with?

Thanks for reading.

Sentimental Sundays - 5th Grade Confidential

Time to check out some more of my old crap.

I've still got a dozen or so Micro Machines from my childhood toy collection. I loved the things, but always seemed to me they were more expensive than they should have been. So small, after all! I'm not a big "car guy" but this is a '57 Chevy, right? Cool car. If I won the lottery, I'd probably pick me up one of those to cruise around on pleasant Sunday afternoons.

I've had this lava lamp for a long time. Recently brought it "out of storage" and set it up in my little temporary "work station" area where I do much of my work-from-home stuff. Pretty neat. Also works well as a hand-warmer, as it gets quite hot, but not hot enough to burn you if you want to hold it for a moment.

I never really collected stamps, but the collecting gene was strong enough in me to hold onto interesting stamps that might have fallen in my lap as a youth. The 25¢ Yosemite stamp is uncanceled, though by the back you can tell it's been used. Then there are a couple canceled non-US stamps. I'm sure none of this is worth anything (though I might be able to get away with using the Yosemite stamp as a quarter's worth of postage), but interesting enough not to throw away, I suppose. Not sure how I came into these 2 foreign stamps.. probably an aunt of mine or maybe a family friend sent us a postcard with them or something like that.

Hey, it's my old geode! The perennial "show and tell" standby. Speaking of passive collections of my younger days, I also have a rock collection from back then, and this geode is among the few highlights. It's about the size of a racquetball when the halves are put together. Not super impressive as far as geodes go (Google image search), as it only has a tiny flicker of shiny crystals in there. But still cool to a kid.

Ooh, I'm happy to find this thing-- I hadn't seen it in a while and was worried maybe I had lost it at some point over the years. It's a metal bottle-opener from Peru featuring what I'm guessing is a llama.

I think I've told the story here before about how in Mr. Pedrazzi's 5th grade class, when it was your time as "student of the week" or whatever, you got to pick out a neat item from a small box of goodies Mr. Pedrazzi would bring in. Future ballplayer Marcus Giles was in this class with me, and he got a slingshot that was the envy of all the boys in class. (And we're talking a legit slingshot-- meaning it was a real, manufactured, metal and rubber slingshot, not just a conveniently shaped stick with a rubberband that the rest of us had to be content with.)

The item I eventually ended up with wasn't as cool as a slingshot, but I was still pretty happy with the neat old bottle opener from a distant land of long ago.

No markings on the back, but I'd guess it's probably from the 60s or 70s. I can imagine it cranked caps off plenty of pop and suds in its prime. It's not "in service" currently, packed away with my childhood crap, but I might use it to open a beer later today for the heck of it.

Always loved Ghostbusters as a kid. This Stay Puft Marshmallow Man was a way to sneak a "toy" into my pencil case.

See, it's a pencil-sharpener.


That's probably enough for today. Normally I like to squeeze in something baseball related.. but I suppose I mentioned Marcus Giles, so that's close enough.

Thanks for reading and have a great week.

Sentimental Sundays: The Return

Remember when I did a few "Sentimental Sundays" posts a couple years ago? Been a while, but I'm going to try bringing those back. It's really just an excuse for me to dig out a box of my childhood crap that I've held onto and feature a 4 or 5 items that I think maybe a couple readers might find interesting.

I've kept the bottle of Mr. Bubble I had during much of my childhood.

But actually this isn't the last one I had. We had a bottle in the early 90s that had an updated label, but you know me, I love vintage.. and I ended up keeping the old one around anyhow, and have somehow kept it still today. There's even a couple uses of bubble bath left in it. Please note that I don't typically keep stuff like this-- that would definitely be hoarding!-- but no, this is one of the few things like this I might have still.

Here's the back. Dated 1987.

I don't remember where I got this pair of carved animals. Probably an aunt of mine took a trip to Africa in the 80s and brought me back these souvenirs as a gift. Sometimes I'd play with them.. you know, like having them attacking my G.I. Joe guys. lol

I believe this is the bowtie that my great-grandfather wore at his 50th wedding anniversary. Pretty cool. It's the only thing I have of his. Never met him, as he died before I was born. But seems like a cool guy. He was a big deal in the plastics industry in Chicago back in olden times.

Fifty years is a long time to be married! His son, my grandfather, also got there. I don't think I'll get to there. Well, I think I'd be 86... I guess that's possible. But hey, nobody's promised tomorrow, right?

But anyways, if I do make it to 50 years married, I damn well better remember to put on this tie.

You know how when you're a kid, any little bit of technical crap like this was super cool. Loved this thing. It was from inside our old garage door opener. The little blue box on the left is super fun to clicky-clacky with, if you know what I mean. I believe that is how you set the code for the garage door opener so that you and your neighbor don't have the same wavelength opening garages. Wow, from looking at the date printed on it, this thing is a little older than me! Also, I love how it's camouflage coloring! Fit right in as a "super computer" while playing G.I. Joes.

I try to include at least one baseball-related item in every Sentimental Sundays post, you know, since this is a baseball card blog after all. Don't want to alienate my base!

This is an antenna topper that was available from Jack In The Box in San Diego. Or was it a stadium giveaway? I'm not sure. Maybe both. I rarely eat fast food these days (my wife is awesome in the kitchen), but back in my bachelor days, a Sourdough Jack Combo Meal was my go-to when I wanted to splurge on something special.

I bet Bob from Best Bubble will like this thing since Jack is blowing a bubble. I don't think I was actually the one who originally got this, but I seem to recall a friend of mine had an extra one and gave this to me, back in the mid 90s.

Last item for today is this vintage Hot Wheels car.. whoo! That's a classic, right there!

Well-loved. This is one of my earliest toys ever.. One of those toys that you've had since further back than you can remember. I added many more little vehicles like this in my youth (many of which I still have stored somewhere), but this was one of the original fleet.

My mom did a thing where she painted a little nail polish on the bottom of my cars so they could be kept track of when I played Hot Wheels with other kids and know which were mine. From an adult collector standpoint, that makes me cringe. It's like parents who put their kid's initials on the back of their baseball cards. Not cool! But my mom never messed with my baseball cards, thankfully. And I suppose if I really cared about resale value of my Hot Wheels, I could probably do some restoration on this, and wipe off that nail polish with some nail polish remover. Searching "Auburn 852" on eBay reveals this is not a high-dollar toy-- one in much nicer condition than mine would likely run you less than $10 shipped. Oh well, it still means a lot to me! I wonder if I've got any "valuable" Hot Wheels. I'll probably keep including them in future Sentimental Sundays and eventually check them out. You guys like Hot Wheels, right?

Anyways, that's gonna wrap things up.

Quick update on my situation, after my stressed-out previous post... I was eventually able to work it out to where I can get much of my work done at home, avoiding leaving the house as much as possible. Still have to pop out once or twice a week, but it's a whole lot better than my usual work schedule before Corona. Trying to do my part in staying home as much as I can while still having a job.

Oh hey, if you're worried about getting mail during this pandemic, here's an article that may put you at ease. (Your mail isn't really a danger to you, thankfully.) I'll try to get some card mailings out to some people over the next week since I'll have some free time later in the week. I know Billy said he doesn't want to receive cards for the moment.. is anyone else among my usually trade buddies also not wanting to be mailed anything right now? If so, please let me know. Thanks, and thanks for reading!