ignorable filler post: 1991 Cardboard Dreams #4: Wayne Gretzky

Whoopsie-doodle, the last card I did in this series was #5 (Canseco and Madonna, from back in February.. those innocent, carefree days of yore). Nobody noticed, so I think I got away with it. But today we backtrack to #4, which is a very good hockey playing man.

What do you think of this headshot likeness? I mean, you can tell who it's supposed to be, so I'd say it's good by those standards. I'm seeing a little Dolph Lundgren in there too. As for the action shot, I probably wouldn't have guessed that was Gretzk' unless maybe I noticed the uniform and guessed from there. Squint your eyes and it might resemble a Penguin.. like Sidney Crosby or something? Oh whom I kidding, I am a poser (poseur) hockey fan. I don't know a puck from my pecker!

Yet...

I went out and bought a Gordie Howe autograph card. Check this mother out! Big, horizontal on-card signature! Limited edition! Hawaii! (Oh man, I'm glad we squeezed in that Hawaiian vacation right before things started going sideways. We're still coasting off that high to get us through these days.) I love this card! I just wanted a Gordie Howe autograph so bad! He was "Woodrow" on that one episode of The Simpsons where Bart catfishes Ms. Krabappel!

Hey.. Speaking of Edna!..

I also recently scored this card! Full disclosure, it is not in-hand yet, but should be arriving very soon. I really hope the auto looks better in person and it's just a weird glare shown in the photo.
Love and miss the late Marcia Wallace.. so great!

Anyways, back to hockey...

I just dig hockey superstars and like to score good hockey cards for my collection once in a while. I assume it might be something like how maybe a guy who doesn't follow baseball much would still get a thrill out of owning an autograph from Hank Aaron or Willie Mays, ya know?

My hockey collection has no right to be this good! Yet here we are!

I'll probably target a Jagr next, but no rush.

As with all these Cardboard Dreamers, it's the back doodle that always seems to steal the show with its endearing bizarreness that looks like it was drawn by a 6th grader on their binder divider tab page. The fun facts they share on the back are often quite interesting too!

• A Google search for "most money ever paid for a baseball card" says it's still a 1909 T206 Honus Wagner, but now the record is $3.12 million. Damn inflation. lol

I don't think it's Wayne's Wagner that scored that top sale, though, was it?.. I remember hearing there was some controversy about his being trimmed before he bought it. But pretty sure he sold it years back regardless.

• The Toronto Argonauts of the CFL are still around.. the franchise going on.. [checks notes] 146 years?‽‽! Holy crap! The CFL is seriously that old? That must be hooligans screwing around on Wikipedia with April Fools jokes that haven't been corrected yet because there's no way Canadians were playing football back when Lincoln was freeing the slaves!

Oh man, speaking of deceased actors I love a bunch and miss greatly.. John Candy! Wow, I hadn't heard about him co-owning a sports team with Gretzky and another guy. Spaceballs, Stripes, Plains Trains and Automobiles, Uncle Buck. SCTV. So much good stuff!

Anyways, the 3 guys owned the team from February 25, 1991 – May 5, 1994. The split was Bruce McNall (60%), John Candy (20%), and Wayne Gretzky (20%).

Oh man, remember Rocket Ismail? They signed him for a huge contract-- we're talking T206 Wagner territory!-- and then the team won it all in 1991. That must've been a thrill for Bruce, Wayne, and my man John Candy.

I honestly have no idea what an Argonaut is. Is it like an arrogant astronaut?!

Here is a cool song by Frank Black called "At the End of the World" which might seem like it's fitting for these times, but is actually written about John Candy.


Cool song, right? It was a b-side to the "Headache" single.

Oh man, I've really been neglecting my MusiCards blog! I haven't posted there since before the dark times. Gotta start cranking out posts there again soon.

Candy sadly passed away in 1994, shortly after he sold his stake in the team.

• The last bullet-point on the card talks about Gretzky's records total. Wiki says, At the time of his retirement in 1999, he held 61 NHL records: 40 regular season records, 15 playoff records, and 6 All-Star records.

Yep, he was pretty good!

But I think I've achieved a sports accomplishment that not even The Great One could dream of...

The other day I was playing Wii Sports Resort - Island Flyover subgame.. an old favorite game of mine when I just want to chill out and fly around like I'm Roy Halladay (RIP, the psycho son-of-a-gun). It's really fun. Sometimes I like to challenge myself to pull off trick moves just for fun (Not like you score points for it or nothin'), and the latest thing I managed to pull off was landing my plane in a swimming pool. It's tough because it's a small pool and you need to time your landing just right or you'll crash. But yeah, after a few attempts, I managed to just barely splashdown safely with a cut engine for a minute or two just hanging out with the kids at the pool. Pretty cool, right?! LOL

Have a great weekend, everybody! To help raise some good vibes, check out the first completed page of what I hope will one day be a decent-sized Thumbs-Up Binder! Yeah, a couple photos are reused, so it's not perfect-- but still! Nine different cards with a thumbs-up! 👍

quick trade roundup and other rambling

Got a couple PWEs in the mail this past week.

First up are a few cards from GCA.

Always love getting a new Rod Beck card! Pretty cool one. I visited the Golden Gate Bridge once when I was a kid.

A trio for the Kris Bryant PC.

A couple Sox I collect.

Nice! I had this card in my ongoing '78 Topps setbuild, but happy to score another one for my Tim Blackwell PC.

Thanks a lot, GCA! I'll continue keeping an eye out for cards for ya.

-    -   -  - --o

And now here's a surprise PWE from friend of the blog mr. haverkamp.

Some appreciated needs toward my '84/'85 Donruss setbuilds, with a couple HOFers and an MVP. The "Jeff" Pendleton error is more common than the Terry correction. While I'll consider my set complete without the corrected variation, I wouldn't mind snagging one someday.

This seems to be the card that was the catalyst for the mailing, as mr. haverkamp is a Danny Gladden supercollector, and he noticed I threw this '91 UD card onto my Desperate Double Dozen recently. It's for inclusion in my Thumbs Up minicollection I'm just starting.

Big thanks for the generosity, man! I definitely owe you cards at this point, as this is probably the 3rd or 4th "unanswered" PWE from you, so please let me know if I can return the favor (perhaps some Gladden customs or something?)

- - - ---o

Padding out the post with some non-card miscellany. (If you follow me on Twitter, some of this may be a repeat for you.)

Earlier this month I tackled the project of trimming down a massive bush that had pretty much taken over our front yard. (Yes, my wife took the first picture; not my nails, LOL) I think it was my first experience with a chainsaw, and I'm happy to report all my limbs and digits are still intact! Funny thing is we kinda miss the shade now that it's gone. But the stump bit remaining is already growing back strong (we didn't want to 100% kill it, just get it under control). So I'm sure it'll be back to a reasonable size soon, and then we'll just have to remember to trim it down once in a while so it doesn't go nuts again.

Also pruned some flowers out front that gave us a nice bouquet for a day or two till it withered.

Coming home from work the other day, I saw not one, but TWO bunnies in the front yard of our neighbor on the corner. I'm not sure how these wild rabbits are thriving in this busy city area, but as long as they don't munch up our garden, I'm happy to see these cuties hop around when I can.

Here's Annie ready to protect our garden from any fluffy intruders.

I often doodle on our Tupperware lids to differentiate them from similar containers in the work fridge. Crow is the latest one I've done, just whipped up yesterday, which inspired me to take a pic of a few of them. Nobody at work would dare mess with Satan. And I'm sure I've confused people with "Warning: Contents may be sardonic". I'm an odd guy, what can I say.

Here's the tracklist for a Valentine's Day mix cdr my special gal made me several years ago when we were still in our long-distance courtship. I've been recently ripping all my discs to mp3 (this is a big project begun many months ago that I'm still finishing up). I got a kick out of her including the Mike Piazza song, even if she did misspell it Pizza. :) Hey, she's not a baseball fan, so you gotta give her a break.

We celebrated 4 years of marriage last week (my blogging anniversary is right before, so it works as a nice reminder, haha). We checked out Solo (both liked it) and had a nice dinner at a place near the theater afterwards. Nothing fancy, but a fun evening out.

She's out in Canada for the weekend now, so I had some "me time" to work on a couple new customs and put together a couple trade packages. Also watched Black Panther and Thor: Ragnarok. I'm not a big superhero movie fan (nor is my wife, which is why I watched them while she's gone), but I thought they were decent. Best thing I've watched lately is The Strange Name Movie, which is a 52 minute documentary streaming on Netflix right now. I'd recommend it if you like amusing names, which it seems most of us card collectors do. (Sadly, baseball dudes such as Dick Pole, Rusty Kuntz, and Pete LaCock were not featured, lol.. but still worth your hour.)

Thanks for stopping by, everybody, and all the best to you in the coming week.

Bountiful gifts from Rod

This post wraps up my haul from Cardblogger Con NW '18, the big meetup a few of us had a couple weeks ago in downtown Portland. Rod loaded up my backpack with probably around 1000 cards.

I'm only showing "keepers" in this post, which was probably about 40% of the lot. As you can see there was a ton of 2018 Series 1, with plenty of PC needs for me. (Extra Altuve "Legends in the Making" insert if anyone wants me to set it aside for them.)

A few from '18 Opening Day too.

I'm thinking of starting a "thumbs up" minicollection. I just think that flipping through a few binder pages of people giving thumbs up could be uplifting.

There was a blaster or so's worth of WWE Diva cards in the lot, and I plucked out a few that caught my eye for inclusion in my girlie card minicollection. (Unfortunately for me, Rod also collects Alexa Bliss, so there wasn't any of her in there for me.) I think Kelly Kelly should hook up with the Padre minor leaguer named Henry Henry.

Here are some more cards, including a signed Darcy Fast custom. The Raines is a Berger's Best insert.

A bunch of guys I collect from the overproduction era.

Big stack of 2017 Bowman, including what might be my first card of Vlad Jr.

Nice selection of 2018 Heritage. With all the fake errors they put in there, it's almost refreshing to pull a real error (Hanley Ramirez included on the Batting Leaders card when it should have been Jose Ramirez of the Indians).

Ton of Gwynns! Many of these are dupes for me, though I'm sure there are some needs too. Always love those "Greatest Hits Album" diecuts.

Craptonne more Padres of the Past that I collect.

And some special favorites of mine to close out the post. A red Khalil, new Rod Beck, great trio of Cammys, and some Bips. While I've got a very robust collection o' Bip, the '93 Donruss Diamond King was a conspicuously missing "junk" card. Nice to have that one squared away now.

Thanks as always for your generosity, Rod! Very appreciated!