Transmogrified into being: My two Dicks

EDITOR'S NOTE: This is a very immature post, you should probably just stop reading now. Actually, delete the bookmark to this blog completely, we'll all be better for it.

Back when we could still trade on the Transmogrifier, everybody wanted my Dicks but I wouldn't let anybody touch them. I decided I just couldn't live without Dicks, so I gave Topps some money and they delivered me some fine looking Dicks. Now that I have my Dicks in my hand, let's see how they measure up. Penis.

1969 Topps Dick Bosman

Not in great shape but pretty typical of the cards I own from the '60s. The gloss is scuffed at several spots. All four corners are starting to get rounded. All four edges have at least one ding or nick. There are three small creases, one by his hand, one near his shoulder and one at the top left corner. Centering is off 35-65 on both axis. Even with the flaws it still looks decent as there are no real catastrophic problems with the card. This is your typical garden variety '60s common card.

The back looks great. The orangy-pink is strong, The black ink is bold and there's a kickass cartoon with a racing theme where Dick is driving one of those bullpen carts shaped like a baseball in competitive drag racing competitions. I wonder if Dick drove faster than he could throw?

1967 Topps Dick Kelley 

My other Dick is kinda dirty. All that black schmutz all over Dick's uniform is more wax stains. 1967ers gave a good tip on how to get rid of crusty stuff on your Dick on my last wax-stained post so I pulled out a tube sock, rubbed it off and did a final buffing with a kleenex. Now my Dick is as clean as a whistle. (I warned you right up there at the top but you didn't listen). Even cleaned up - I wonder if this is technically card altering - Kelley is still not in better condition as the Bosman. All four corners are rounded to the point of starting to fray, the edges are dinged, there's a small crease in between the V and E in Braves and worst of all, there's a scuff right on Dick's face. A card can take a lot of abuse and still look good, but paper loss on the player's face is not one of them. It's still in acceptable shape for a card from 1967. I once had a '67 Diego Segui card that had been attacked with a hole punch. That was a sad looking card indeed.

The back is a little dirty and the green is faded, but like the front, it's acceptable. I had this card in my team set already so I was hoping for maybe getting an upgrade. No dice. This one goes in the box with the rest of the '67 commons.

Interestingly enough, both of these cards were acquired through straight code redemptions. I guess Topps just likes giving me the Dick.

An important announcement concerning Panini Sticker Albums

Acceptable: for a grown-ass man to clean out a store of all packs of Panini World Cup Stickers. I did this when I bought the last 5 packs from the Wal-Mart on Windward Parkway. The packs were there, I wanted some packs, so I bought 'em. The distributor will likely see how well they are selling and fill it back up soon if not put in a second gravity feed full of packs. That's just basic capitalism.

Not acceptable: for a grown-ass man to clean out a store of all packs of Panini World Cup Stickers and peel all the packs off of the sticker albums as well. Now everyone who buys an album (at $2 a pop instead of the $1 they charge for the non-sports albums) gets screwed. The albums probably won't get refilled now either. If you want the packs that badly, pony up for the whole album. Total dick move, whoever did this at the Wal-Mart on Mansell.

DON'T BE A DICK

DON'T PEEL THE STICKER PACKS OFF OF PANINI ALBUMS WITHOUT PAYING FOR THE WHOLE ALBUM

Well now I kinda feel like a dick

National Trading card Day has come and gone. Joe got screwed, so did Chris. Mark got his though (epic new banner, by the way) and so did Mario. Not sure about Jason though, who is the one who reminded me about the promo in the first place.

Reasons why I feel like a tool tonight: First I didn't know until way after the fact that there was a list of participating locations, at least among hobby shops. If I had known that the only hobby store in Georgia that had the packs was Northlake Stamp and Coin, I could have gone there and skipped the two trips I made to confused hobby shops and the local Toys R Us. They weren't too coordinated either from what I hear from my fellow bloggers, Joe was 0 for 4 with Utah locations and Chris found one who didn't know about it and one who knew about it and never got their shipment. The packs were supposedly given out at games today too, I don't have any confirmation on that though. While others looked everywhere for free cards that never came, the guy who complained about how screwed up the promotion was ended up getting the jackpot.

So I hit the hobby shop and they know nothing about it. No biggie, I got some cool stuff I'll show off tomorrow after I get some sleep. Afterwards I headed over to the Toys R Us to see if they had the packs. I get there and there's a big Opening Day display up front with baseball equipment, various baseball related paraphernalia (did you know they still sold the mini helmet standings board?) and yes, trading cards. I found the Superstar pack from Upper Deck that was listed in that ad I showed you yesterday and it was basically a little box with 75 cards in it and a three card star pack. There was no mention of inserts so I assume it's just base cards. Even with a Teixeira possible in the star pack I passed. There were a few blasters there but I opted for a pack of UD and Heritage instead. An employee told me about the free trading card day, so this store was prepared at least. On the way out of the store something cool caught my eye, so Toys R Us and McFarlane toys were able to get a 10 dollar impulse buy out of me thanks to Trading card day.

So here's the part where I really feel like a dick. I get up to the register and when I'm checking out, the cashier goes back to customer service and gets me not one, but three packs of the free cards. That's right, three. One of each rookie too, so I got a complete set out of the deal. Shaweet. Then I get home and see that my fellow card-addicted brethren ended up driving all over town for no cards. Even more dickishly of me is that I'm not going to open the packs to show them off. I've saved unopened promotional sets since the Wrapper Redemption sets from the mid nineties so these are staying unopened too. Sorry. I registered for a free pack online, so if one arrives rest assured it will be ripped and shared on this blog. That was my National Trading card day, I got a complete set, some cool stuff that I'll show off once I feel like scanning it tomorrow and I got to watch a couple of games to boot. Anyone else out there get (or not get) your free cards?