Happy Frank Zappa day

Ok, so Frank Zappa day was actually August 9th 2007. I'm not three years late, I'm just trying to create a new holiday. It's not like there's a decent holiday in August anyway. So what if such a holiday has no commercial potential, you don't need greeting cards or presents or candy or a gigantic feast with all the family over to sit around in your underwear all day drinking coffee and listening to all six volumes of You Cant Do That on Stage Anymore.

This is also a good time to share a card I got from the Dean of card bloggers, Chris Harris. Back in April, he did a bad, bad thing. Something I still can't bring myself to write about. But mixed amongst the horrors was something beautiful.

A Stale Gum original Relic. What could this be???

FRANK ZAPPA'S VISAGE LOVINGLY PRESSED INTO A DISC OF UNITED STATES CURRENCY AND SUBSEQUENTLY EMBEDDED INTO A CARD!

There's even card back legalese!

Congratulations!
You have received an authentic Frank Zappa squished penny. This penny was squished on a% a& authentic I-95 rest stop in Maryland. 
                                                                                                 1/1

It's 100% real, yo!

I considered MSPainting a Zappa card for this post, but really, the unique squished penny relic stands on its own. In honor of the best relic card I've seen this year here's my favorite Zappa song, featuring Don Van Vliet on growls.


That's the best guitar solo you will ever hear right there, folks. Enjoy the third anniversary of Zappa Day and celebrate this day as is the custom of your people.

Catching up on trades - Stale Gum

A little while back, Chris Harris of Stale Gum bought twenty packs of junk wax for a buck a pop. Included int he packs were two packs of 2000 Topps Tek. Tek is one of the more obnoxious sets in baseball card history, but I find its plastic holo shinyness irresistible. So I made him an offer: Whatever is in those two packs of Tek in exchange for 40 cards off his wantlists. Chris took me up on the offer and sent the Tek:

Among the many gimmicks in Tek is the background patterns. This one here has Corey Patterson's hometown of Kennesaw featured. Pretty cool, since I live right down the road from Kennesaw. Also included were a pile of random Braves (with two Upper Deck Powerdeck CDs which is a post in and of itself) including a 1/1 autographed* card of Denny Neagle!

Man, these sticker autos are getting crummier every day. This one's got flaps hanging off the sides! It's the autograph version of a maxipad with wings.

As an aside, I mentioned that if he had any T-51 Murad lying around he didn't want I'd be interested in trading for it. So, along with the Tek and the Braves, he sent some T-51.


A WHOLE FRIGGIN BOX WORTH.

Holy bleeping bleepity bleep.

This is why Chris Harris is The Man. And Topps is The Company for sending him the box in the first place. That's one way of building a starter set. Time for me to go look through some more wantlists.

* autographed by Chris Harris, that is. I think this is my third 1/1 auto from Chris. Another 217,000 trades and we'll start to approach Moments & Milestones numbers of 1/1 cards.

The Boycott Is Over

Chris Harris ends the boycott and buys a box of 2008 Topps Updates & Highlights.

I for one am glad.

I will not be buying my own Hobby box, but I'm glad.

In other news, I really like the WBC insert set.


If you didn't click on that Stale Gum post the first time, I suggest you do. It's very, very good.