Tradeaway #4 and a serious I-D-10-T error

Getting: 1993 Republic of Liberia Dollar Coin Nolan Ryan
Giving: Derek Jeter Heads Up, Alex Rodriguez Green Back

This trade comes from Brandon in Kokomo (and, yes, I hear you singing the song in your head right now!). I tried very hard to honor Brandon's request, alas, the closest I could come was a couple Yankees.

This trade falls under the "any oddball ya got!" category, and I am glad to accept it! Though my collection is accurately 99.97% Indians, I do collect certain other players, and Ryan is definitely one of them. This coin commemorates seven career no-hitters. I have never had a coin minted from another country (except "Canada, but that doesn't count because it's, like, attached..."), though I have seen those commercials for "painted" coins from Liberia. Evidently, Liberia makes a killing off of producing money featuring things we Americans like to celebrate or commemorate... Who knew?

As for the Jeter and A-Rod: I like the "Heads-up" versions of the Goudeys, and you get to learn things like the fact that "Derek is Bob Dylan's favorite baseball player." That'll be on some game show, I'm tellin ya! A-Rod opts for the classic "bat on shoulder" pose. In a way, I always found this to be an odd pose because I have heard more than my share of coaches constantly yelling, "Get that bat off your shoulders!"

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Okay, so the I-D-10-T error... After I spent most of my creative juices coming up clues for DAYF's cards, I pulled a bonehead move and left his Goudeys on the blankety-blank scanner! So, my apologies to DAYF, and I will send those to you ASAP...

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I received my box(es) of 6000 cards, as I had discussed winning on eBay not long ago. My 5-year old daughter and I went through every card, picking out the Indians. I will input the ones I need into my card database, and then put the rest up for sale (along with the other 5950 cards) soon.

If you have not had the pleasure of looking through rows and rows of cards, searching for specific teams or players, with your very young child, allow me to paint you a picture:

The shipment is in two 3000-count boxes, so I pull one box onto the floor. Using an unopened pack of hockey cards in the box as a divider, I pull out a stack of cards and hand them to my daughter. I then grab a stack for me.

"We're looking for Indians, Honey," I tell her.

"Okay," she says, and begins to cycle through the cards, creating a scattered 'pile' on the floor. About halfway through her stack, she stops. "How do I know which ones are Indians?"

"Look for the picture of the Indian (the logo, though she knows what I mean because she has seen the 'picture' a billion times now), or the card will have the word 'Indians' on it. It begins with an 'I' for 'ih-ih-ih-Indians." I sound it out, so that she knows what to look for.

With one side of her mouth cocked upward and a raised eyebrow, she invokes the 'tone of DUH' and says, "I know what Indians starts with... Ih-Ih-Ih like IGLOO..." The 'DUH' is not vocalized, but I feel it hanging there just the same. All I can do, of course, is laugh.

She picks up the cards again, and this time methodically searches for Indians. She discards football, hockey, and basketball cards. All the while, she is calling out teams like the Pirates, the Red Sox, and the Cardinals. Frankly, I'm impressed. She does hand me a couple of Braves, thinking they are Indians, and again, I cannot help but smile at the aforementioned email from dayf on the subject.

As we complete stacks, the unopened pack is moved along, and I spend more of time straightening out her 'pile' to put the cards back into the box than actually searching through my own stacks of cards, but it is a small price to pay. At one point, however, she has grown tired of looking through card after card, and suggests that I give her all the "shiny" cards to look through. Thus, we sort each stack into "shiny" and "not shiny." Basically, if the thing had any scrap of foil, it was shiny. Given the preponderance of foil on cards these days, spending my time 'fixing' her piles did not hinder progress much at all... :-)

In record time, we burn through 6000 cards, and we have created quite a nice stack of Indians cards, though I have to be honest and say I thought there would be alot more, simply based on the fact that in the past, Indians have served as "filler" cards for many of the bulk purchases I have made. I'm not sure if I am glad this is not the case this time or not... Ah well...

So, now you know... If you have young child or relative and have not had this experience yet, I encourage you to try it out for yourself. It's a memory you will both keep for a long, long time.