Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Catching up on posting, FINALLY!

Hello, Tribecards Fans!
  I appreciate your patience as I worked through (and am still working through) several things going on around here as of late!



First of all, an update on my novel writing: As of today, I am at 40099 words out of the 50000 it takes to earn the coveted "National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo)" badge!  I am very excited to finally putting together the novel I started 15+ years ago while working on my Master's.  Of course, there will be TONS of editing to follow once it is done with this phase, but that is much easier for me than the first-run writing.



Next up, I got a new car to replace my aging truck:

From 2009 Charger


While I dearly loved my Tribe-inspired truck, the HEMI was starting to nickel and dime me to death at about $1200 a whack. Ouch.



And, I have received several gifts in the mail lately, too!  I can't believe the generosity of the card-blogging world!  Simply amazing.  It is incredible to think there were just a handful of people that started blogging baseball cards and what explosion took place in such a short time!  Sometimes I feel like one of the "old geezers" at this, even though I, myself, came into the game comparatively late. I digress.

First up, I received a bubbleope from BigD with cool cards in it:





First of all, I *LOVE* Studio cards.  Next to great action shots, the Studios are my favorites.  The 2001's included in this group have great posed shots.  Though, I admit, I am not a fan of the HUGE white border on the things! Ouch.  Remove the frame and you basically have a wallet-sized photo.  Some of the other goodies in here include Absolute Memorabilia - with full-frame foil features.  (Sorry, I've been working on my alliteration, can you tell?)

I also like getting multiple versions of the same card - like the regular and chrome versions of Vizquel in the Topps!  I don't think I realized until just now that most of these are Thome and Vizquel!  Throw in a couple of Cy Youngs, and this was a very pleasant surprise!!  Big-D also included Lofton, Sabathia and a Pronk, too!

THANK YOU very much, BigD for a wonderful surprise!!



The next bubbleope I received just a couple days ago, and it came from Max.  His note said there were "two great cards in here," but I beg to differ:




There are several great cards in here!  Granted, the Grady Sizemore Propaganda card is one of the coolest items I've seen.  I love that kind of artwork, and even did a mock-up of something similar for a worldwide interactive video program we hosted a couple years ago at work. (Sidenote: It is called "Megaconference," and connects hundreds of sites around the world at the same time, some of which perform songs, others read poetry, some dance, and most of us just sit there with our jaws on the floor at the wonder of it all)

I love the "Support Our Tribe" at the bottom of the card.  Are these available as posters?  If not, they should be!  But then we also have things like the Baerga Hit List (7030/10000) and the Score Platinum Team Giles.  Add to those a couple of Donruss Silver Press Proof cards and you can see there are more than just two great ones.  Of course, the "greatest" card in the lot for me is the Thome.  Not only is it a Thome, but it is a "Dropping the Hammer" game-used bat-in-the-shape-of-a-hammerhead card!  All I can say is that there was a lot of "Tim Allen-esque" grunting going around here when I laid my eyes on that one.

For the icing, Max tossed in a handful of 1982 Topps Traded cards, too!

THANK YOU very much, Max!!  Awesome stuff in here for sure!



I also received a BOX of cards from Kevin, but I have yet to even open those yet.  I will get to those very soon, though!  The anticipation is killing me almost as much as the anticipation of watching what happens to the kids in my story.  In both cases, I have no idea what to expect, but I have a feeling I am going to enjoy it once things are finally revealed to me!



Oh, one more thing... In June 2009, me and a couple colleagues went to Chicago for SharePoint training.  You may remember my posting about the Cubs-Indians game in which the Tribe lost in extra innings.  Well, we also managed to grab seats at the Bill Engvall "Aged and Confused" routine he was doing in Chi.  Turns out, they were taping the show to be put on DVD.  I may have talked about that then, I'm not sure and am way too lazy to go look right now.  In any case, his routine aired on Sunday and WE WERE ON!  In the TV version, we are 17 minutes into the show just before a commercial break.  You can recognize me by the fact I am wearing my INDIANS jersey.  And it is not a "hey I am in the crowd of people" shot.  Nope, this is a close-up shot of me and the two guys I was with at the show!  Yeah, I am still psyched about it... Just think, I will be on DVD players around the world.  My daughter (age 7) left the room embarrassed.  My son (age 14) thought it was the coolest thing ever - his Dad on Comedy Central for the world to see. 

Thursday, November 12, 2009

Ladies and Gentlemen, we are in a holding pattern

Three things:

First, I know there are a few folks that did not get their "Trick or Treats" yet.  I *hope* to get those out first thing next week.  My deepest apologies.

Second, BigD sent me a bubbleope of cards some time ago and I had hoped to have those posted by now.  Alas, I have not, but rest assured, BigD - I got them and I appreciate them VERY much!! Thank you!

Third, I've been neglected all my blogs lately for two reasons, one of which is personally-motivated and the other is well, flat-out selfish.  The first reason is because of the work I am putting into my novel for the www.nanowrimo.org contest.  I am writing at least 50,000 words by the end of November.  So far, I am more than halfway there!  The goal after that is to rewrite and edit and eventually shop it out for publication (and most likely subsequently self-publishing it via LuLu.com).  The other reason is my latest addiction to Plurking.  It's yet another social networking site, combining some features of facebook with those of twitter.  If you'd like to read more about that, you can check out my post here: http://www.poppedinmyhead.com/2009/11/do-you-hear-crickets-chirping.html

In the meantime, keep the Tribe on your mind!

Saturday, November 7, 2009

Belcher dons a Tribe cap

No, not this one:

(as seen on Thorzul)

But, this one:



Tim Belcher greed to become the pitching coach for the Indians yesterday.  Well, he'll be doing it for the whole season, really, but he signed up yesterday.  The new head-chief-in-charge, Manny Acta, is taking his time in rebuilding the Indians after Wedge's unceremonious dumping.

I haven't talked any about Wedge's replacement.  Call it sour grapes, call it being preoccupied with other things in life, call it "David Being Michael."  To be honest, I hadn't given much thought to Acta until today.  I'm sure many of you knew that he was the head guy for Washington.  I didn't.  Some of you may have known that he, like the guy he replaced in Cleveland, was fired from his job.  Nice.  The Indians couldn't wait to hire someone, so they picked the guy who was fired from his last job.  Maybe it's just me, but I'm thinking that might not be the best method for picking potential employees - let alone the one who is supposed to be management material.  I guess we'll see how it goes.

Monday, November 2, 2009

Dave's not here, man....

I know, you're thinking, "Holy cow, man! Does this guy EVER post anymore!?"  Well, I have had the past few days off from blogging in order to become the "Fat King of Pop."  While this is not card related whatsoever, it is related to my (unlike the actual King of Pop) undying fandom of Michael Jackson: