Twilight Zone & Hobby Happiness

Yesterday, it seemed as though we entered some sort of strange and twisted twilight zone. A time when our son was acting bad and our daughter was acting good...well, for the most part. No, my boy didn't want any part of schooling yesterday (you must be thinking to yourself, why would they homeschool on Christmas break? - Well, that's how we roll.) and was just throwing fits / being very slow, etc. I hated to have to do this, but for the second time in his life, we had to take away ALL of his toys until he can be a good boy again. He has been cranky / whiny / slow to obedience and I miss my good boy! It hurts to have to go that far, but discipline must be strong enough to get his attention. I will tell you this though, it is much better than rushing your daughter to the emergency room because we thought she was choking! That happened on Sunday. Never a dull moment in our household, indeed...

The past few weeks have been rather slow from a work standpoint, which has been nice in some respect. I guess it is always like this at the end of the year, which is nice because I have a break, but a bummer because it gives me more time to worry about stuff.

I have been focusing more on fitness, and that is one of the main things I am proud of myself for in 2009 - having lost 55 lbs since April, and over 100lbs since 2003. I say this because last night we went out to eat for the 2nd time in 4 days. I decided against running afterwards because it was too cold and this morning because I was too ... unmotivated, but I was able to get a bit of a workout in doing some chinups, pushups and situps. Hey, better something than nothing!

Speaking of going out to eat last night, it was a great time to catch up with some friends in town from Dallas. I loved it! A wonderful time to unwind, catch up and relax. Praise the Lord for good friends. Now, if only we had more and were able to get out more with people. I have been able to do this a few times over the past several weeks, but it just still isn't enough.

Over the past few weeks, I have been able to do some great deals as far as sports cards and memorabilia go. I met a woman at Whataburger (and no, I didn't eat there...saved from the clutches of the mighty tasty A1 Thick & Hearty Burger!) to buy some 1960's/70's sports cards from her to help her get money to help bail her boyfriend out of jail for Christmas. It wasn't the deal of the century, but for $15 I got several hundred older cards, which included about 20 keepers - 4 Griffey Sr. rc's, some older Nolan Ryan a Gary Carter rookie & some other good stuff. I hope to get rid of the rest of them for a bit more than I paid and keep the cards I mentioned above.

After the previously mentioned emergency room experience, I packed up the fam and headed down the road to meet with a guy that had a collection of autographed jerseys and several complete sets. My friend who is a dealer alerted me to this - he wanted $600 but I talked him down to $400. What a deal, let me tell you! I got autographed jerseys of Roger Clemens, Shaquille O'neal, Yao Ming, Steve Francis, Clyde Drexler and Earl Campbell. Not to mention a 74-75 WHA OPC Hockey set that sells for $90, a 78-79 Topps Hockey set, 81-82 Topps Hockey Set, 78-79 Topps basketball set, 89-90 Hoops basketball set, 82 Topps Football set, 83, 84 & 85 Topps baseball sets & 85 & 86 fleer baseball sets. 99% of the other sets mentioned sell for $20-$30 each. It is my hope to rid myself of all the non-baseball cards + the Francis / Campbell & Drexler jerseys to keep the Yao / Clemens / Shaq autographed jerseys & baseball cards.

Tomorrow, I am looking forward to a long drive to sugarland to meet with a guy who has 161 unopened boxes of baseball cards for $350. Here is the inventory list:

1986 Donruss-4 wax boxes
1987 Donruss 24 wax boxes
1989 Donruss 8 wax boxes
1987 Topps 14 wax boxes
1989 Fleer 9 wax boxes
1989 Bowman 20 wax boxes
1991 Upper Deck 2 wax boxes
1988 Donruss 5 wax boxes
1988 Donruss "Baseball's Best" 3 sets
1991 Conlon 1 wax box
1988 Topps "Big Baseball" 11 boxes (4-1st series)(3-2nd series)(4-3rd series)
1989 Topps 6 wax boxes
1990 Fleer 17 wax boxes
1988 Score 7 "Premier Edition" factory sealed sets
1988 Topps 8 wax boxes
1988 Score 15 wax boxes
1990 Upper Deck 5 wax boxes
1986 Topps "Leaders" 1 wax box
1990 "Sport Flics" 1 wax box
= Total 161 boxes

The first 6 lines on the list, I plan of bust open myself and sell the rest to hopefully break even. What fun to open 59-79 wax boxes!