May 6, 2017

Discounted Stadium Club and Some Blog News

I'll make sure to get the card related portion of the post out of the way first so that those of you that aren't interested in the blog news can easily skip that.

The other day, I posted about a Bowman 'value pack' that I found at the local Walmart. That pack turned out to be a pretty awesome break, but I found some other packs that same day.


I love discounted packs. As previously mentioned, I'm still trying to put this set together so I couldn't pass up 'clearance' Stadium Club. Oh, who am I kidding? I wouldn't have been able to pass them up even if I'd already finished the set.


This is not too shabby. The gold foil Trout is definitely the highlight of the first pack, but the pics on the Forsythe and Soler are top notch.


Pack two was also pretty darn good! A Kershaw insert, Bryant, and a cool pic of Bumgarner throwing at my head top the second dozen SC cards. I suppose at some point I'll get it together enough to post my needs list for this. Until then, I'll keep my eyes peeled for more discounted product.


I've spent a lot of time over the past few weeks trying to figure out why I've allowed the blog to go for multiple lengthy periods of time with little to no activity. It's certainly not because I'm not interested in the cardboard. Though you wouldn't know(since I haven't written much), I've been acquiring cards at the same alarming pace that has characterized most of my blogging history. Some have been through FB group trading, some through case breaks, and some through my normal purchasing habits. Sadly, there haven't been many acquired through the cardsphere. As I considered the reasons I haven't been as active in the blog community there were many reasons. The constant feeling of being behind on scanning/writing about trades with fellow bloggers, guilt at not packing up outgoing trade packages on a regular basis(though I definitely have the stacks available to send out), and a lack of creative subject matter are all pretty high on the list. Utilizing my 'free' time for other card-related activities(recently discovered COMC challenges and digital card apps) also ranks up there. However, there is one other reason that my mind kept coming back to: my blog feels stale and isolated. The original design of the blog has served me well, but I no longer feel like it is fresh and exciting like I once did. Additionally, I've established multiple collecting communities(cardsphere, FB groups, in-person, etc) and they all feel isolated from each other. This leads me to the conundrum of being extremely excited about recent additions to the collection, but then holding off on posting about it anywhere due to a feeling of paralysis by analysis. I end up feeling unsure of how to tie together the new card(s) when the source isn't a part of the community I'm trying to share with. I realize even as I'm writing this that this reasoning may be rather silly, but it's a glimpse into my thought process. So, what does this long-winded, rambling bit of nonsense have to do with anything? I suppose the short answer is: whatever readers I still have left will probably be noticing some significant changes to the look of the blog. Additionally, I'll be launching a new, blog-specific Twitter account that will hopefully help me to begin integrating the multiple communities I wrote about earlier. In the long run, I hope that these changes will make the blog feel fresh again and eliminate some of the inexplicable hesitancy I've had to write about a bunch of stuff in recent months.

Sorry for the wordy, pictureless announcement. If there's anyone still out there that made it to the end of this, please take a moment to comment. Do any of you feel like your various collecting communities are isolated from each other? Clearly I'm overthinking all of this, huh? Anyway, thanks for reading.

10 comments:

  1. Be careful with the challenges, they have a habit of becoming very addictive!

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  2. My only card communities are basically the blogs and Twitter, and I'm only regularly active on the blogs. When I first started blogging, I was still on the trading forums and tied the trades I'd make on the forums into blog posts fairly often even though neither one had anything to do with the other. The forums/blogs did eventually become quite isolated from one another, but that's probably more to do with the fact that trading on the forums seemed to get more and more tedious after I joined the blogosphere. No matter what you post, Tim, I'll be reading.

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  3. I've missed you Tim. I was absent for months for various reasons. I am still catching up on trade posts (two more should do it) but feel guilty for not sharing cards sooner. Our blog friends do take time to put together some awesome packages. My personality tells me I'm obligated to share them. When I returned to the blogs, so many of the guys understood, telling me just to enjoy the cards and not worry about posting them. Of course, I'm doing it anyway but feel less pressured about the time it is taking. I don't use Twitter. I perused the KIR FB page and found some great deals but never wanted to trade there. It's too much for me to handle with the time I do have for the hobby so prefer to trade here with blogger pals. I honestly don't know how so many bloggers with family (new babies, kids, school) manage to blog regularly and collect so voraciously! Share you cards here! It's fun to see the new additions to your collection no matter where or how they were obtained (looting aside.) ;) Have fun Tim!!!!

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  4. I can see how trying to come up with content in multiple communities can be frustrating when they are connected. I do belong to a couple of forums but I stick around to see cool pulls from other forum members and to get card related news otherwise my blog is my only outlet, though I occasionally highlight some of my posts on my personal Twitter.

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  5. By no means am I a "regular blogger," so I'd take this with about 15 grains of salt, but I am regularly in a similar situation to you. I feel no desire to post about general card acquisition from outside the blogging community (unless I have something creative to say about it).

    I've ultimately come to the conclusion that I only will write a post when I know I'll enjoy doing it. Sometimes that quite often... and other times I ease off the gas pedal quite a bit. I guess what I'm saying is, we know you're around regardless how much you post or what you post about!

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  6. I know exactly what you mean by "isolation" when it comes to this hobby. I really like your idea of opening a card specific twitter account. I feel my personal account, which a bunch of my teaching co-workers and students follow, is not the place for my hobby posts.
    You've given me something to ponder. Thanks!
    Oh, and good luck with your changes!

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  7. I've been pondering the same thing. It must be prime card season, because I've been acquiring stuff in heaps and bunches lately too. I post blogger trades and show hauls, but I've also ordered from Sportlots and get smaller trade packages from a seperate group all the time too. I could put those up, but then it feels like all I would post is the mass hoarding and nothing else. I think a few of the people in my trading group may be aware of the blog, but it's the group policy to acknowledge trades by email anyway, so posts are sorta redundant.
    I prefer to mix it up between incoming loot, customs, commentaries, and the bat-arounds/challenge posts. I only post every other day, and so far that's been enough. I'm not on Twitter at all, or Facebook either, so I don't know if I'm missing out on anything or not.
    So keep posting whatever...we'll keep checking.

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  8. One of my best friends in the hobby doesn't read blogs at all, even though I've mentioned him several times. I don't worry about where I got something so much as what I can say about it. I posted every day in April and even though I had all the posts written before the month started, it still made it feel more like "work" than fun. Luckily, for me, I love to talk about cards, and since I've bored my family with endless card talk for the last thirty years, now I can bore hundreds of people I'm not related to as well! :)

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  9. I've been in your shoes where it comes to letting too much time pass between posts. Happens to us all, right? (at least to most of us)
    Good luck with your changes and just do what feels right. The beauty of our hobby is the blogging end of it doesn't have any rules, so be yourself.
    I enjoy peeking in on your blog and reading. Hope you'll be sticking around for a long time.

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  10. I don't really do any trading outside the Cardsphere. The people I know at the card shows aren't in our community, but I feel like the blog is a good place to consolidate all my card activity.

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