A small part of my collecting goals for 2013

Here is the top 5 cards that I would like to put into my personal collection for the year 2013.

 1. A Ken Griffey Jr autographed card. I had one at one point and time but I lost it in the fire.

2. A David Wright autographed card. This is one auto that I have not pulled yet and I've always hoped that I would! It seems to be eluding me and it's getting nerve racking!

3. An Avery Brooks autographed card. I was a big fan of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and I loved seeing Avery as Captain Sisko.

4. A Mark Messier autographed card. While I was so delighted to get Wayne Gretzky's autograph in person after a game at MSG I was kind of hoping I could snag Mark's as well. Unfortunately I just missed him by like 4 seconds.

5. A Magic Johnson autographed card. He is my favorite NBA player and my favorite LA LAKERS player! I wish I still had the pair of Lakers colored Converse Weapon sneakers. Loved em!

and finally a special card that I need to get for someone I love dearly:

A John Kruk autographed card. Actually what I would like to do is to find out where I could send a picture to him and see if I could get it signed and personalized to Kathy, my fiance who is a Phillies fan. Her Pap and her used to watch the Phillies games a lot when she was growing up and John Kruk was both their favorite player. I though it would be something to cheer her up and bring back back some good memories for her. She deserves it!

HAVE YOU SEEN ME? Kevin Ahrens Edition

Kevin Ahrens was drafted 16th in the first round of the 2007 MLB draft. Kevin has played third base in the minors for the last 6 years playing on the Single A Lansing Lugnuts and the Advance A Dunedin Blue Jays ball teams. 

 IF SEEN PLEASE CONTACT 1-800-MLB-FADE (NOT A WORKING NUMBER)

Chicken Scratch: Captain Kirk Edition

For this lovely edition of Chicken Scratch I have decided to look at one of the autographs of NY Mets outfielder "Captain" Kirk Nieuwenhuis.

When you look at this autograph you can easily make out the "K" in his first name and the "N" in his last name. He even added his jersey number which is clearly legible. As for the rest of the letters........good luck on figuring that one out. In his first name you have a "K" and it looks like an "A" almost at first glance. Take a second glance and you might even see, "HA". 

Here's another version of his "younger" autograph:

As for the last name portion.....well......the "N" is visible and the rest of it ends on a long loop. It could also be possibly going "NS" as well. Not really sure what he's communicating but it looks like, "HA NL". Maybe he's saying, "HA! I play in the National League." All I know is he's barely getting 2 sharpies for his poor penmanship!

Doe....a deer....a female deer.....bleeding all over the road

Well the score goes like this: Mother Nature (deer) -3  Tim's Envoy-0

Friday night when I was going to work I had a herd (about 6-7) of deer jump out in front of me. I'm already going 50 mph and I have three choices:

1. There was a car coming in the other lane so I had go straight in order to avoid a collision.

2. There was a hill to my right that I could go up and possibly roll the envoy and hit some deer.

3. Take my chances and slow down and try to go into between at least some deer.

I slowed down and tried to go into the middle of the heard where I saw a little space but then one doe stopped and the one behind her stopped and then....... POW BOOM SMASH.


The other guy that was coming in the opposing lane ended up hitting the back end of a spiked buck. He had sustained some damage to the front right corner of his Ford Taurus. He was okay though. He was surprised to see a "6 pack of deer" as he called it running like that. He asked if I was okay and I said, "yeah......but those two doe lying there on the road.....well......they won't be going anywhere anytime soon. Come to think of it neither will I probably." Basically the whole right front corner is missing from my vehicle. No headlight, no fog lights, no bumper, no signal lights, no headlight washer, and no grill. Everything was smashed. The funny thing about this (well not really) is last year the day before Christmas I hit a deer going to my children's Christmas program and did $3700.00 worth of damage on the driver side from one big buck. I can't wait to see the cost for this one one the passenger side. I have a Progressive agent coming this morning to see what the damages are going to be this time.

I'm glad we were both okay (the other guy and me; screw the deer). I'm glad the kids were not with me because my daughter would've been really upset and I can just imagine my son standing there saying, "can I gut them Dad can I can I" as he's at the first year stage of hunting and that is all he has been talking about lately. Then more thoughts rush my head like, "oh great Tim, you're supposed to go to Philly the end of the month. You have to take the kids to Thanksgiving Dinner on Thursday. How will you get to work?" I stop and take a deep breath and just think to myself, "one day at a time Tim.......one step at a time." I love it when life throws screwballs at you. The nice thing is I have a good "on base" percentage. Hey Mother Nature........BRING IT ON! I'll hit you the same way Roger Clemens hit Mike Piazza with the bat chunk!

P.S. Yes that picture is from Carmageddon 2. Great Game!

I was out of commission but now I am "back" on track!

When you have bulging discs in the L2-3,4-S1 areas of the spine and the pain is so bad that it drops you on the floor and you cannot get up or move and you're having to lay there in miserable agony while feeling the nerves pulsate with agonizing pain that it leaves you feeling breathless......well it was time to have it taken care of professionally and medically. Things are so much better now and I have good mobility and I can bend pretty good again! Things can finally get back to normal again!

Sorry for the delay

To the Contest winners and to those who I have some trade packages going out and for those I have cards to fill out their checklists I must apologize for the delay in getting things out. Everything was set to go out in the mail on friday morning. However on thursday evening I had to deal with some serious health issues which ended up in a required 5 day stay in a place that I HATE but the doctors are good (Not going into the details of why I hate hospitals but not the docs). I'm home now and the recovery process is going good. Sometimes we just need to take that extra time and learn to breathe a little when we get overwhelmed. That is what I am definitely doing now. I will get the goodies out here soon guys and a big thanks for being patient and understanding! I'll throw some extras in for the delay guys! I'll be back on my feet in no time! I'm using my cell phone for writing this (samsung infuse) and I have been using it to surf the web while I was staying in the "freezer". Amazing how we've come so far with technology. It's good thing that technology saves lives as well as entertain!

Picks for NFL Week 3: WE NEED NEW REFS!

 ATTN: contest winners- your prize packages are almost completely put together and will be mailed out on friday morning September 21!

Well here's what I had picked for this past weeks NFL picks:

Chicago at Green Bay                                      GREEN BAY    W
Tampa Bay at NY Giants                                  NYGIANTS      W
New Orleans at Carolina                                  CAROLINA- UPSET PICK   W
Arizona at New England                                   NEW ENGLAND  L
Minnesota at Indianapolis                                  MINNESOTA    L
Baltimore at Philadelphia                                   BALTIMORE    L
Kansas City at Buffalo                                      BUFFALO        W
Cleveland at Cincinnati                                     CINCINNATI    W
Houston at Jacksonville                                     JACKSONVILLE   L
Dallas at Seattle                                                DALLAS               L
Washington at St. Louis                                    WASHINGTON    L
NY Jets at Pittsburgh                                        NY JETS             L
Tennessee at San Diego                                    SAN DIEGO      W
Oakland at Miami                                             MIAMI               W
Detroit at San Francisco                                   SAN FRANCISCO  W
Denver at Atlanta                                              DENVER                L


My stats for the season so far go like this:
week 1: 6-10
week 2: 8-8

Now here's the BIG KAHUNAS picks for week 3 of the NFL:

 WINNING

Giants at Panthers                                       NY GIANTS
Buccaneers at Cowboys                             TAMPA BAY
Rams at Bears                                            CHICAGO
49ers at Vikings                                          SAN FRANCISCO
Lions at Titans                                             DETROIT
Bengals at Redskins                                    WASHINGTON
Chiefs at Saints                                            NEW ORLEANS
Jets at Dolphins                                           MIAMI
Bills at Browns                                            BUFFALO
Jaguars at Colts                                           INDIANAPOLIS
Eagles at Cardinals                                      ARIZONA
Falcons at Chargers                                     SAN DIEGO
Texans at Broncos                                       HOUSTON
Steelers at Raiders                                      SQUEELERS
Patriots at Ravens                                        RAVENS
Packers at Seahawks                                  GREEN BAY

Those are my picks and that's what I'm sticking with!

On a side note, I wrote a poem to Roger Goodell about the replacement refs and it went something like this:

The happiest time of the week for me
is when the NFL would play on sundays,
But the refs threw the flag on the season
because for them it's all about the money.

Replacement refs are calling ghostly penalities
and giving one of the teams an extra "TIME OUT",
Now they're calling an incomplete pass a fumble
and letting Jake Locker's shoulder pop out and about.

Players are having their helmets removed via foot job
and then they get smacked with a penalty for removing it,
Letting the clock run when it should've been stopped
and not knowing how to spot a yard instead of an inch you idiot.

The refs should be so lucky they have survived
and week three is coming around the bend,
One ref was busted for being a proud Saints fan
So the NFL tossed his ass to the curb end over end.

The replacement refs know they hold some power
to determine the outcome and cover all of the bets,
We'll pull some strings and make a sick wad of cash
and how Tim Tebow will never quarterback for the Jets.

We'll let the horse collar tackle slide this time
and turn a blind eye to the QB getting illegally hit,
We'll screw up a few calls when the defense looks too good
and then call out some infractions that were not legit.

One ref says, " hey McCool you need 4 more yards"
because in my fantasy league I chose you in the draft,
For every first down and closer to 100 yards you get
that's more money for me while the others get the shaft.

Oh how I messed up my NFL week 1 picks: Here's week 2

My NFL picks for last week was something like this:

Match-up                                                        



Dallas  at  N.Y. Giants:                                   NY GIANTS    L

Atlanta  at  Kansas City:                                  Kansas City     L
       
St. Louis  at  Detroit:                                       Detroit            W
         
Miami  at  Houston:                                         Houston         W
         
Buffalo  at  N.Y. Jets:                                       Buffalo            L
         
Washington  at  New Orleans:                        New Orleans    L
        
Philadelphia  at  Cleveland:                             Philadelphia     W
        
Indianapolis  at  Chicago:                                Chicago          W
         
Jacksonville  at  Minnesota:                            Minnesota        W
         
New England  at  Tennessee:                         Tennessee          L
         
Carolina  at  Tampa Bay:                                Carolina           L
         
San Francisco  at  Green Bay:                        Green Bay        L

Seattle  at  Arizona:                                        Seattle             L

Pittsburgh  at  Denver:                                    Pittsburgh         L

Cincinnati  at  Baltimore:                                Cincinnati         W
                  
San Diego  at  Oakland:                                Oakland            L



OK OK OK....... so my selections were a bit off (6-10 for my first week). Seems like the whole NFL week was kind of odd. Green Bay barely rushed the ball at all. Frank Gore played a game and did not get injured. Randall Cobb caught the ball. Peyton manning is still laughing at the Squeelers. The Eagles barely beat the BROWNS. The REDSKINS played decent football for once. Perhaps we might see a little bit of QB controversy in the Arizona CARDINALS camp unfolding. Never the less I made my choices and now I will live with it excuses free!

Here are my picks for WEEK 2 OF THE NFL:

                               

MATCH-UP                                                           

Chicago at Green Bay                                            GREEN BAY
Tampa Bay at NY Giants                                        NYGIANTS
New Orleans at Carolina                                        CAROLINA- UPSET PICK
Arizona at New England                                         NEW ENGLAND
Minnesota at Indianapolis                                        MINNESOTA
Baltimore at Philadelphia                                         BALTIMORE
Kansas City at Buffalo                                            BUFFALO
Cleveland at Cincinnati                                            CINCINNATI
Houston at Jacksonville                                           JACKSONVILLE
Dallas at Seattle                                                      DALLAS
Washington at St. Louis                                          WASHINGTON
NY Jets at Pittsburgh                                              NY JETS
Tennessee at San Diego                                          SAN DIEGO
Oakland at Miami                                                   MIAMI
Detroit at San Francisco                                         SAN FRANCISCO
Denver at Atlanta                                                   DENVER

those are my picks and that's what I am going with!

ALOHA!

The results are in and the winners of the 1982 YUGO is.......

Here is the list of people who entered via comments:

1. Night owl
2. Captain Canuck
3. High-Five Man
4. Greg Zawkin
5. Ryan H.
6. The Lost Collector
7. Irondequoit36
8. Dhoff
9. The Dimwit
10. The Angels In Order
11. BA Benny
12. Chunter
13. AdamE
14. Richard Nebe Jr.
15. Wilson
16. Joe Average Card Collector
17. Play at the plate
18. Skroeker
19. The Brooklyn Met
20. Jeff Wilk
21. Cynicalbudda

AND NOW the first winner of our two showcase showdown is: 






GREG ZAWKIN is our first winner! He also receives a bonus for tweeting to topps about the contest!


Once again there are two prizes so we need 2 winners so we will turn to the RANDOM.ORG GODS again for a second winner and that person is:





RYAN H is our second winner!

BUT WAIT..............there is one more consolation prize winner to be declared and after a few more shuffles that winner is:




 MR. BA BENNY......come on down!


Congratulations to all who won and a big "thank you" and a round of applause to all of those who entered. What I will need then from the winners is the following:

Name
Address
favorite player and team (your choice of FB or Baseball)

email that info with the title in the subject line: Contest Winner to my email: hertzog27@msn.com

Thanks for following! Aloha!