A Pick Me Up

*takes a sip, sits down to get ready for another Cards Over Coffee post*

*makes sure Kleenex box is still nearby*

I am sure you are sick of hearing about me being sick for the last couple of weeks, but here we go again. I am on the mend finally, but still have some lingering symptoms. 

I can assure you this much, if you haven't had Covid, you won't want it.

*takes a sip*

*blows nose*

*takes another sip and returns to today's post*

My mail box has been extremely slow this past week with no cards incoming, until yesterday in which a surprise envelope arrived from blog reader Oren.

Since this envelope was a surprise, this meant that the contents were as well. This wasn't the typical trade where he lets me know ahead of time what is being sent. My curiosity was at an all-time high and I ripped into it.

I was greeted immediately with a note that stated this was a pick-me-up mail day since I wasn't feeling well.

Then I was greeted with some Seasons Greetings from Florida and Kadarius Toney. What I wouldn't do to be on the beach in Florida. Maybe some day.

The next card was full on Dufex with Future Force of Garrison Hearst. I hadn't seen one of these inserts before and are from 1994 Select.

A Trevor Zegras rookie card from NHCD. (I had to smile at this as Oren continues to hook me in on hockey)

Rookie Rewind of Bryant Reeves. If this card doesn't scream 90's, not sure what card does.

And my final two cards were from Fleer Tradition.

They were Great Expectations inserts of,

Shareef Abdur-Rahim (is it just me or did I pull a lot of cards from this guy back then)

 

And Tim Duncan.

I really liked the design on those.

Thanks again to Oren for the pick-me-up mail day. I really enjoyed it and it means a lot. Of course I always appreciate the friendship as well.

*takes a sip before finishing up today's post*

Before closing today, I wanted to take some time out to thank the rest of you who came on here and on Twitter and wished me well. Every thought matters.

Thoughts on my mail day welcomed in comments.

Have a Super Saturday.

*Coffee Card Blogger Out*

Not The Same

*gets up very early, before the rise of dawn for no reason but decides to have a reason for it and starts to blog. It's going to be a three cupper today*

I know I am not alone when it comes to saying life has changed so much since my youth. 

(picture a grumpy old man at 37 shaking his stick at the kids on his lawn and goes to reach for a hose to spray them away)

• There are no more Saturday Morning Cartoon countdown as cartoons are always available. I remember having Saturday's off from school and living for a bowl of Cap'N Crunch and a block of cartoons on ABC and CBS
• Outside fun has become a thing of the past with video games. I lived outside in my youth and never got bored. I used to see commercials for water guns and Nerf items to play with your friends but those have cut back to more video game related commercials basically forcing the youth of today to be inside.
• Counting down to the holiday specials on TV is no longer needed as most are easily available on DVD, get played more than once (they used to get played once and that was it) and some just aren't showed anymore at all. Remember the California Raisins Christmas special? Yeah most don't even know what that is today. I used to countdown to those specials and would write on a calendar when they would come on and would make sure I was ready to watch those. Now they play Rudolph and Frosty two to three times and some don't even come on TV anymore.
  
• No more video rental stores as you can access any movie you want to watch through different devices. One of my favorite things to do on a Friday night was going with my parents to go pick out movies. My mother would get the five out of the seven picked but my sister was able to pick one (most of the time it was Little Mermaid) and I would get one as well. It was a fun family trip.
• Cool action figures and toys no longer exist. Have you seen the toys they make for kids today? Most need apps or are digital in some way and the ones that are made are cheap plastic that break way too quick. What happened?!
• Leaning simple life skills in school is no longer offered, at least here. Instead of learning to live on your own you can learn how to use a digital 3D printer because that will help you in life when you are home alone and can't make a sandwich or do your own laundry.
  
• Too many are offended and the world is simply a mess with subjects I won't even touch on as I wouldn't want to offend anyone or lose readers. It's better to keep my mouth quiet and simply say we had tougher skin in the 80's and 90's.
• Reading Books have become a thing of the past. Most small bookstore don't exist anymore
• Hobbies are not important anymore as devices keep you occupied in your free time
  
• Board Games. I played a ton with my grandmother and still play them. It's especially fun when the family comes up around the holidays and plays as well, but overall, you don't see a lot of board games being played anymore. It's actually forced board game companies to combine device app aspects with board games. Just the other day I saw one for Tik Toc and I have also seen them for Memes too.
  
• And now the latest thing because of Covid is the no magazine policy across doctor offices where they encourage you to stare at your phone more. I can almost see them never making another return again which is sad because that used to be the one thing you had in the waiting room to do. Now you just see people staring down at their phones.
  

 

This is a note inside of the eye doctors I recently visited which at the bottom states, "Please Enjoy Your Phone." Seems ironic that they want you to drain your eyes at a Eye doctors office but maybe that is part of the ploy. 

 

Insert thinking face emoji here.

It's not that magazines are really that popular anymore-or even the back of a shampoo or cereal box as well-or that I ever see anyone before Covid actually read anything but their phone but its the idea of them no longer being around that is bothersome.

Things just aren't the way they once were. Which by the way, were much better back then.

This concept goes for the hobby as well, especially when you are taking a look at the base cards.

*takes a sip, nope, chugs down the first cup. Pours the second and comes back to blog*

Base cards in the hobby are no longer tempting to chase. I still do just to find my favorite players but overall I don't chase base sets from today.

They are bland with no creativity. Not like they once were and yes, I am speaking of the 90's.

We had base cards printed on acetate, complete foil board, thick card stock, action packed photography, embossing, and my favorite, holograms.

*takes a sip and a trip back in time. I am taking you with me*

For those that have followed me awhile now, you would know my passion for hologram cards. Back in the late 90's Upper Deck created a set known as Spx that combined a thick micro-etched card stock with a hologram. They created this for multiple sports and I was on board.

I have been chasing all of the sets, inserts, autographs that have to do with the iconic Spx sets.

I have so far completed:
1996, 1997, 1998 Spx football base sets
1996 Spx racing
1997 Spx racing
1996 Spx hockey
1997 Spx baseball
1997-1998 Spx basketball
1996 Spx football Tribute cards and the Tribute autographs

And am close to these ones,
1997 Spx hockey (13 away)
1996 Spx baseball (13 away)
1996 Spx basketball (need just the MJ)
1996 Spx hockey Holoview Heroes (just a couple remain)
1998 Spx Football Steel (missing only 8) 

And now thanks to my friend @90sNicheFBCard I have...

1997-1998 basketball complete set!

This set features 50 cards full of stars and holographic awesomeness. I will let some of the cards do the talking......

That was

That was quite the experience..huh. I bet you are Googling them right now to find your own.

*takes another sip, tempted to finish cup two but decides to sip this one slower*

With this basketball set in hand, I am now only one card and one set away from having the basketball sets completed. My next goal is to finally chase down the MJ for the 1995-1996 set so I can finally say that one is complete. The last set, 1996-1997, is my favorite design of the three but with a Kobe rookie in the set it will be darn near impossible to ever own that one. Would have to be some major trade to pull that off.

Thanks to Bryan, @90sNicheFBCard, for the huge help in getting this one done.

*takes a sip before closing*

Now that I am done with today's card portion of the post, it got me to thinking. Maybe not having those magazines isn't a bad thing. Maybe you should be on your device more. Maybe you should have a cup of coffee in one hand and your device in another. If you haven't gotten to what I am hinting at yet, maybe your device while you are sitting there with your coffee should be called up to this blog for your reading material. There is quite a bit of content on here now, just sayin'. Of course sharing this blog with others in the room who see your fascination of coffee and cards wouldn't be a bad idea either.

Retro Cup:Out Of This World

The Diamond King sent me a box loaded with 90's basketball goodness. LOADED. So I came up with an idea to do a mini series with so many great cards to show off called, Retro Cup. Along with the card showings, I will re-live a memory I had as well when it comes to coffee. So I hope you are sitting down with a cup of steaming fresh hot coffee so we can give this series a go.

*takes a sip of a new brand of coffee, daaaaannng pretty good. May be out of this world....*

Have you ever had something that tasted so good, that it gave you goosebumps or even made the hair on your arms stand up? Maybe it even gave you that tingly feeling on the inside or even made you smile on the outside? Maybe you even consider it out of this world?

I have.

Some of my grandmothers cooking always took me there and it was the oddest of things that she made that brought it home.

Let's take a look at a list of items she made that was so weird, it was good.

• Fish Stick Gravy. I can picture your faces right now reading this. But, it was pretty darn amazing. I do not like seafood at all and can't stand fish sticks, but, somehow she turned something so disgusting into something amazing. She would fry up the fish sticks, make her homemade gravy, add them in and some special seasonings and wahbam, a masterpiece.
• Frozen Milk With Vanilla. Yeah, it should say ice cream, but it never turned that way. She would take a bowl of milk, add some vanilla and salt, stir and stick it into the freezer. For some reason, it only froze the top layer but the flavor but it tasted so good.
• Raisin Pie. There was no dessert I looked forward to more than her raisin pie at Thanksgiving. I am not normally one that's a fan of raisins, but that family recipe that she used to make it and how well it tasted in a pie, not to mention homemade crust, it was pretty mind blowing.
• Bread Stuffing. This is another classic Thanksgiving favorite. I would spend the entire previous day to Thanksgiving breaking up pieces of bread, usually three loaves, and we would let it sit in a bowl overnight til it hardened. She would then cut up some onion, add some Old Bay seasoning, some hot water and bake. It for some reason or another, this was so much better than store bought stuffing.
• Butterscotch pudding and Peanut Butter sandwiches. This was my favorite meal she made. When you are low income like she was, you sometimes create the cheapest but yet greatest meals ever.
• Varieties of toast toppings. From favorites of peanut butter to butter, there was also cottage cheese, coffee crystals and some funky stuff she bought in a plastic jar but no matter what she added to my toast, grandma's knew best and knew it was going to taste great.
• Beef Stew. It's simply beef stew. The question here is if the beef she used was beef or not. It came from the food shelf and was marked Beef on the outside of the can so it makes you question what was actually in there. But, it still was darn good.
• Strawberry Pie in a Graham Cracker Crust. She simply experimented one night after we went to bingo together and took a can of strawberry filling and dumped it into a graham cracker crust. Despite the sugar overload, it was really good. 
• Her Coffee. You know I couldn't have made this list without coffee. Hers was odd as it was boiled on a stove in a pot and then she served it that way with milk and sugar. She didn't always allow me to have coffee as she was old fashioned in that nature, but she would sometimes reward me after I had helped her with a cleaning project, etc.

This is just some of the items that come to mind first. Some of those items and remembering them just gave me goosebumps.

*takes a giant gulp of this delicious cup of coffee*

The mid to late 90's produced some of the greatest cards EVER. EEEEEEEEVVVEERRR. The base, inserts and even the rare occasional hits were well designed, creative and just plain out of this world.

Recently with the popularity of Fleer (Skybox) Metal coming back for every sport, mainly the Fleer Metal Universe sets from 1997 to 1999, I had forgotten how much I appreciated the set myself and started to dig into my collection just to see what I had. What I didn't realize is I didn't have much. Here I was thinking this whole time I was sitting on a bunch of these to look back on some day but I actually wasn't. So where did my Metal go over the years? I have no idea. Maybe I looked in the wrong spot, maybe my father sold it off. Who knows.

Either way, it was disappointing but I plan to keep looking.

Luckily, my disappointment turned to some happiness when I found some in the box I got from The Diamond King.

1997-1998 Fleer Metal Universe Kevin Garnett. What other card is etched foil textured and takes a popular basketball player under the sea? None. The only thing missing here is Spongebob.

Great background. This was from the 1998-1999 cards. At first glance you would swear it was the same photo as the previous year, but, the facial expression is different.

 

Tim Thomas first trip to space

After I saw these three from The Diamond King in hand, I became addicted and wanted even more so I took to Twitter to see if anyone there had any to trade. I had a lot of RT's, but only one response. That one response was from @Offbeatallstars who had a handful he was willing to trade to me.

So fortunately for me, I haven't ever traded with him before, he was as easy as it was trading and we had a deal done pretty fast. I like traders like that. He gets something he can appreciate and I do as well. In the end, we both were really happy and to me that's what really matters in collecting.

Within a few days, his mail day was in hand. Here's what he sent,

Rodney Rogers who is playing some major street, or I guess you could say interstate ball

 Brevin Knight driving away from a mysterious cloud

Tracy McGrady in our solar system

Michael Finley towering over the city

Keith Van Horn, seemed like I always pulled his cards, is jamming away from the milky way

Danny Fortson

And Tim Duncan playing out of this world.

Appreciate the trade @offbeatallstars! Hope to do it again.

*the final sips of cup one, will lead to cup two but will be done this post before that happens. I am trying to savor every moment of this first cup*

Getting these in hand, gave me that arm hair standing up, goosebump feeling and made me smile. The creativity like this is what we are missing a lot of from today's products. Too much of the same old thing or trying to repeat something that is done gets kinda boring. Sort of like today's food in comparison to my grandmothers.

Card companies, go make something yucky great again!

And yes, I am seeking more Fleer Metal Universe of any player, team and sport. I also feel a hankering for a piece of my grandmother's Raisin Pie to go with this cup of coffee. If only she was around still like Fleer Metal, as I bet she would have been more than happy to have made some and would have put this breakfast out of this world.

A Mystery

*sun is already shining, heat/mugginess is building, and here I am sitting down with my first cup of joe to type this*

 

I love a good mystery.

Well, except for my coffee. Don't mess with my coffee. I have one way of liking it so don't mess with it and add some flavored mumbo jumbo or replace it with tea. 

Don't you dare.

Otherwise a good mystery is fun. Whether it's a mystery book, mystery movie, mystery mail day or mystery packs that you can buy. A good mystery keeps us on the edge of our seats.

Just like recently, when I tried my very first mystery pack.

Why is it my first? Well that's not a mystery I will leave you hanging on.

I always worry about buying them not knowing what kind of junk could be within. I assume in order to get the money the sellers are seeking, that the "chase" cards are impossible to find and a lot of it is what we could find in nickel and dime boxes. Which I am running out of places to store that kind of stuff. Yes, I have gotten to the point of collecting where space is becoming an issue. Mainly because my boxes to store stuff in are running low.

Another point to make about these mystery packs is most of these packs cost $10 when I could have turned that into a card or even two for my PC instead of possible junk.

But, this mystery pack was different than the rest I found. It was focused on my favorite era of collecting, late 90's and early 2000's. What made this pack even better, it was cheap. It had my attention.

So for $2.25 plus shipping, you get 30 cards. There are "25 cards" plus 5 cards that are Inserts/Parallels/RC cards. Intriguing.

All of the cards are NBA cards from the late 1990's through early 2000's. The seller put the Inserts/RC's/Parallels/#'d cards in plastic sleeves and each pack was wrapped like the above example.

Here's an example of some of the sets that were to be included into these mystery packs,

• 1997-1998 Topps Chrome
• 1997-1998 Bowman's Best
• 1998-1999 Fleer Mystique
• 1998-1999 Fleer Brilliants
• 1998-1999 Topps Finest
• 1998-1999 Skybox Thunder
• 1998-1999 Fleer Ultra
• 1998-1999 Upper Deck Black Diamond
• 1998-1999 Upper Deck Ionix
• 1999-2000 Skybox EX
• 1999-2000 Topps Gold Label

And the list of players that are in it as well,

• Kevin Garnett
• Vince Carter
• Grant Hill
• Shaquille O'Neal
• Anfernee Hardaway
• Tim Duncan
• David Robinson
• Jason Kidd
• Steve Nash
• Paul Pierce
• Dirk Nowitzki
• Richard Hamilton
• Chris Webber
• Kobe Bryant
• Michael Jordan
• Scottie Pippen
• Reggie Miller
• Karl Malone

Combine all of that with the price, the BIG NOSTALGIA FACTOR, how could I say no? So I grabbed two of these packs and paid under $10 for them both. After getting the packs and seeing how I did, I wished I had gotten more as they sold out almost immediately.

*smiles during my next sip*

Time to show you why they sold out so fast after opening them,

PACK 1:

We kick off the pack with a Topps Finest Felipe Lopez rookie card in old school Grizz uni. I would love a pair of those shorts to wear.

(no that's not an extra Lopez, that's the same one) I found John Stockton and a Karl Malone. Man I wished that Jazz team could had won a title. But, those darn Bulls...

Tim Hardaway, Payton, Garrity Finest rookie

Marbury (I wonder if my buddy still collects anymore who was a big time fan), another Payton and a Barkley

Shaq, Garnett, Penny Hardaway (forgot he played for the Suns)

And now onto what's supposed to be the good stuff. I thought I had already seen all of that up to this point.

Grant Hill Wing Men

Charles Barkley NBA All Stars

Elton Brand Topps Gold Label rookie. Imagine how hot this card must have been back then? For me it's about the Gold Label

Kobe! Great photo to. I never busted any of this Fleer Genuine

Cummings Topps Chrome rookie

And a Larry Hughes Black Diamond rookie. If I remember right, the rookies in this product were Sp's.

That was just pack number one folks. I was feeling like I had drank the best cup of coffee I had ever had after opening that one. Well, the cup I have right now isn't too shabby either nor is Pack 2.

*takes another sip*

PACK 2

I remember Mcleod and how hot his cards were supposed to be.....

Here we go some more. Fleer Mystique was another great looking product, PC guy Allan Houston Topps Chrome, Shawn Kemp, Spreeeeeeeeeeewelllll or as MSG called it out

Jamal Mashburn, Ewing, my first dupe with the Stockton, Kittles

A few Gary Paytons, Barkley another Hakeem Olajuwon

Marbury peeled Finest parallel, The Admiral, Hakeem again, Ray Allen

The sleeved cards including Webber, Tom Gugliotta nice die cut insert

Tim Duncan insert. I think it's either rookie year or year after. I can't remember now. I opened this awhile back.

And I believe I can fllllllllllllllllyyyyyyyyy wooooooooooooo. An MJ spotting. Very cool especially being a side PC card and the way his cards have been moving. Fleer Ultra was also the bomb back then

 

It was the back of the card that caught my attention. I am not sure if you can read it, but the Did You Know? was "four hours before every game, Michael eats a 23-ounce New York Steak, either a baked potato or mashed potatoes, a salad and ginger ale."

That's crazy. Can you imagine running around for three hours with that in your system? That's just another reason why he is the GOAT.

*cup one down, next one coming up*

I contacted the seller afterwards and thanked them for a trip back in time and told them how much I enjoyed their mystery pack. They mentioned to me that they may make a second series seeing how this one went, if they could find the rest of their cards.

A week later, guess what they found and made and even contacted me about.

And guess what I did

And guess how I did...

A mystery isn't it....

Too bad that's for another cup of coffee, or two, another day.