What Does Eighteen Bucks Get You At A Card Show?

The local card show was this past weekend, and unlike most of the other ones I try to attend, it is only about 20 minutes away, so I can be back home before noon if I end up finding what I want right away.

I try to keep my budget to about 20 bucks. Sometimes I go a little bit over, in this case I went a bit under. There's not a whole lot of dealers at this one, but this is my favorite show because I always seem to get the best deals here.

I left the wife and dog, got a coffee and one of those rubbery sausage, egg and cheese biscuits at the local Circle K before heading out to my destination. As usual, I brought some bloggers want lists as well as my own because I've learned not to trust myself to remember what I need to get.

I went around to all the tables first without buying anything as nothing caught my eye initially. The last time I was at this show one dealer had a bunch of auto/memorabilia cards for a buck. He didn't have any this time. He also didn't bring his 1979 Topps again! So I circled around for the second time. I was forgoing dime boxes this time as I was looking for some cards for other bloggers that would not fall in the "dime box" category.

My first purchase was this:

This set me back 3 bucks, which ended up being 1/6th of my entire spending spree.

I'm sure you're wondering why a Red Sox fan would be seeking out Yankees, especially when they just took three out of four from us, but there is a sensible reason for this. You see, quite some time ago, I had a Yankees collector email me with a trade proposition. He was offering up a bunch of cards that I needed.

So I looked at his want lists.

Do you know how many cards I had?

Zero.

It happens.

Even with the ginormous (thanks, Weather Channel!) amount of cards that I have, it still is possible to come up empty (especially when their want list consists of numerous autos/memorabilia and insert cards).

So I've been slowly accumulating a fair amount of Yankee oddballs, autos/memorabilia and other cards that I hope will make him have some compassion, which may lead to a pat on the head and have him say "it was a valiant effort, however feeble, but here are your coveted junk wax cards". If not, I'll have a lot of unwanted Yankees that I will need to remove from my humble abode as quickly as I can.

I moved on to another table. This dealer had been here last month, but I had spent most of my money when I had gotten to his table. He had a sign that said "3 for a dollar" in front of a bunch of Derek Jeter and other Yankee cards, but I was all set on those for now. He had a bunch of oddball cards on his table, but none of them were priced. I hate that. No, I really hate that. I will walk away from your table if you do that. That was pretty much why I didn't buy anything from him last month.

So instead of walking away this time, I pointed to a couple of the oddball cards that had captured my interest. "How much for these?" I asked.

"Three for a dollar." he replied. "All that over there is three for a dollar."

"Oh." I replied. "I thought the sign was just for those Yankee cards."

"Nope." he said. "Those are included too."

Stupid me.

So here's what I pulled out of that pile.

First up is this cool 1987 Our Own Tea Dave Winfield.

From that same pile I got a 1993 King B Doug Drabek...

...and a 1978 Papa Gino's Ron Guidry.

I also found 1976 Isaly's Discs of Al Oliver...

...and Catfish Hunter.

Now some of these cards/discs are going to the Yankees collector, plus I'm also putting together something for a Pirates collector that sent me some cool cards recently. So I haven't bought a thing for myself yet. But I've only spent somewhere in the vicinity of 5 bucks, so I've still got three-quarters of my budget left.

One of the most rewarding things about blogging is finding out what other collectors like and picking something up for them. I know of a huge Ron Cey collector and when I saw this I grabbed it immediately.

This is also from the 1976 Isaly's disc set and I picked it up having no idea whether he needed it or not. Just checking his list now, it appears he doesn't. So if Mr. Night Owl wants this, I will send it his way...

...along with the Steve Garvey that was underneath it.

So now that I was done shopping for others, I began to look for oddball cards for myself. He had a small stack of cards in 9-card page protectors on another table. I pointed to the stack and asked him how much for those. He said they were three for a dollar as well, but if I bought enough he would charge me only a quarter a card.

I made sure I bought enough.

I took several pages off of the top of the stack and handed it to him.

Here's what I grabbed.

That's forty-four from the 1982 Kellogg's 3-D Super Stars set! I loved these as a kid, but until now I only had a couple.

Wait, there's more.

One from the 1974 set.

Four from the 1977 set...

...and seven from the 1976 set.

The overwhelming majority of these were in fantastic condition, there were only a few that had some cracking.

Also included with the Kellogg's cards was the 1965 Topps Gold Embossed Boog Powell.

I think I'll be increasing my budget for next month's show. If this dealer is there, I'll be cleaning him out.

And this is what eighteen bucks (and about fifteen minutes of your time) can get you at a card show.