Do Yu like this retail hit?

It's winter, I have a preschooler, so it is expected that we will all be sick around here (we are).  On a trip to Rite-Aid last night, I was buying a bunch of stuff for the family -- Baby Tylenol for the infant, toothpaste for the 4-year-old, and unmentionables for the wife.  As I was heading to checkout, I said, let me see if there is anything I should get for myself. 

This Rite-Aid does not have a card aisle.  It has a "card section" which consists of whatever will fit on 4 little hangers below the Yu-Gi-Oh cards.  Right now that is 2013 Topps Update baseball and various Panini football rack packs.  I'm not much of an impulse purchaser, but I saw the 2013 Topps Update and figured that splurging on a $2 pack would be fun.  Maybe I'd get a Royal!  I didn't have any of the 2013 Update yet, so no dupes...

I grabbed it, checked out, took it home, treated the kiddo, then settled down to see if I got anything good.

First - Chris Getz -- a Royal! casualty of the offseason priorities.

Then, I noticed that the remaining stack felt thick and fairly firm.  What's that in here????



2013 Topps Update - Yu Darvish - All-Star Stiches Relic Card



 That's surprising!   So I guess I made the right choice on that pack.  :-)  This is only the 2nd-time I have ever pulled a retail hit, and my first time from a Topps product.  It's got good colors, and even though I don't collect the Rangers, I think I'm gonna keep it as a reminder to always be selfish when at the store....errr......rather as a reminder of my good fortune.   

Victory in the Craigslist Free Section - Griffey and Nolan Ryan

Craigslist is a wild place.

It's main advantage is that it frictionlessly brokers any type of exchange that you can think of.  You can find any sort of trouble that you want there, but it also fosters the quick transfer of goods to people who want them from those who no longer have any desire to keep them.  Usually, there is some cash exchanged, but the best part of Craigslist is the FREE section.  Whenever someone is cleaning out a garage, moving, etc., they will find stuff they don't need but want someone else to have -- so they just post it for free.  No strings attached.   I just gave away my equipment for "Rock Band" on PS2 tonight, for example.

I have an alert set up on my local Craigslist so that all posts with "cards" in them get sent to my Google Reader (note to self, find some service OTHER than Google Reader to use after June).  Recently, one popped up in the free section as "Uncut Sheets of Cards."  I emailed the guy then hustled over there.  Here is what I came home with for a grand total of $0.

Here are two uncut sheets from 1991 Mother's Cookies.  The one on the left is a 4-card "Father and Son" set of Ken Griffey, Jr. and Ken Griffey, Sr.   On the right is the 4-card set called the "300 Wins Set" of Nolan Ryan.  The 4-cards are just printed over and over on these sheets. I guess that means I have 18 complete sets of each.  :-)

Here's a little blurb on them in the 2011 Standard Catalog.

Here's a close-up on the Griffey's.

So are you jealous yet?  There's no need to be.  I'm not keeping these.  As cool as they are, I'm probably not going to display these, frame them, or do anything productive with them.   Living with my family in a 2-bedroom apartment, I don't have a ton of extra room for stuff that is not in the heart of my collection.

So, would any of my fellow blog-people want these to do something with?  Griffey fans?  Rangers fans?  Uncut sheet fans?  I'd let them go for the cost of shipping/packaging.  They are a thin cardstock, so they don't roll-up super tight.  I could try to get them into one of those big priority mail triangular tubes, maybe.  I wouldn't want to make them all curled/bent/jacked-up any more than is necessary.  Let me know if one or both of these is up your alley.

There is some damage on these, although they still look pretty good for being stuck in some guy's garage for 15 years. 

Tear along the side