Birthday contest!

 Sorry it's so late, I'm on a weird schedule and was pretty busy and also not feeling too good due to my poor choice in eating, LOL.

If you want the big stack of slightly damaged NASCAR cards, be the first to comment that you want them and you win. That's all there is to it. 

It's my birthday but you get the gift!

An actual post about cards! + Contest announcement

 Most of my posts lately have been more focused on the "history" part of Cardboard History, but today there is a very small post about cards. I actually scanned some for the first time in months! I had to get my scanner out so I took care of a few odd shaped cards, and I thought I would share them with you all, mostly just so I could actually put up a post with some fresh card content. 

I'll start off with the biggest card first, one that barely fits onto my scanner tray. 

That is the Matt DiBenedetto hero card I got at the showcar appearance back on September 11th.

And you get to see both sides. Look how much info they can cram onto a card this size! Of course, I'm glad this isn't standard size because collection storage would be a lot harder. NASCAR hero cards don't have a standard size, although this is probably as close as you'll come to one. They come as small as 2 standard size cards to as large as 14 inches (and maybe more, that's the largest in my collection). This is the first hero card I've gotten at a show car appearance since 2008 so that's pretty darn cool, too. 

Next come the two cards from the Sports Cards Inc. A Word from the POTUS set that I showed photos of back when I got them, here are legitimate scans. These are neat cards and luckily I have a good scanner because I didn't take the Reagan card out of the holder. The back is partially obscured by the sticker they sealed it with but it's just some color that's lost, no words or anything. 

Finally, we have this 1999 Racing Champions promo card, which I didn't even know existed until my friend sent it to me. Kraft apparently was a secondary sponsor on Kenseth's Busch car that year and they made a promo of it that included this card. Like I said, I had no idea but I'm glad to have it. The promos can be kind of a love/hate relationship. I love when I get them, but I hate the fact that I'm missing some of them because I simply don't know they exist so I can't look for them.. I know of at least two other 1999 promos that I found out existed within the last couple of years. Haven't tracked them down yet, though. 

It's not much in the way of cards, but at least I got a cardboard post onto Cardboard History. 

====================================

I feel like doing a contest. Next Monday, October 18th, is my birthday. But one of you is going to get a present...of sorts. Back in January I bought a large lot of NASCAR cards, but many of them are in low condition. Bad corners and surface scratches abound. They aren't good enough condition to put onto my tradelist but perhaps one of you out there might like them. So, here's the contest. Sometime on October 18th, I'll put up a post about the contest and maybe my birthday too. Be the first one to comment on THAT post (not this one) that you want the NASCAR cards and I'll send you a whole bunch of them. That's it, simple as that. You can promote it if you want but it won't get you anything, just be here...that's all that's required. 

Thanks for reading.

Wave 1 is away

Wave 1 of my Contest Prizes is going in the mail as I type this post (with a tip of the cap to my mom, who's waiting on line for me since I'm in too much pain to do so)

You may notice that there are 15 packages going out, yet there were only 12 winners, (two declined to get any cards) and yet I call this wave 1...well, there's a good reason for that. There's a couple of PIFs, and a couple of trades from the Database in here as well... and there's more to come. I'm waiting on the addresses for 3 people, waiting to hear back from one more, and waiting on my COMC box to arrive so I can send out my Secret Santa, which I may have to overnight depending on how long it takes COMC to get my box to me. Scheduled to arrive here December 17th, which is cutting it close, but they usually get it sooner than they predict. Fingers crossed, I may never use them for Secret Santa again if it blows up in my face, LOL.

I've received far more PIFs than I have received, so much so that I'm embarrassed by my lack of reciprocating. While I can likely never repay the kindness I've been shown, at least I can occasionally send out a little something to some of the people in the hobby who have been kind to me.

Some of these are going pretty close to me, and some are going pretty far...across the country and even out of the country.

I hope the people on the receiving end of these packages is happy with what I've chosen. In truth, I've had some of these cards waiting to send out for over a year, just needed to get myself in motion. Finally did!

Edit: It cost $86 dollars to mail all them...next contest is only having one winner, LOL!

And the winner is...

Thank you all for making my first five years of Cardboard History such a resounding success! With a big anniversary comes a contest, and now it's time to pick a winner of said contest...

I can't...I just can't...so everybody wins! Make sure to let me know what your address is, and which sport or sports you want your cards to be. It's not going to be a lot, just a little token of thanks for supporting my ramblings and musings. 

I realized my email was not showing on my profile, so it is now, but I don't do email often, once a week at most. Best way to contact me is through the Trading Card Database or Twitter. I have Jon, Chris, SCC and Kirk's already...thought I had a few others but apparently not. You can also leave me a private comment on the Cardboard History Gallery, click the Private box and I will be the only one who can see it. Either one of those ways will get to me in a matter of a few hours. 

Thanks again for reading and taking part, I have so much more to come, including a great new series starting next week...that's the closest I'll ever get to a Frankenset! 

By the way, this is the first Meme I've ever made. 

1 Million Views Contest

Do you ever scroll all the way down to the bottom of my page? Past the blogroll, past the Tags, to the very end?

If you do, you see some fun stuff, like my view counter.

I have to be honest, I don't scroll down that far very often. I see I'm approaching 1 million views. Holy mackerel! I can't believe that. I am constant surprised that anyone cares what I have to say, but, based on the view count, it looks like I shouldn't be surprised.

So, I'm having a little contest for my viewers. If you happen to see the 1 Million number- exactly 1 million- take a screenshot or even a photo of your screen. Send it to me and you'll win a prize. I don't know what exactly yet- I'm losing my source for baseball and football cards at the end of this year but I'll try to find something you'll like...tailored to your collection. It won't be anything big but free is free, right?

Since I don't check that part of my page often, I am not sure when to expect it to be reached. It could be this week, it could be January. I don't have any idea. But I really want to see the counter at exactly 1 Million views.

I'm thinking about temporarily moving it up to the top of the screen, so I can see it more regularly, but I'm not sure if I will do that or not. So stay tuned as it's location may change.

Ten Year Anniversary and Contest!

It was 10 years ago today that I began my project of scanning every trading card in my collection.

My hobby was VERY different in April 2009. I was, at that time, collecting only NASCAR. I had drifted away from non-sports a decade earlier, and I had left the NBA at the end of 2006, which, I thought at that time, was permanent. I now regret that immensely.

My hobby was also pretty solitary. I had not yet discovered the Trading Card Database, though it did exist then. I was a member of Trader Retreat but my activity was way down. (a forum I miss, had good times on there). I had not yet found NUTS, that would be a few months later. (sometime in August 2009)

I had zero idea what a blog was, even less so that there was already a vibrant card blogosphere. I would not discover that until I found the Trading Card Database.

Things were going to change drastically for me soon...I got back into Non-Sports in a big way in September 2010, I found the Database in August of 2011 but found I could track my collection there in October 2012 (I used it for checklists only before then) Entering my collection on there got me fully back into the NBA, after I had begun watching regularly again in 2011, and eventually, in 2014, the Database spurred on the creation of Cardboard History, and then in 2016, got me into hockey, which has since taken over my life.

But one thing began that day, ten years ago, that would become the thing I spent most of my life on for the next 10 years, and counting. Scanning my cards! In 2009, I had sorted out my NASCAR card collection from set to by person, and entered what I had of each person into an Excel chart, which I have discussed many times in the past. Well, my scanner, ever present on my table next to my computer, was of course right there so I thought to myself, "I wonder how scanning cards would work?" It worked well, and this was the first card I ever scanned:

This is the factory set special insert in the 1995 Hi-Tech 1994 Brickyard 400 set, which is embossed gold foil on both sides. Since it scanned pretty well, I decided that I would do everything else! The only way I know now what day that was, is because I instantly created an album for my card collection- at that time, one album for everything- and uploaded it on my website. Luckily, my website, which I've maintained since 2004, automatically provides the upload date of each image (and for photos, the date taken as well, if you have the camera settings correct)  At that time, I was doing only card fronts, and I did not always do a very good job, a combination of it being "close enough" to the fact that I had not yet discovered PhotoScape, which means I couldn't properly fix each scan. Since I was doing the fronts only, and since I was not putting much effort into them, I got the fronts done by early 2010, but I did such a poor job that I've been debating just starting over from scratch with them, holding off mostly because I did them on my original scanner, which was the highest quality. Since I got a new scanner, perhaps of even higher quality, in February, I may end up rescanning them instead of trying to fix my crappy early scans. I am going to work on what does not have any scans first.

And that's what the contest is about. I'm well past halfway on the scanning...I would say at least 3/4ths, maybe further, along. Keeping in mind that I originally estimated that I would finish scanning everything in 2016, and that obviously didn't happen, my current estimation is that I will finish in 2021.

Here's the contest: Guess what day I will finish scanning everything, and be "caught up" for the first time ever. Guess a specific day, and just for fun (not part of the contest, will not increase your chances of winning) guess what topic the card that ends up last is. (basically, which sport, or do you think it will be non-sport, or multi-sport or...? I have a little bit of everything left needing scans, from vintage to modern). The Caught Up Date that determines the contest winner PROBABLY doesn't reflect the NASCAR cards that I did the fronts poorly on. If I do everything else, and finish my "To-be-Scanned" boxes, that will count as the end of the project. If I get on a NASCAR and Non-Sports kick (they need to have the backs done as well) and do them BEFORE I finish my To-be-scanned boxes, then it WILL impact when I finish because the time spent on them will take away time from working on the To-Be-Sorted boxes that the contest is based on. While I'm always working on "something" with cards, I have the attention span of a squirrel so who knows what I will work on when? Even I don't know.

Whoever comes the closest, by number of days away (either direction) will win...something. I don't know what yet. I'll tailor it to whoever wins. You can feel free to promote it if you want to, but it's not going to help your chances of winning, it's one entry per person, whoever gets closest wins, end of story. (I maintain the right to disqualify anyone for any reason, but I don't forsee having to do that)

Now, like some of my other contests, this is a long-running contest. I guarantee you this won't come to fruition in 2019. I can almost guarantee it won't be 2020 either, but I can't guarantee it fully, so if you want to risk it, go ahead. I mean, if I really get going, and my health doesn't act up, I can scan 300 cards in a day. It's rare, but not unheard of.

Any cards that arrive to me- either by trade, gift or I go out and purchase them, are going to be mixed into the stash so even I cannot predict what/when it will truly be yet...and since I predicted 2016 originally, my predictions are maybe not the most reliable anyway, lol.

Pooped a Winner!

A few weeks back Paul over at Scribbled Ink ran a contest, and I won...in the most unique way possible! Make sure you watch the video to see exactly what I'm talking about...I've never been pooped a winner before, nor have I ever won any poop, in this case, I did. Dinosaur poop! Literally!
(borrowing Paul's picture here)

That is, by far, the most unique thing I've ever won. I mean that. Ever, in my life!

It wasn't all coprolite, there were cards as well. Lots and lots of cards! The first thing I saw when I opened the box was some really, really large hockey cards-

Two each from the Oilers and Flames team sets, and three of the postcard sized Canadiens set. The Flames cards are now the tallest cards in my collection, I think- they come in at 8  & 1/2 inches tall by 3 & 3/4th inches wide! The Oilers cards are also quite large but "only" 6 & 3/4ths by 3 & 3/4ths. I don't know the year they are from, unfortunately.

Standard sized cards were plenty as well, and covered a little bit of everything. All 5 major sports, plus soccer, are represented, although not a lot of the NBA was stuff I needed- there were some. Non-Sports probably saw the biggest boost for me, with 168 of 341 total new cards being of the Non-Sport variety, some of the sets I have not added to in many years- Several cards from the Topps Batman Returns set were in the box, and I had not gotten a new one of them since the set was new- 1992! That's 27 years between additions to a set, which I believe is a new record for me, not counting sets I've completed of course, because for them there's nothing more to add. The Spider-Man 30th Anniversary and Wolverine From then 'til Now II Set also had not seen any additions in many years- both sets were issued in 1992 but I'm not sure if I got them then. I did not begin to keep records of when I got any cards until 1998, and those were long present by then, so I would guess they were new when I got them.

The Comic Images Ghost Rider set was totally new to my collection, I now have 59 of 80 cards, or 73.8%!
I added a bunch of new sets to my collection, in addition to the three promos above:

1. 2012 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Decade of Supermodels (Non-Sport)
2. 2010 Topps National Chicle (Baseball)
3. 2018 Panini The National (Multi-Sport)
4. 2010 Donruss Elite Extra Edition (baseball)
5. 2005 Reflections (Football)
6. 2002-03 Upper Deck Vintage (NHL)
7. 1992 Ghost Rider II (Non-Sports) 
8. 1993 The Valiant Era (Non-Sports)
9. 1992 Savage Dragon (Non-Sports)
10. 1993 WildC.A.T.S. (Non-Sports)
11. 1993 Comics Future Stars (Non-Sports)
12. 1994 Upper Deck World Cup '94 (Soccer)
13. 1994 Coca Cola Monsters of the Gridiron (Football)
14. 1993 The Lion King (Non-Sports) [how did I not have any from this set? It came out in the time period where non-sports was my main focus, and I saw the movie several times when new, but not in years now]
15. 1995 Upper Deck Gridiron Fantasy Football (a trading card game)
16. 2002 Topps American Pie (non-Sport, some people list as baseball)
17. 2018 Certified (Football)

Did I mention there were some hits, too?

Here's just some random cool cards I happened to get scanned before I felt guilty for not posting this fast enough and just published as is...I told Paul I would get this published in January, and you see what day it is now, so...

 These O-Pee-Chee 25th Anniversary Series reprints from 1992-93 are cool. I am not sure what they are celebrating, as O-Pee-Chee was well over 25 years old at that point, but I'm not going to complain.

 I've been collecting these 1995 AMT cards since 1999 and he managed to find one I didn't have!

 This came with a diecast that looked a whole lot like the image.

A hockey insert that needed a scan on the Database. It's holofoil.

My Favorite card of 2018

Unlike some years, this one was pretty easy. I didn't really mention it until recently, on the Trading Card Database, but 2018 was the year of hockey. OK, last year was too, but this year, Hockey became #1. The NHL has surpassed the NBA and NASCAR for #1 in my interest list. (and it will soon surpass it in number of different people in my collection as well, update on that soon, probably next week.)

And for hockey, it all started with the Golden Knights. As you may recall, I got into hockey because I wanted to see what the new logo was, after seeing a thread discussing it (but not showing it) on the Trading Card Database. I put on NHL Network to see, and by the end of On the Fly (which was repeating the next morning, around 8AM based on my posts on the Database) I was hooked on the sport. Hockey has been a part of every single day of my life since then, and it's increasing in importance all the time. That, however, was November 2016. The Golden Knights debuted in the 2017-18 season, and it was magical. There are some teams that are just "special"- and that team was one of them. As an expansion team, they succeeded beyond anyone's expectations, including their own, and got all the way to the Stanley Cup finals! They were not able to win it all, but before the season began, the stated goal was to make it to the Finals within 6 years. Mission accomplished!

Even though they are not doing as well this year, they are still one of my favorite teams in all of sports (even though the Rangers actually are my #1 team, they got that spot during the final few months of the 2016-17 season before the Golden Knights began playing), and if they had won the Cup last year, I am pretty sure it would have been the greatest sports moment of my life, not something I say lightly as this is my 32nd year of being a sports fan.

My favorite card is from the 50 card boxed set that Upper Deck released to honor their first season.

It's #48 in the 50 card set, and shows not only most of the team celebrating, it also shows their mascot, and cheerleaders. I just noticed when making this post, even though I've seen the card dozens of times, in hand and on my computer- it's a UER. Upper Deck dated it 2019!

With all that said, if I had been able to get the promo card of Gritty that Upper Deck was giving away at the Expo, that probably would have been my card of the year. But, unfortunately, I have been unable to get a copy.

Don't forget to post your favorite card of the year. P-Town Tom is holding his now annual contest and it always brings out some great cards.

100,000 Card Prediction Contest

Let's have a little fun with a contest that I don't actually know what it will take to win...yet.

On Saturday, May 12th, I hit my 90,000th unique NBA card. It's taken me 22 years to reach that mark. but my collection is pretty much my guiding force in life. I don't plan to ever stop collecting, and I know when I hit 100,000 I am planning a big giveaway/contest. (Speculatively, 1000 cards will be the prize, but I may think of something better by time we actually get there).

So here's how to win:

Predict WHEN I will hit 100,000. That's still a long way away as I am at "only" 90,030 as I type this. It will NOT be this year, unless I win the lottery. Give me more than just a year, I need day and month to determine who comes closest.

To break ties, here's some more things to predict:

1. Which TEAM will the 100,000th card be?
2. Which PLAYER will be the 100,000th card? Since this is still a ways off, "Not Yet in the NBA" is a valid option
3. Which SEASON will the 100,000th card be from? I am all over the map, collecting the entire history of the NBA, so there's no guarantee it will be a new card at the time.

Some boilerplate:
Entries MUST be a reply to this post. I'm not going to be able to find them when I hit the 100,000 mark if you post them to me on Twitter, Facebook, the Trading Card Database, etc. I will be putting in a special Label/tag to make this easy to find.

I reserve the right to disqualify anyone for any reason, although that doesn't seem likely.

If you want to send me a bunch of cards to move the process along, I won't complain 😃

ONLY NBA cards count. Not anything else I collect, this is solely NBA.  Duplicates do not count, either.

Entries will be accepted until I hit 95,000 cards, whenever that may be.

I'll make sure the winner gets a great prize. I have no idea yet what it will be, but I have time to determine it.

Promoting it on your blog or twitter or whatnot will NOT get you any bonus chances, Sorry, but it's going to be too hard to track that stuff whenever this milestone gets reached, but I certainly wouldn't stop you from doing that if you choose to. 

To give you a little hint to get started, so far in 2018 I've added 867 new NBA cards in the first 132 days of the year. So, do a little math, do a little guessing, whatever makes you happy. Just give me those guesses in the comments!

500th Post Contest Winner Reveal!

Thank you for everyone who entered my 500th post contest. 22 of you entered, and with the second and third chance opportunities I offered, it brought it up to 48 eligible entrants. That's a pretty good turnout! It only bumped my "followers" up to 45, but I'm glad you're reading me.

I want to say thank you for the nice comments as well...it really made my day to read them. It makes me especially glad I started this whole thing back in 2014.

OK, now, I have the list of entrants, it's time to go to Random.org and make some random person get some random cards they may randomly need. Yes, I tried to see how many times I could get the word "random" into one sentence!


I adjust the final number of entrants, hit the button and the winner is....

Not sure how the video is going to come out, I've never tried to record my computer screen before, or upload a video directly to the blogger format. I probably should have dusted the screen first...

#10, Matt Keppel!

Congratulations Matt! Since I have your address already, since we just traded last week, I should be able to get the package out to you this week, once I make it up. Couldn't do that until I knew who the winner was, of course.

Thank you again to everyone who entered...I'd really like to send you ALL something, but the postage on that means I can't do it right now...not after having some unexpected medical expenses come up recently.

I enjoy giving back, and plan to do more contests in the future...stay tuned because there will be more chances to win cards at a later date. Thanks again!

500th Post Contest - win free cards!

This is my 500th post. Quite a milestone! I didn't know if anyone would read this when I started, or if I'd just be shouting into the wind. As it turned out, you all have been reading what I have to say...a lot. I've had a post cross the 1000 view mark and I average about 120 views in the first week of posting a post, although probably about 20 of them are me refreshing to see if there are new comments or a new update to the blogroll, LOL. You seem to actually like reading my work, and I thank you.

So, it's time to give back. Comment on this post if you want to win some cards. If you want Basketball, NASCAR or NHL, I will stuff as much as I can fit into one of the small "If it fits, it ships" boxes and send it off to you. I don't have enough baseball or football or non-sports to do that with, but I can still come up with something to send you, although it's going to be early 90s heavy, because it's what I've got. If you select those two sports, you'll probably get a bubble mailer. Non-sports could go either way, depending on what I can come up with. You can also select Olympics as I have some duplicates available there, too.

You can also select a mixer of various subjects. I have a lot of duplicates that could bear to go into a new home. I probably won't be able to tailor it to your collections, because if you supercollect a team there's a good chance I've already sent you what I have available, in the NBA especially.

To win the cards: Comment on the post, telling me which kind of card you would like to claim.
Since giving extra chances to win is a pretty popular thing to do on the blogosphere, I will give you two bonus chances as well. If you follow my blog, you get a bonus chance. It's just that simple. See the screencap below. Your second bonus chance: Leave me your username on the Trading Card Database. This is a not-so-subtle push to those of you who are not using the very best card website in the history of the internet to start using it, and those of you who already are, I probably know your username already but put it in the comment anyway just to make it easier for me to see who needs to get more than one name on the list. Remember, Cardboard History would not exist without the Database.

That means you can get 3 chances to win. I'll do the standard random.org randomizer to determine the winner, unless only one person enters.

Click the blue follow box for a bonus chance to win!

You can win if you do not live in the USA- I will ship internationally! I reserve the right to give out bonus prizes, but due to unexpected medical expenses I can only expect to afford to ship ONE package so there will be only one winner...this time. I have some ideas for future contests that might be fun, but I will save them for the future. I also reserve the right to disqualify anyone, not that I expect to but I should put it up just in case.

Thank you for reading, and thank you for leaving me comments throughout the years. I don't plan to stop posting anytime soon, so onto the next 500!  You have until the end of February to enter. Any comments datestamped this month count. any made in March don't. That gives you five days.  Good luck, and may the randomizer be with you!

100th Post Giveaway Contest! Free NBA cards! (and an anniversary message)

This is my 100th post on Cardboard History. I'm not even at the 1 year mark yet so that is a victory to me. I have some issues with follow through so to have been able to keep it going this long, I kind of surprised myself. And I have so many more things I want to post, so I should be able to keep this going for a decade or more. (Hopefully!)

Since it is my 100th post, let's do a small giveaway. Comment on this post for a chance to win a small padded mailer full of NBA cards, taken from my duplicate stash that's not yet posted onto my tradelist on the Database. Will be a mixture of things ranging in age from early 1990s to 2014-15.

Simply comment to enter. I will use random.org to pick the winner's number and I will let that winner know so they can get me their address. You have until Thursday night to enter. I can only mail on Saturdays since our Jeep is essentially dead, have to borrow a car to get to the post office. Open to all- I will ship internationally - and following the blog is not necessary but would be appreciated. 

=================================================================

And now, the anniversary. I realized today that this past Sunday, my birthday, was the 10 year anniversary of when my brother gave me my first scanner! That was the best one I ever had, but my new computer does not recognize it. I can still use it, but it involves getting my old computer out, which barely works at all. I basically save it for when I  have to scan slides and negatives, which  neither of my other two scanners can do.
The very first thing I scanned with my first scanner was in fact a card...however, I had it too close to the edge and cut part of it off.
This was the very first scan I ever made-

You can see how I cut the point off the card. I had to rescan it, shown below. The second version of the scan had it's colors overadjusted. I hadn't quite gotten it perfect yet when I did the majority of my NASCAR collection.

The reason this became Scan #1? It was simply on top of the pile of cards that I had just gotten recently...possibly earlier that day, I no longer remember, and don't feel like getting my collection book out to check (lol). I have no idea how many scans I've made since then...I know by time my first computer (mostly) died it was over 20,000 and I have not slowed down over the past two computers...I average about 15-25 a day!