2025 Collecting Goals and trip to K n T Sportscards

 Last year, I posted some collecting goals. I figure now would be a good time to see how I did. I’m going to try to do this quick. 

Little goals accomplished:

Complete a 1990’s Topps run- I did when I acquired a 1996 Topps John Mabry in a trade. 

Finish my 2002 Topps set- This is technically complete, but some of the cards are in my SportsLots box. 

Finish my 2021 Topps Update set- As I guessed in the goals post last year, the last card I needed was indeed sitting in a Phillies team box. 

Big goals accomplished:

Complete an ‘80’s Topps run- Another one technically completed and just needing to have SportsLots cards shipped

Put all of my cards into TCDB- All of my baseball cards are in. Random non-baseball cards in baseball sets like Allen & Ginter ones, random sets like Topps American Heritage, and stuff like that aren’t, although if I have some free time and need trade bait, it could be worthwhile. 

Big goal not accomplished- Put all of my cards into binders. This was not possible due to the sheer number of complete sets I’ve purchased towards the end of the year, but I have put most of my newer cards in all of my binders besides the Padres, Giants, Expos/Nationals, and most of the AL teams. Not bad, just considering the enormous task it was. 

I even accomplished a life goal of having some of my music published on a CD and out on iTunes, although it wasn’t quite how I envisioned it. In the fall, the comedy band my brother in law and I started called ‘The Younger Griffin’ released our first CD, a collections of songs with our collective original lyrics and music done by AI. While I really wanted my original music published to the song, ‘Liberate the Penguins’ is written entirely by myself, with other songs ‘Credit Misery’, ‘Soccer is Death’, and ‘Megan still doesn’t answer her Phone’ having some lyrics by me. Still, not too shabby. I also got a pineapple to bloom, the Bankee$ lost the World Series, and the Criminal Tide just got their 4th lost of the year today!!!  

Goals for this year are just going to be listed as Card Goals and Personal ones. 

Card Goals

Complete a set from the 1970’s. 

Get my Topps runs of 1980-2002 and 2019-2025 closer to being connected by finishing a set like 2003 and 2018. 

Complete a Rays parallel set.

Personal Goals

Get the mesh surgery with Karen done and have it work. This will open up so many doors in my life. She won’t have to worry about having to breathe doing mundane tasks. No worries about having to cancel plans. Less responsibility for me around the house. Hopefully not having to rely on her mom for things. This will help me out tremendously with number two. 

Get her Mom to move out or have our credit improve so we can  move out ourselves. I don’t care. Just something to separate us so she’s not constantly in my personal bubble, trying to make conversation, or creating mess. 9 months are damn long enough. 

Get going to some doctors again. My therapist ended up quitting, and I haven’t got around to making another appointment. I also missed one with my endocrinologist when Karen had her last surgery, and I just haven’t got around to making another one. I’m hoping with the holidays being done that I can just settle into a routine and get better at mundane things like calling people to schedule appointments. 

I feel like if Karen can get her health better and cut the cord with her mom that everything else will settle into place. We can probably take a good vacation and not worry about having to make it short in case of breathing problems, and a vacation means a good chance at a ballgame, perhaps a new stadium. There’s a chance I could record some music this year, and that big custom card project is finished, just waiting for final word on the product it goes with. 2025 has the potential for some great things. Might even be enough for me to not really even care if my boss stays another year. We’ll see. 

Before 2024 ends, I was able to get some new cards. I managed to go up to Ormond Beach after work yesterday and stopped by K n T Sportscards. I had left my wantlist folder there a couple weeks ago, and John from Johnny’s Trading Spot was going to pick it up when he was scheduled to swing by. He ended up not making it down there, but called the shop, and let me know that they had it. They had it when I got there. 

My plan was to spend an hour or so going through dime boxes, but some teenaged flipper brah’s were hogging the area. One of them had a briefcase, and I wondered why they would even be in the area. The place was busy, and a variety of people were there. Some guy who had apparently driven from St. Louis was there loading dollar boxes into his van. He had a buddy who must’ve recognized him but was from a different area talking to him. There was also a family there who flew into town from Soutb Africa. They were there for baseball cards, and said that most people from South Africa follow soccer. 

I ended up looking through the dollar team boxes until the brah’s left. They had a few good cards, not much different selection from the last time I was there. I found a few cards to go into some blogger care packages hopefully this month. I went through 1 or 2 dime boxes, picking up most Tigers, Rays, and players I collect that I saw, since I figured they would be basically free. I spent a few minutes going through the 2-5 dollar boxes, and found 2 Rays autos for 2 bucks. I think I had about 30 bucks of cards plus the dime ones, and I paid 20. I got home, and we ended up going to Wal-Mart, and while there, I picked up another Topps Holiday ball thing. 

The Holiday ball had some nice cards. Out of 2 Holiday balls and a blaster, I managed to pull 3 Skenes cards, 2 De La Cruz cards and 1 blue parallel, and a Merrill base and metallic. If I didn’t have so many doubles, I’d be tempted to get more. 

The rest of the basic team cards. 

I found a number of guys I collect at K n T’s. A number of Lakeland guys in fact, with Sale, Taillon, and Yarbrough. I almost complete the 2022 Bowman Platinum Prospects Ice parallel Rays set, and am only missing the guy on the bottom left, Kyle Manzardo. The Zunino Chrome Platinum auto was one of the 2 dollar autographs I got. I’m a Wily Adames autograph away from having most of the autographs of key guys from the 2020 AL Champion team.  

The Rays were nice ones. A few refractors, an Xavier Isaac rookie (people on Rays boards are always high on him and Caminero. I hope they’re right), and a Heritage SP of Mejia. I found a Torkelson rookie for the Tigers, and both Riley Greene Chrome rookies. 

The rookies hit hard in the Holiday ball. Another Junior, the Skenes and De La Cruz from earlier, and the Merrill metallic one. Also had a Henderson Santa hat SP. Not shown is an AJ Smith-Shawver Blue metallic card I had set aside for John. 

We’ll see if I can accomplish my collecting and life goals for 2025. I’m going to bed, and am going to have a great first day of 2025, as I will be working on the slowest day of the year, and might go on a date with Karen that night, which could lead to a Target run with more cards, and who knows what else. We’re both off the next day, so 2025 should start off nice. 

Happy 2025, and thanks for taking the time to check out my latest post. 

-Jeremy