Tuesday, October 24, 2023

Fever, Chills, Loss of Smell, and a Mysterious Pin


Packages are piled up in my office.  Some of them are online purchases.  Others are care packages fellow bloggers and friends have sent my way.  Hopefully none of these people are offended that I haven't opened up their generous gifts.

As many of you know... lately... I've been a little distracted with the recent passing of my father.  My immune system must have been low, because a few days later I had my first run-in with Covid.  Holy cow... this virus completely knocked me out for four days.  Fever, chills, headaches, stuffy head, an earache, loss of smell and taste, body aches, and a really nasty cough pretty much summarizes my personal experience with the infectious disease.

Thankfully... every day since Saturday has been a little better.  As I laid in bed this morning, I decided to read all of the thoughtful comments people left on my previous post.  They brought a smile to my face and tears to my eyes.  Thank you for those very kind words.

Getting back to those packages... I'd love to sit down, rip open, and organize all of the cards awaiting me in those boxes, bubble mailers, and PWE's.  I have the time (that's something you probably won't read on this blog again anytime soon), but not the energy.  My district says I can't go back into my classroom until Thursday, but I might be out the whole week.  I'm still very fatigued and pretty sure my students and colleagues wouldn't appreciate my obnoxious cough.

I did open up one package before climbing back into bed.  It wasn't chosen by random.  It was something I purchased the morning my father passed awayPapa Fuji wasn't a huge baseball fan.  He didn't really watch the sport growing up on the pineapple fields and by the time he came to the mainland... it just wasn't his thing.

However after doing some research a while back, I discovered a hall of fame catcher for the Athletics hit a home run on the day he was born.  I immediately checked online to see if he had any cards issued from my father's birth year.  Outside of a single and seemingly rare Exhibit card, I came up empty-handed.  I did find a pin depicting him produced by a gum company and ironically... there was an auction ending the same morning he passed away.

Here's the latest addition to my A's PC and an item that will forever be linked to my father:

1932 Orbit Gum Pins #28

Sadly there isn't a lot of information out there on these pinsDoes anyone know the story behind these?  How they were distributed?

By the way... I'm gonna start working on another blog post to address the state of the blog.  Hopefully I'll publish it this week.  We'll see how things play out with my health, work, and family stuff.

Until then... thanks again for all of the considerate and kind comments everyone wrote on my last post.  Just one more reason I'm grateful for this card community, the hobby, and this blog.

Happy Tuesday and sayonara!

17 comments:

Nachos Grande said...

I hope you continue to feel better!

Billy Kingsley said...

Oh man, sorry to hear that hit you and right then especially. Hopefully you feel better soon.

Johnnys Trading Spot said...

Get well my friend. Plenty of rest and fluids. By week's end you're gonna want some tacos or burritos, or wings, heck even Mickey d's. :)

Rod (Padrographs) said...

Mickey Cochrane for whom Mickey Mantle was named.

Zippy Zappy said...

Hope you feel better soon, as someone who's had COVID at least once it's definitely not fun. Take all of the time you need to heal both physically and emotionally.

Anonymous said...

Covid cough was the worst for me as well. Dr prescribed some kind of cough meds that numbed my throat (not sure if right terms) and it cut it down some. Covid hit me hard both times I had it but fortunately I think the vaccine has prevented any other bad case.

Hope you feel better soon and sounds like you need some rest. I need to read your last post apparently as well as I missed it.

Take care friend
Matt-CardsOverCoffee

Bo said...

That Cochrane pin is fantastic.

My dad is a few years younger than yours, was born during DiMaggio's hitting streak. I think there are some cards that commemorate each day of the streak, I should look up the ones on his birthday.

Get well soon!

CaptKirk42 said...

Ouch sorry to hear about the COVID hit. Glad to hear you seem to be improving daily. I have been fortunate enough to avoid getting hit by it's nastyness. I have had some colds and fits of coughing but not the big C. I am one of the few I guess, thank goodness.

Matt said...

Getting COVID sucks. I'm glad you are on the mend and hope that you make a full recovery very soon.

Derek said...

Get well soon! You have a healthy prescription of packages to help you out

SumoMenkoMan said...

Get well soon and cool pin with a great tie back to PapaFuji!

The Snorting Bull said...

That's a sweet pin! I hope you feel better soon.

AdamE said...

I hope you get to feeling better.

The Standard says your Orbit is a PR2. Orbit made some of these pins unnumbered and they are designated PR3. The PR2s are numbered to 40 then skip numbered to 120. Unfortunately all it says is they were produced by Orbit Gum but doesn't say how they were distributed. I'm going to guess they were in gumball machines and you either got a gumball or pin when you put your money in a machine but that is totally a guess.

Jon said...

I'm really late, but I hope that you're back to your normal plucky self by now.

Jafronius said...

Wow you made it a real long time before succumbing to The Virus. Hope you're all healed up by now!

Johnnys Trading Spot said...

A: I am hoping you are over Covid by now.
B: I need you to send me that list of 92 Leaf Black Gold cards that you need, I found another stack of them.

Big Tone said...

Get better, bro!