Saturday, November 24, 2018

Black Friday Building and Busting

Oh man... a lot of stuff has gone down this week.  My brother and I went down to visit my parents in Vegas for a few days.  This was my fifth or sixth trip down there since my mother broke her hip last Christmas and it was really nice to see her moving around with her walker.  After nearly a year, her doctor finally signed her up for physical therapy and it has truly worked wonders for her morale and energy level.  It has also made life a little easier for my father who has been her righthand man.

The trip down to Vegas gave my father a chance to catch his breathe and recharge his batteries, while allowing my brother and I the opportunity to bond and take care of the woman who has always been there for us.

When I came home on Thursday night, there were three packages waiting for me on my dining room table.

One of them contained contained this Lego set:

Lego Architecture #21047

When I first heard about this set, I knew I wanted itFrom what I had seen in reviews, Lego did a really great job of capturing the Las Vegas skyline.  Then Amazon had this set on sale a few weeks ago for 20% off ($31.99), so I snatched it up.

It took me a little over two hours to build, but I'm not exactly an expert builder.  The building process involved a lot of repetition and tons of tiny pieces, but overall I thought it was very therapeutic.

Here's a look at the finished product:


Starting from the left, you'll notice the iconic Las Vegas sign, Bellagio and their famous water fountains, Luxor's pyramid and Sphinx, Wynn Casino and Resort, Stratosphere, and finally... the Fremont Street Experience.

The second package contained a new card for my left-handed Cy Young Award winners collection, but I'm going to save that for another post.

Last, but certainly not least was a package from Marc over at Remember the Astrodome.  He had reached out to me and mentioned he had built a nice stack of A's for my collection.  He wasn't lying.

He sent a bunch of base cards:


Outside of few blasters here and there, I don't really open too many new products like Topps Fire.  It's care packages like these that allow me to add singles I probably wouldn't acquire otherwise.

There was also a nice stack of parallels, inserts, and oddballs mixed in:


I will never turn down mid 90's Stadium Club parallels or album stickers.  And the final card in Marc's package was this autographed rookie card of Dustin Fowler:


Fowler might be the future centerfielder and leadoff man for the Athletics.  Only time will tell.

Thank you Marc for this generous care package.  I'll definitely hit you back with some Astros for your collection.  My goal is to ship out care packages in time for the holidays.


In the meantime... you've been added to the hit list.

Happy Saturday and sayonara!

14 comments:

Jon said...

It's good to hear that your mom is doing better, and it's nice that you were able to go visit her for a couple of days. And I'm not really much of a Lego guy, with that being said, that Las Vegas set does look pretty darn cool!

night owl said...

You don't owe me anything.

I know exactly what you're going through, I have the same story, except my mom has memory issues to go along with her problems walking. It's a major workload on my dad and we travel down to help when we can but you know how that goes when you have a family of your own. I hope she shows the progress your mom did.

Commishbob said...

Glad to hear your Mom is improving. My wife spends about 50% of her time dealing with her very elderly parents. It's a tough go for sure.

I've never really looked at one of those fancy Lego kits. Pretty cool.

Matt said...

I will be on the HIt List soon I have a PWE headed your way :)

The Snorting Bull said...

I see a Fernando Valenzuela Cardinals card in there. Very cool.

Adam Kaningher said...

Lego Architecture sets are pretty fun. Lots of tiny pieces.

Paul Hadsall said...

I'm glad to hear that your mom is doing better.

Lego architecture sets have never been on my radar, but the Vegas set does look pretty cool there.

SumoMenkoMan said...

I love the LEGO architecture sets. I’m excited to see what they continue to bring in the future. Nice care package!

Big Tone said...

My daughter has the NYC skyline.It looks cool but the statue of liberty is just a tiny little brick,lol.It would have been cool if it were sculpted.

sg488 said...

Great Lego item,glad to hear Mama Fuji is doing better.

Community Gum said...

I'm happy your mother is doing better, and that you get the opportunity to go down there often enough. My friend spent every weekend going back home to take turns caring for his mom. It can be a rough situation that no one envies.

J. Meeks said...

Glad to hear your mother is doing better! I received the US Capitol Building LEGO Architecture set last year for Christmas, but I haven’t put it together yet (I’ve been moving and haven’t settled just yet). I’m pretty excited to build it.

Fuji said...

jon - thanks. wish i could go down on a more regular basis. as for the lego set, it was very pleased with the way it turned out.

night owl - lol. good to know i don't OWE you anything. i'll still be sending a few sabres your way. as much as my parents prepared me for the real world, i don't remember them preparing me to see them struggle with age. but it's lead to some great discussions with my students about giving back to your parents.

commishbob - the toughest part outside of getting my butt down there is watching her struggle. truly hurts the heart. that being said... my mom was moving around much more last week and with a big smile on her face.

sport card collectors - i'll keep my eyes peeled.

snorting bull - i meant to actually single out that card, because i don't even remember him pitching for the cardinals.

adam kaningher - it was a little overwhelming in the beginning. i kept worrying that i was going to lose pieces. by the end... there were a bunch of pieces leftover.

paul hadsall - lego architecture is my 2nd favorite product line. star wars is my first.

sumomenkoman - me too. it's pretty amazing what they've created so far. i'm hoping they create the golden gate bridge at some point.

big tone - lego set #21042 is a detailed statue of liberty set. i'd love to build that one day.

sg488 - thanks. hopefully she continues to improve. looking forward to her visit over the holidays.

community gum - yeah. my siblings and i are trying to work out the details, since the three boys live in the bay area... my sister is in scottsdale... and my parents are in vegas. hopefully we'll figure something out soon.

j meeks - the capitol building is another set i'd love to build. it's right up there with the statue of liberty. when you end up building it, i'd love to know how long it takes.

Bru said...

Phew. Finally getting around to catching up on some blogs. Glad you enjoyed the cards! It feels good to finally send you something after having been a reader for so long.

Also, as a mild architecture nerd I love the Lego sets. I'd love to have the room and time to build some of them - and maybe even tackle some non-official builds.