Life is full of unexpected expenses and surprises. Last month it was repairing my AC unit. Yesterday it was replacing the alternator in my daily driver. Oh man... what an adventure.
The story began on Thursday morning when I woke up early to hit up the Capitol Flea Market. I noticed a slight hesitation when I tried starting my car. It caught my attention, but didn't stop me from seeking treasures at my former favorite flea market. The issue occurred again at the flea market, so I went straight to O'Reilly Auto Parts. That's where I purchased my battery last summer. They said it was fine, but that the alternator was dead/dying. I immediately called my mechanic and he told me I could bring it in that day or tomorrow (Friday).
I was meeting up with some co-workers (we're all on spring break) for lunch on Friday, so I made plans to have my friend pick me up from the shop (after I dropped off my car). We'd go to lunch and Trader Joe's, then she'd give me a ride home.
Unfortunately when I tried starting my car in the morning, the battery was dead. Normally my portable jump starter would easily fix this issue, but it came up short. AAA came to the rescue and got my car running. However before letting me drive off... they had me turn on everything in my car (fan, lights, radio, etc.) and run the car for five minutes. It lasted about three. In other words, I wasn't driving my car anywhere until the alternator was replaced.
AAA originally sent out a truck that specializes in "jump starts", so they had to send out another truck to take me to my mechanic. It was sort of embarrassing, because it sort of looked like my car was being repossessed.
Anyways to make an already long story... a little shorter... my mechanic installed a new alternator and had O'Reilly give me a new battery (it was under warranty). As expected... it wasn't a cheap adventure. Between that and the AC repair from early March... I had to dip into the rainy day fund. But that's life. It just means that I won't be making any large hobby purchases in the near future.
That's okay, because I have plenty of stuff to blog about... include some recent purchases I've made. One of them was a 1996 Pinnacle Mint coin starter set I bought off of Greg over at The Collective Mind:
1996 Pinnacle Mint Football Coin Starter Set
Last month he left a comment on one of my Flea Market Finds posts where I bought the John Elway coin from this set. We started exchanging some emails and he offered to send me what he had for free. With the rise in shipping costs, I couldn't accept this offer unless I could pay him a nominal price for the set and cover the shipping.
I'm pretty stoked to add these coins to my collection. I actually bought the 1997 and 1998 baseball coin sets back in 2023, but they didn't include this special coin display that Greg included.
He also tossed in a bunch of bonus material, some of which he mentioned in our emails. The one I was most excited about was this awesome Brett Favre coin:
1996 Pinnacle Mint Nickel Coin #NNO
This shiny silver coin is so cool. Pinnacle actually released a fine silver version of this coin, but you can easily tell them apart by looking at the back. On the fine silver coins, they stamped the words "fine silver" under the word "CLUB". According to this Beckett thread, both versions were inserted in packs. However the fine silver coins came with a COA card.
The Favre was paired up with this Heath Shuler:
1996 Pinnacle Mint Nickel Coin #NNO
Finally, he also sent me some cards for my PC's...
Here's the third and final Ginter card that Greg sent me:
2024 Topps A&G Mini Exclusive #394
When I first pulled this card out of Greg's mailer, I just assumed that this card was your standard Ginter mini. But in the process of writing this post, I discovered a very unexpected surprise. This card was originally inside of his Masyn Winn rip card.
I completely forgot that he had damaged this card when he removed it and that I offered to give Shota a loving home in my Damaged Card PC. What's even crazier is that I didn't even notice the damage and it's now sitting among the rest of my Imanaga cards.
Speaking of damaged, he also tossed in these miscut cards from the early 80's:
1981 Topps #472
1981 Topps #23
1981 Topps #323
These three look like they might have been lined up on the same sheet at one time. Now they're lined up in the miscut section of my Damaged Card PC binder.
Next up is another card Greg pulled from his 2024 Topps Allen & Ginter box breaks:
2024 Topps A&G Foil Filagree #201
Yamamoto was outdueled last night by Paul Skenes, but he still pitched really well and is having a pretty stellar season. This is a very nice addition to my collection.
2023 Topps A&G Spotless Spans #SS-28
This card celebrates Rickey's 84 stolen bases before the 1982 MLB All-Star Game which took place on July 13th. That's 84 stolen bases in 88 games. To put that into perspective, the last time anyone stole 84 or more bases in a single season was in 1988. The player? Yup. Rickey.
I don't remember this particular piece of baseball trivia, but there was a better than average chance that I attended at least a game or two when he swiped one of these 84 bases.
Oh and I almost forgot, here's another cool card from the 1996 Pinnacle Mint set that was part of this purchase:
1996 Pinnacle Mint Gold #9
I would have loved to pull this out of a pack back in the 90's. These gold parallels were inserted into packs at a rate of 1:48 packs (or 1:3 hobby boxes). This copy isn't in mint condition, but until I find an upgrade this card is going into my Brett Favre PC.
Thank you Greg for selling me the 1996 Pinnacle Mint Coin starter set and tossing in some really generous bonuses. I spent about an hour scrolling through your "want" pages... but didn't come up with anything yet. I'll start looking through your player collections next.
As for the rest of the people taking the time to read this post, I hope you encounter more unexpected and pleasant surprises in life than unexpected expenses.
Happy Saturday and sayonara!
15 comments:
Yuck, it's been awhile since I had a car "towing" adventure, though there was a time when it was pretty common for me. I've got some car repair needs in the near future and it's not going to be cheap.
Sorry to hear about the car troubles (and A/C), glad they're taken care of. But don't worry about that....:) Let's hope it's 5 years before anything else pops up. At least 5 years. :)
I was in that spot last year with my alternator and battery.
I really like those pinnacle mint items!
Not fun times. Car repairs, especially unexpected ones, are a real PITA. Nice additions to your collection there!
No need to be embarrassed about having the car towed. The only time the thought of a repo crosses my mind is when I see a very specific truck driving in my area. It has giant letters painted on all sides spelling out "GAME OVER."
Hopefully the worst of the car troubles are over. Life has a way of having all these things gang up on you at once so it becomes hard to sort and concentrate in the moment.
Happy Saturday and bummer to hear about all the crazy repairs. Glad you are able to supplement your hobby budget with some really cool value trades and purchases! Awesome!
I hope no students were around to document your car getting "repossessed!" But never fun to deal with that sort of thing. For me, it always happens at a bad time, although I guess there is never a good time. At least it was a fairly quick fix!
I feel you on the unexpected expenses. Our water heater died 2 days before Easter and we were hosting the family.
Nice cards from Greg!
That's a bummer about the car. Been there done that.
night owl - seems like car part prices escalated after the pandemic. hope the work you eventually need isn't too pricey.
johnnys trading spot - my mechanic already warned me that the 100k mile tuneup is gonna be expensive and that's probably a year away. but that's why i put money in my savings.
matt - the good news is we shouldn't have to worry about an alternator for a long time. the battery? that should last a few years too.
karsal - yeah. i'm just glad it happened over spring break. otherwise i would have also had to take a day off too :D
cardboredom - there's a side story to the "repo" thing. my neighbor was going to his car (before the aaa guy had put my car on the hauler) and he freaked out. he thought the guy had come to take his car. i ran over and explained he was going to be taking my car.
zippy zappy - they say it comes in threes, right? ugh. hope the third thing isn't a biggie.
sumomenkoman - it's part of life. having a blog to rant and complain helps :D
the lost collector - i hope so too. i actually have a student who lives in my area. i've run into her a couple of times. the crazy thing is i work about 10 miles away from my place and she's suppose to go to another school. but i told her i'd look the other way (not my business). anyways... there's a chance (probably really small, but a chance... that she saw).
jafronius - dang. sorry to hear that. i hope it didn't leak all over. when my last water heater broke, water was everywhere. now i have one of those drainage pans.
crocodile - yup. it's life. honestly... it could have been way, way worse.
Sorry to hear about your car, Fuji. At least it happened while you were off work for spring break. The added stress of if it would’ve happened while you still had to work is not ideal.
Those Pinnacle Mint coins were a cool idea to me back in the day, but I’ve never owned any. I should fix that.
As for Imanaga - nothing a little glue stick can't cure. :) I have those '11 Updates ready for round 2....
I remember buying packs of those Pinnacle Mint Football when they came out. I don't think I still have any tough, 99% of my football was traded off before I moved to AZ. I do not remember seeing the coin holder ever before though.
bryan - yeah... the alternator dying sucked, but it happened at the best moment possible. as for the coins, the good news is that the can be pretty affordable. good luck
gca - you did a great job! thanks again for selling me this starter set and tossing in all of these generous bonuses.
adame - i opened up some pinnacle mint back in the 90's too. i'd love to find a cheap box at the flea market to bust open. as for the holder... i wonder if it was one of those mail-in things.
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