Derek Jeter saves the day (Tales from the card show)

I'm still unemployed as of this writing, and while I've been able to live relatively comfortably off my savings, I've forced myself to cut out the more extravagant purchases lately (i.e. cards).

It's hard to justify dropping a good amount of cash at a card show without a job. But for the second time already this year, a card I kind of lucked into ended up taking me to a show on house money. After some hemming and hawing, I decided to sell the 1993 SP Derek Jeter rookie I inherited from one of my dad's friends last year -- a sale which funded the entire hotel card show I attended this past Sunday with a good chunk of change left over.

And if you're making me choose between a Jeets rookie and a card show, well...I'll take the card show.

As I've mentioned many times before, I love hotel shows like this one because they're pretty much my idea of what a utopian card space should look like.

Many of the vendors at this show do have a bit of The Prospector in them, but they're not overly boisterous about it. It's a special place where all forms of collectors can live in quiet harmony (and as an introvert, I like my quiet). Plus, unlike the bigger shows I attend, the dealers here have some of the more affordable cards of big prospects on hand, which is good because I've started collecting a few of the game's bright young stars as of late.

I paid just a single dollar for my very first Gleyber Torres card, and $5 for the Ohtani (probably an overpay, but oh well), and thus the very small Prospector in me was satisfied.

I can always rely on this show to take care of a bunch of recent needs, as was the case once again this past Sunday.

The only bummer of the day was the fact that stupid ol' me left the stack of Series 2 singles I bought from a vendor at the guy's table (which were set to pretty much take care of my remaining needs from the set), a mental glitch which I didn't notice until I arrived home hours later. Drat!

(I also crossed out most of my 2018 Stadium Club needs, but we'll discuss those in a separate post.)

I still like these Salute inserts, if for no other reason than they feature a hefty amount of awesome throwbacks like these (a quarter a pop aside from the Kluber gold parallel, which was a buck).

Quick Dime Box PSA: I now collect Didi Gregorius, so please keep me in mind should you happen to come across anything of his.

Minis!

Sparkles!

A couple fine spoils from the limited amount of quarter-box digging I undertook on Sunday.

Some of my "high-end" pickups of the day (aka dollar-box finds).

Probably the lone detractor of this show is the fact that it doesn't usually rate high on the sheer randomness factor, which isn't a huge deal since I learned long ago not to expect as much from the vendors there.

But wouldn't you know it, one of the guys this time around had exactly that: a wonderfully random dime box, packed with gems of all eras like the four you see above. It turned out to be a fun respite from the gobs and gobs of latest-and-greatest cardboard I dug through on Sunday (which can get tedious after a while).

And in terms of sheer aesthetic pleasure, I have to say that Drysdale is one of my favorite dime box finds in recent memory (a card that elicited a verbal WOW when I found it).

There isn't much vintage at this show either, but I did manage to rescue these beauties (which I somehow didn't already own) from that glorious dime box.

Horizontal wonders.

Just when you think you've seen it all, along comes these weird cardboard mashups of Bo Jackson and Bart Simpson (does it get any more '90s?!).

And just when you really think you've seen it all, along comes a card of some dude throwing out a first pitch with a roll of toilet paper and another card of...a toilet.

Let me repeat that: I now own a baseball card of a toilet.

As the aforementioned Bart Simpson and latrine cameos might indicate, the oddballs were strong with this random dime box.

These are just a handful of the wonderful oddities I dug up for dimes, with some particular favorites being the Canseco Japanese Free Agent Draft(?) and the Mother's Mr. Padre (I can probably count on one hand the number of times I've found Mother's Cookies cards here in the Midwest).

Also, do us all a favor and listen to Bo: Turn Your Back on Crack.

Also among the oddball goodies was the unopened pack of 1994 Yoo-Hoos I found from one guy's dollar box, although with the deal he ended up giving me it was basically free.

Clemente, Ryno, (I'm) Keith Hernandez...think I picked a pretty good pack here.

As the hours waned and many of the vendors began to pack up, I closed out the day with perhaps the supreme Dime Box Thrill of them all: a photo-variation SP (of a guy I collect, no less!).

While I enjoyed being able to say I owned a '93 SP Jeter rookie for about a year there, I have to say that I'm much more content with the cards and experience this most recent trip to the hotel card show provided me. No contest.

Thanks, Jeets.