A Little (Important) News and Little Helmets

Let's start with the news. It's a bit lengthy. Sorry about that.

First, I'm moving. It's not very far, but it very soon. At the end of the month, I'm moving to a different apartment around the corner from this first one. It's a bit of a long story but at least I'll get a slightly bigger place. And I think it's somewhat nicer too, though my current apartment has been at least decent for the past four years.

This means I've been boxing up stuff lately. That's mainly my souvenirs that are still loose. I'm photographing or scanning them all so that I can keep them packed safely. Even with a bigger place, there's no way I can display-store my souvenirs as I'd like. Besides, nobody who comes to my apartment wants to see them, I'm sure.

I owe some people (at least the Prowling Cat, if not more of you!) cards for trades, and there are some pending emails in my boxes. I'll address those next month. A couple of you have my current address in Japan, but please don't send anything to it!

Which brings me to my second piece of news. I'll be going back to the US for a week for my grandma's memorial service in February. She passed away about a month ago, I might manage to get to a card shop, but it sounds like things will be pretty busy, and there's no telling how exactly I'll be feeling anyway.

That said, I will be bringing my trade stacks with me to mail out next month. When I "pack" that shelf before moving, I'll take note of who I have stuff for and send out calls for addresses.

Also, many of you have a San Francisco address for me for trades. Please don't use the San Francisco address anymore - just go ahead and delete it from your listings if you keep such a thing. If you ever have something to send me let me know, and you can mail it to my mom's house in Georgia.

Over the next month, I'll be busy or just plain out of touch at times. I'm going to do my best to keep posts coming as much as possible, but don't be surprised if I go quiet again.

That said, here's today's fun!

Last week, I won an auction of four mini helmets, all autographed by players.

That's the Kyoto Flora women's baseball team. The helmets are the same size as those ice cream helmets from back in the day. Remember those? If someone did a team helmet ice cream promotion again I'd be all over the ice cream shop collecting all the teams. Ice cream four times a day for a week!

So yeah, they are autographed. I don't know who the players are, but I don't care. I just wanted the helmets! Unfortunately, the autographs are rubbing off on some of them. I'm going to have to protect them somehow.

I'm not sure what's up with the lighting on the pictures.