Now thats a welcome home present.

Little known fact about the Big Sexy.  I have never pulled a relic or an auto.  Until Saturday.  My friend took me to a new card shop he had found on his way to his ex-girlfriends place.  I was looking forward to going through the loosies, talking to the owner, who I assumed would be a grizzled old veteran of the hobby, and finally picking up some Gypsy Queen, which hadn't been stocked at the Walmart near my university (strangely, I haven't found it at Walmarts here either, maybe they aren't selling it?).

Unfortunately, the place was nothing like I expected.  Instead of the traditionally cramped, overstocked floorspace of my youth and my favorite shops, this place was roomy enough to play some wiffle ball, and understocked like crazy.  Everything was incredibly price gouged ($6.50 for a pack of Gypsy Queen?  You're lucky I'm desperate.) and instead of the grizzled old veteran I hoped for I found a high school kid disinterestedly texting.

Oh well.

I sorted through the loosies and found a bunch of Paulies and an Ozzie.  (That post coming soon.)  5 for a buck wasn't so bad, although there were a lot of em marked up for higher than that that shouldn't have been.

I took those up to the counter and paid for 'em, along with 2 packs each of Gypsy Queen and 206.

Back in the car I was bitching about the price to my friend while he was ecstatic over the Ryan Miller and Martin Brodeur cards he bought (Hockey fans, I'll never understand 'em).  Opening the 206 I found some parallels and some other cool stuff.  Finally, I opened the Gypsy Queen and much to my suprise I found this waiting for me:

A relic of Milwaukee first basemen and fellow fat-athlete Prince Fielder!

Instantly I wasn't that mad about the price-gouging anymore.

We moved onto Target and I picked up two rack packs of Gypsy Queen.

Some awesome stuff in there as well, including:

 A sepia toned mini of Ryan Braun numbered 81/99 (the lowest number set parallel i've ever pulled!).

The Ichiro Wall Climbers insert that I was hoping for.

And another Relic!  A Josh Johnson this time!  That was particularly cool because I had just heard Curt Schilling gushing over him the night previous on Baseball Tonight.

So I had gone from a guy who had never pulled a hit before to a guy who pulled two in one day in a few short hours.  Pretty sweet.  The Ichiro goes in the collection of course, but the other 3 are completely up for trade.

- Keep it Fun