The Conservative Mistress Part II: The Main Card

Continuing this trade review of cards sent to me by Adam of My Cardboard Mistress.  See Part I here.

John Kasich

I really wanted spend this time saying how much Kasich annoys the heck out of me... and it's pretty hard to do that, but I couldn't find a card that I could relate to Ohio (the only subject he ever talks about).  Instead, Kasich gets a really neat picture of a couple narwhals...undeserving.

Everywhere I've looked on the trusty internet, no one really seems to have a definitive answer as to why Narwhals have these tusks.  They are actually extremely elongated left incisors and some of them even grow two such long teeth on occasions... yes, very much like a vampire.  These "teeth" are also hollow which is even more perfect for blood sucking!  Some experts say these teeth are for communication, while others say they are used during mating rituals.  I personally like my vampire theory, but I don't plan on publishing it.

This is essentially what I'm getting at with Kasich as well.  No one really knows why he's running.  He's very much a wildcard and doesn't really have much of a chance at the nomination.  I don't think he was going for the public acclaim either (similar to Fiorina or even Trump), because if that's what he was planning on, he's not really making a good impression on the American public.

Rand Paul

Rand Paul gets the Stephen Harper card.  I had to give this card to somebody, and Senator Paul is the person I can most easily relate Mr. Harper to.  Stephen Harper, former Prime Minister of Canada, was a famed economist whose ideals catapulted him into a leadership role in the Canadian Parliament.

Rand Paul is a very polarizing figure and turns many heads when he speaks (in both a good and bad way).  He is extreme and very adamant about his ideas regarding budgeting a foreign policy.  I wouldn't say that these two persons have similar ideology (I don't have the knowledge or background to say such things), but I do think both of them have gotten to their current position through a focus on the economy.

Carly Fiorina

Carly Fiorina constantly talks about her time as CEO of HP.  She's also been fairly high up on the totem poll in some other companies.  In any case, she gets the "working man" set.  This set was one of the two case hits in 2013 Allen & Ginter and featured 10 different subjects performing everyday jobs.  It was a bit of a bore of a set in my opinion, but I appreciate getting this rare card nontheless!

Chris Christie

I'm going to preface this paragraph by first stating that I enjoy Chris Christie.  Quite a lot.  He makes me laugh and he seems like a down to Earth guy.

Okay, now story time.

When Chris Christie took office in New Jersey, it was first of all, a surprise to many.  New Jersey has been a historically blue state and Christie represented the Republican Party.  Christie has since been making drastic changes to many of the ways in which New Jersey operates.  One of the more famous ones is his significant cut to pensions across the state.  New Jersey had no money to pay their retired people, so Christie chose to not pay them instead of raising taxes.  This policy decision got him tabbed as a pirate for essentially "stealing" money.

Just like our friend Hornigold.  I love this mini set from this year's Allen & Ginter and I'm greatly looking forward to reviewing it.  I know a lot of people that think the same because getting my hands on the individual cards I'm missing has been quite difficult!

Marco Rubio

I first must explain these two cards.  These cards are Ginter Code parallels from 2009 and 2011.  They are identical to their base card counterpart except for their border.  Pedroia's card features an actual code along the outside of the card that had to be cracked to win the Ginter Code prize.  On the other hand, Chipper's card contains black print "flowers" in the corners.  It was discovered that if you obtained all of these parallels from 2011 and laid them out just so, the shapes would match up and form a coded message.  That message ended up being a complete red herring, but I suppose its interesting nonetheless.  I recently decided that I'd try my hand at trying to put together these parallel sets simply because I thought it'd be a difficult challenge, so I greatly appreciate Adam's generous start (I got far more than just these two).

As far as Marco Rubio is concerned, it always seems like he's wearing a mask.  He always seems to be hiding his true self behind pretty words.  Granted, that's part of politics, and this year is the first in a very long time where candidates actually seem to be striving for truth and blunt honesty.  While I don't believe Rubio is a crook or a complete weasel, he certainly isn't Trump, Cruz, or Christie, who seem to revel in jamming truth down our throats.

Rubio masks the real thing with pretty borders.  He prefers that his poop doesn't stink.

Jeb Bush

Jeb Bush reminds me very little of his presidential family members.  Granted, I wasn't really old enough to know what the senior George Bush was like, but I certainly remember the younger of the two.  Jeb seems only to want to springboard off their past "success" and family money.  When he speaks during a debate, he is clearly passionate about certain issues, but I don't see or hear any drive in his words.  It's almost as if he has no desire to lead this nation.  Either that, or Jeb Bush is too proper and formal in his debate style.

Hence the absolutely beautiful cabinet card from the Pride of the People set featuring one of the prime tourist destinations of one of the world's most stereo-typically "proper" nations.  Every single card (if you still consider 4 X 6 pieces of cardboard cards) that I've seen so far in this set is stunning.  They remind me of postcards that you might find in a souvenir shop, which I think is brilliant.  I don't usually actively chase these oversized boxloaders down, but this is definitely a set I plan to complete sooner rather than later.

Ben Carson

Ben Carson has gotten a lot of heat for a commencement speech that he during which he claimed that he believed that the Egyptian pyramids were not built as tombs and shrines for ancient pharaohs and queens.  Instead, he claimed that they were instead possible built to store food (especially grain) in accordance with the story of Joseph and the Egyptian famine from the Bible.

This claim was quickly scoffed at for a number of reasons including ancients documents, complexity of the pyramids, and items found within the pyramids themselves.

Carson gets assigned the Easter Bunny... another very strange conjuration of the mind that apparently is derived from 13th century pagan Germanic beliefs.  This doesn't make me like the card less.  I won't get around to talking about this particular set, because it is quite rare and EXTREMELY hard to complete.

Ted Cruz

I don't really have much to say about Ted Cruz.  He seems extremely straightforward and to-the-point which has apparently rubbed most of his party-mates the wrong way.

He gets the world's biggest mammal simply because if you forced me right now to try and attempt to predict who would win the GOP nomination, Ted Cruz would probably be my pick.  I just see him as having the least baggage (at least at the moment) and probably has the highest floor of all the candidates.

Donald Trump

This is the card that gave me the initial idea to write this trade post in the this fashion.  If Topps had the chance to reprint this set in 2016, Donald Trump's roller coaster ride this year would simply HAVE to be one of the card subjects.  Every week that we get deeper into the primaries and debates, I have to marvel at the show that Donald Trump is putting on for us.  At this point, his name has been so ingrained into the news and media that I wouldn't be surprised if more people in America knew his name over President Barack Obama's.

I also keep telling myself that this campaign has to be one giant hoax, but at this point, I wouldn't be surprised if his name wound up on the final ticket (not as the presidential candidate mind you).  I could see these other GOP hopefuls trying to leverage his popularity and business acumen by choosing him as running mate... I don't know, maybe I'm going too far.

Those are your possible 2016 Republican candidates, one of which will almost certainly be running against Hillary Clinton in November.

Those also weren't the only cards that Adam sent me.  I only picked one mini from each set as he sent me quite a few from a handful of those mini inserts sets.  Adam also sent over some regular back base set minis.  Here's some highlights!

Thanks for the great trade Adam, and I apologize again for the vast amount of time it took me to get this particular post live.  Hope you enjoyed it!

The Conservative Mistress Part I: The Undercard

This post has been a long time coming.  I've admittedly been procrastinating a bit for no particular reason.  For example, last night I had ample time to start working on this, but I chose to watch Antman instead.  It was a pretty good choice.  I'm definitely a sucker for all these recent Disney Marvel superhero films.  

I've also had a lot of trouble coming up with something to write about for these cards.  I like to give a nice detailed review of cards I get in trades (especially when someone sends me a huge amount of stuff).  Adam over at My Cardboard Mistress did just thas almost a month ago now.  The problem is that Adam's "huge amount of stuff" was almost all Ginter inserts.  

This "problem" isn't that I'm unappreciative of the cards; in fact, these inserts are why I love Ginter so much (plus, I'm pretty sure I only got one duplicate in the entire package).  No, the problem lies in posting the cards and having something to say about them.  I have an ongoing series on each of the Ginter inserts, so I'm not going to talk about the sets he sent me.  I didn't really want to talk about the individual card subjects either... I started a post in that fashion and discarded it quickly.  I got bored with it.

I decided I needed a theme for this particular trade post.  I went through a few before finally settling on what follows.  I still don't like it very much, but I needed to get this trade post up at some point.  Hey, if you don't like it, you still get to see pretty scans of cards Adam sent me like this one!

Whenever I have free time at work or home, my first instinct is to head to my blogger page and read all the recent posts.  Once I'm caught up with that reading, the next best thing for me is a website called FiveThirtyEight.  This website was created, and is still run by Nate Silver, a statistical anomaly as far as human brains are concerned.  Silver is the driving force behind many recent statistical indices throughout the sport and political world.  He was also the guiding hand behind the Soccer Power Index, a rating system that I work with pretty much every day.  He's probably most famous for developing the Player Empirical Comparison and Optimization Test Algorithm (or PECOTA) for baseball forecasting and for his work in forecasting the political scene.

In any case, I love the blog as it really digs deep into statistics over a variety of fronts.  The blog is still owned by ESPN, so it does focus a lot on sports, but it also hits on every other aspect of life as well.  I've never really been too keen on politics, and I certainly don't actively follow it.  FiveThirtyEight however, has certainly turned a lot of its attention in that direction recently, and I couldn't help but read some of it.

Thus my inspiration for this long overdue post.  Today we will do the unthinkable.  We shall somehow relate baseball cards to right wing politicians.  I say right wing simply because that is the only intriguing race at the moment.  I know... it's still possible that Sanders catches Clinton, but we're going to ignore that for the sake of this post.

Also know that I'm not very politically versed, nor do I have any idea what I'm talking about.  I'm simply making comparisons based on the characters (and oh do we have some characters) I've observed in the handful of debates I've seen.  So let's go!

George Pataki

This is by far my weakest comparison of the lot, so I'm starting off with it.  I know very little about Pataki, even though I live only a state away.  Guilliani seemed to steal all the spotlight that New York had to offer throughout the 2000's.  Pataki was there all along as well.

Adam sent me some of these 2012 Murder in Willow Cove inserts that revolved around the Ginter Code for that year.  The back of these cards feature a newspaper front page that you have to put together over the entire set of cards.  This card features a particularly mean looking sheriff.  Out of all the candidates (except for maybe Chris Christie who I have a better card for), Pataki has always seemed like the guy most likely to bust up your day.  Seriously... don''t trust his gentle smile.  He's from New York after all!

Lindsey Graham

There's going to be a lot of finger pointing and guffawing at people in these two posts.  It's by no means an indication of how I feel about these people.  For example, I'm beyond grateful for Mr. Graham's service to the Air Force for 33 years.  However, that's not the only reason why he gets a beautiful picture of an Aerodrome next to his face.  It also has nothing to do with the fact that Graham is from South Carolina and the inventor of this contraption (Samuel Langly) passed away there too.  

Nope... it's more to do with the fact that he always finds a way to look high.  Don't believe me??  Here's another picture.

Rick Santorum

The first of the candidates that I've actually seen in a debate.  This guy recently went out and said that we're in the middle of World War III.  I guess that's the kind of thing you say when you're stuck on the under-card and are trying to get people to listen to you.  A bit audacious I'd say.

In any case, Adam sent a few of these SpaceShots cards along with the package of Ginter as a type of packaging buffer so the other cards wouldn't get damaged.  I like these cards though!  I've always enjoyed space photography, and that first picture reminds me a bit of a missile launch (hence the WWIII comment...).

Another space shot.  I don't think I'd actually ever consider collecting these.  I just simply wanted to highlight one of the best packing materials I've ever seen.

Mike Huckabee

This one's pretty simple.  We've got a Classic Christian Conservative Candidate.  Here's your Complimentary People of the Bible insert Containing the Caricature of Joseph.  538 ran a pretty cool graphic last week that designates where these candidates stand around the "establishment" as they like to refer to it.  I love where Trump is on this graph.  It only makes his card all the better when we finally get to it.

Obviously that's not all Adam sent me.  It's just a start!  I'll leave you with two more inserts that he sent over that didn't get attached to any right-wing people.  Perhaps we can attach these as a whole to left wingers!  Do it!  One is Clinton, the other is Sanders.  No one cares about O'Malley.  Assign them both a card in the comments!

Oh, and I suppose if it took me this long to get this post up, it'll be Christmastime before the next one.  I certainly hope not, but if you don't hear from me, have a very MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Allen & Ginter Insert Overview Series #85

It's been a while since I've done one of these posts, so I figured it's time again.  Apologies to My Cardboard Mistress who sent me an incredible trade package.  I WILL get to it eventually...

Set: 2015 Allen & Ginter What Once Would Be

            Total Cards: 10

            Stated Odds: 1:2 (along with other full-sized inserts)

Bubba’s Derived Odds: 1:14

           # of Hobby Boxes Needed to Obtain Set: 5.83

Favorite (Owned) Card:

This card is my favorite simply because the idea still has potential.  It's currently completely irrelevant simply because of cost, but there still could be possibilities for improvement on the idea.  Every time I see this card I think of the mailroom scene from Elf where Buddy is sorting mail via the vacuum tubes... don't ask me why... my mind is crazy.

In any case, I still think that there are still possibilities behind this idea.  Perhaps not in the realm of human transportation, but for transportation of goods or other things in which speed matters.

Notes and Comments:
I said in my previous insert set review that there was something that irked me in each of the 2015 full sized insert sets.  This set has the worst one... View the card above...

Now view the card below.

I hate this.  In a binder it looks completely ridiculous.  Yes... the same thing happens with card fronts in many sets, but for some reason, that doesn't bother me at all.  I don't really mind horizontal backs overly much either.  The fact that this set contains both vertical and horizontal backs is completely ridiculous.  End rant.

Otherwise, this set is merely somewhat interesting.  The black and white pictures is a pretty neat twist and the theme is good, I do think the card subjects could have been better.  Here's the list of card subjects:

Flying Car

Jetpacks

Robot Housekeepers

Automated Kitchen

Food in Pill Form

Giant Airliners

Easy-Clean Furniture

Mail Via Parachute

Vacuum Tube Trains

Lunar Colonization

I suppose I just get a bit let down by most of these.  There are very few that I can point to and say, "Hey! That would be super neat to have in the future!"  Most of these have either been completely ruled out of the realm of possibility already, or are simply too silly to even consider anymore.  Maybe I'm fooling myself...

Arbitrary Rating (out of 100): 45

Click link above for complete up-to-date ratings

% of Set Completed: 100%

Missing Cards: NONE!!!

Extra Cards: All but WOULD-6.

I Was Sent Braves That Aren't Actually Braves...

I was introduced to Jeff and his blog 2 X 3 Heroes when he won one of my Allen & Ginter contests a few months ago.  Perusing his blog lead me to a page called Club PWE which I signed up for.  Apparently Jeff likes sending out random cards.  I like getting random cards.  It's a good fit.  

I got 8 Braves cards in my envelope.  5 made the cut for the team binder (the other 3 I either already had, or were so hideous that I wouldn't want to look upon them).  I found it funny that of the 5 cards, none of the players featured were on the Braves last year (3 of the 5 were on an active roster last year, and a 4th had a minor league contract).  Here's the 5.

I don't have very many cards of Mr. Jeff Francoeur in a Brave uniform even though he was with us for almost 5 years.  His best years (even to this day) were as a Brave and he did his best to defy the sophomore slump by belting a career high 29 HR's in 2006.  This card is a black version of 2008 UD Starquest insert set.  Don't ask me how many different parallels there are of this card.  There are many... that's all I know.

2010 Topps Jordan Schafer.  This guy always irked me while he was with Atlanta.  He got a ton of hype, but never even came close to realizing it.  Apparently he had a decent year last year???  Who would've know?  He's with the Twins now, but I'm not even sure if he's still on their 40-man.  Oh well, still makes the binder because I've got to have at least one card of him.  He was always super fast and a pretty good defender and this showcases that (so its a winner for now).  If I find a decent card of Schafer stealing second though, this one will probably get cut.

We interrupt this program to bring you a card of a player who is probably still most often associated with the Braves... even though he's a dirty Redbird.  What can I say?  I like pitching.  I still like the Shelby Miller trade and I think it's been the biggest win for the Braves in the past year or two, regardless of what happens to Miller now (there are some talks of him getting traded away too).

By no means is Vazquez a Brave.  However... I give you his career numbers: 

165-160 (.508), 4.22 ERA, 1.25 WHIP, 8.0 K/9

Now his single year in Atlanta (2009, a year where ATL went 86-76 and placed 3rd in the NL East):

16-10 (.600), 2.87 ERA, 1.03 WHIP, 9.8 K/9

The differences are startling.  All of those numbers are career bests for Vazquez.  He carried that team on his back in 09 and deservedly got 4th in the Cy Young balloting.  He absolutely gets a spot in the binder (if not more than one).

Another Bravo who is no longer with us... and another player who probably had his prime in ATL.  I was really hoping Tommy would go somewhere, as his effortless, yet jerky delivery was extremely fun to watch.  Unfortunately, Hanson passed away just over a week ago now with reports indicating catastrophic organ failure.  My thoughts and prayers are with his family and teammates.

Thanks Jeff for the Club PWE package!

Eccentric eBay Entertainment

We've all probably purchased something off eBay before, and I'm sure we've all had our fair share of horror stories and/or "deals of the century."  I frequent eBay quite a bit myself, but don't find myself actually buying much.  I'll put feelers out there on a lot of things, but I tend to be looking for mid-range cards (i.e. not commons, not high end) and eBay really stinks for that type of thing.  

You can typically get commons really cheap shipped in a PWE and high end cards are also very reasonable because usually the seller is willing to take shipping on him/herself.  These mid-range cards are really a struggle though.  If you're looking for a specific say $0.50 card, you can find it for $0.50, but then there's a $2.54 shipping charge attached to it... so typically simply not worth it.

Because of this, I've ended up buying lots of random cards instead.  First, they are much more reasonable, and second, I love doing it because it feels like I'm opening packs since I'm not actually sure what's going to be in the lot half the time.

Prime example below.  This was perhaps the single most extraordinary eBay auction I've ever won for so many different reasons.

First, the title:

Allen And Ginter Mini Inserts Lot of 36 Cards mixed lot

This is exactly the sort of listing that appeals to me.  I find myself searching the keywords "Ginter mini lot" more than anything else, and this is the type of thing I'm looking for.

I clicked into the auction and this is what I saw.

Mostly 2012 and 2013 minis.  Cool.  A couple blacks thrown in as well.  I honestly didn't bother looking at each individual card.  That would take far too long.  The item description wasn't very informative either:

I appreciate this.  "I'm throwing cards at you.  Pay me."  I said okay and placed a bid on the lot.

A week later the cards came in the mail.  The first thing I did was laugh.  I had noticed in the listing that the cards were individually sleeved in oversized sleeves of some sort.  When I got the package in my hands, I discovered what they actually were.  Each individual mini was put into the world's smallest version of a Ziploc bag.  

Now I won't lie, minis can be a bit tough to ship at times.  The most efficient way I've discovered is to throw a bunch horizontally into a team bag and tape it up good.  They tend to protect each other very well when you do this, and you can offer them even more protection with additional packaging (bubble-wrap, cardboard, ect).  They do make mini toploaders as well, but those get expensive real quick.  

This variant on the art of mini protection was quite new to me.  I couldn't even believe that Ziploc actually made bags this small.  What could one possibly want to store in these things?  Buttons?  Even my bags for board game pieces are bigger than these.  Any ideas?

The second thing I noticed was that the person who sold these minis clearly didn't know what he had (or else he was extremely lazy).  Here's a glimpse at a few of them still in their glorious mini-baggies.

Not only did I get some really big names (a Machado rookie and a Hunter black border), but I also got a no-number mini of Shelby Miller's rookie year!  For reference, one usually pulls 4-5 of these NNO-minis in a CASE.  They used to be numbered out of 50 and its pretty well accepted that they still run around 50 copies of each card.  I was thrilled.  That single card is probably worth close to double of what I paid for the entire auction!

Out of the 36 cards I even got two that I still needed for completing my mini sets!

Bringing it Back Nice and Slow PWE Style

I received a surprise PWE from Kerry of Cards on Cards, oh probably like 3 weeks ago now?  It shouldn't have really been a surprise though as he mentioned he was doing so in a post.  Either I forgot about it or skimmed over it, because I certainly wasn't expecting it.

The envelope was true PWE style.  None of this modern "stuff as many cards into a third of a 9-pocket page because shipping is expensive."  No, this was your classic 3 cards in a penny sleeve.  When I opened the envelope, Cameron Maybin was on top in Heritage fashion.

I flipped the envelope over to see John Smoltz staring me down and looking to strike me out.  My dad was actually next to me when I opened this and he even commented on the card and thought it was pretty interesting.  The back of the card is a pretty ugly yellow though, so I didn't scan it to save your eyeballs.

In general, I think I like these motion capture shots.  I actually think it's pretty cool when done well.  I've seen some really awesome cards that use this technique for players sliding into second base.  Pitching works decently well as seen above.  Capturing a player swinging a bat can be a struggle though, as most hitters (at least the ones with good form) swing in one plane, so you wouldn't actually see much difference between the pictures.

I was a bit confused after seeing the first two cards.  Why would someone send me a PWE with two random base cards in it.  I didn't have these, so I'm not complaining (and they'll go straight into the Braves and Smoltzy binders), but it wasn't like these were on my want list or I was specifically looking for them.

There was one more card between the two though!  One of this year's retail only full-sized inserts!  Woo!!!  Number 4 is off my list now and we're down to three cards remaining to find!  I'll get them someday.

Thanks for the surprise PWE Kerry!  Much appreciated!

A Big Black Chair and One Crazy Maze

I decided to move.

Apparently when I decide to do something life changing, it happens quickly.  Two weeks ago my cousin and I started looking around for an apartment.  As of yesterday, I'm sleeping in a new bed in a new town.  Granted, there are still plenty of things that need to be done to get the place in order, clean, and all set up, but I did sleep there last night!

I've been all over Connecticut these last two weeks for this reason.  Most of the travelling was for shopping for the new place, and I got got to experience some new stores.  Both my roommate and myself are moving from living with our parents to save money, so we're starting completely from scratch as far as the various sundries needed for a place.  Over these two weeks we've been to all kinds of stores, from discount bargain bins, to high end outlets.  It's been quite the adventure!

By far, the two most interesting stores were "The Pit" (owned by Bob's Discount Furniture) and IKEA.  The Pit is simply that... a cesspool of furniture that is usually ruined in some way.  I went there on mission to find some furnishings for the new place and found a lot of broken crap.  There are signs on all the pieces that state the price and then will sometimes have a description of a possible defect.  There were a few that had holes in them, a couple had some broken wood… you know the deal. 

Big black chair in it's new home.

In any case, I found a really nice looking black leather recliner that had an original list price of $650 (who knows how correct that is) and was knocked down significantly.  The sign had no other information on it as far as defects, so I went and tested it out.  Of course the automatic reclining part of the chair didn’t work and I let the salesperson know.  She proceeded to write the problem on the price tag.  I asked if the price was going to change because of the defect and she snottily replied with a “no.”

Naturally, I bought the chair (and a lamp plus end table) anyways.

IKEA was a far more interesting place.  I know that I've been into one of these furniture super-stores before, but it has been quite a long time since that visit.  I remember playing hide-and-seek once in one of the floors because of all the fun setups and alcoves it had.  I was certainly looking forward to seeing the place again (...well as much as any man might "look forward" to shopping).

In any case, the closest IKEA to where I formally lived was about 75 minutes away and I cut that time in half by moving.  I also knew exactly what I was looking for before I left.  I needed a storage shelf that would display nicely and be able to hold both board games and binders of baseball cards.  After a bit of online searching I found the KALLAX unit that IKEA sold and decided to traverse on over.

What a monster... When you walk into the place, they usher you up an escalator onto their display floor, and that's all it is.  Display.  You can't actually pick up anything to buy.  It's just all ticketed and tells you where you can buy it.  I was looking for "media storage" and I found the section on the convenient map (yes... there was a map).  The clever map told me that I was right next to the section in question.  I simply had to walk through a wall to get there.  Luckily, there was a cleverly hidden "shortcut" to get me there faster.  This is not the exact map, but hopefully you get the idea.

After you finished walking through the showroom, they ushered you to the ground floor marketplace where there were even more hidden shortcuts that you could only use if you had a map in hand.  I would say that we did a speed run through the place and it still took us 30-45 minutes to get through it all.  It definitely had us laughing.

I did get my storage shelves though!  I have to go and build them today!  I just wanted to let you all know what I was up to.  I have some trade posts to get up in the near future, but it still might be a bit as I have to go out and buy a brand new scanner.  MORE MONEY!

Oh, this also means I have a new address.  I almost forgot about that.  You're more than welcome to send to the old address if you wish.  I'll still be there 3-4 times a month.  Otherwise, feel free to reach out to me for the new one.  I'll still be more than happy to trade!