No Girls Allowed*

First off I must say that my Shame My Sisters Campaign has worked splendidly. They have both agreed in principal to visit. They have no idea how excited I am for that. I was smiling so big when I saw their comments. And let me reiterate, how much I love my sisters, and how awesome they are. I'm glad my Washington friends will finally get to meet them.

I'm a little late on this post. Dare I say, I have been crazy busy working and playing I haven't blogged in a few days. Last fall, I came across a photo essay by Bill Simmons about the National Sports Collectors Convention.  It's basically sports nerd heaven. The asterix in this title refers to the fact that although no girls were allowed on the trip, evidence shows that no girl would want any part of it. Just a bunch of guys wandering around looking at baseball cards, autographs and all manner of sports memorabilia.  When Bill said that next year's event would be in Baltimore, I knew I was in. I told JJ, Dan, and Joe and they too were excited. We looked forward to this for a year.

I decided to make Saturday a Man's day. That meant sports, fighting, and meat. My kind of day. Of course one of my most favorite activities is play flag football. I love it. I've loved it since sixth grade and would play everyday if I could. Even though it was really hot, we still had a very competitive game. Of course I love to win, but I really hate losing. That being said, I don't really remember what the result was, but I can safely say, I probably threw some touchdowns, and probably a few picks as well.

Not from Saturday, but you get the idea

I got back from football and Joe, Dan and I headed up. JJ and Jennifer met us there. We knew were going to have a great time the moment we walked in and saw one of Joe and Dan's personal hero's, Nats legend Dmitri Young. Dmitri took a moment from his burrito to stop and chat with Joe and Dan. I doubt that Dmitri realized that he was in the presence of two of his most loyal supporters. He was also nice enough to stop for a snap shot.

Just behind that I believe they had every baseball card you could possibly imagine. I had decided early on that if I could get a Vlad Guerrero game used bat that I would. I set myself a budget and I was on my way. I didn't even know how to tackle everything. There were so many vendors. I finally found a vendor who had a a game used bat, but it was way out of my price range. I did however take a picture with it. 

According to her mom my niece Savannah liked how I looked in this picture. She is so right.

I am a fan of west coast teams, so there wasn't as much for sale of the Angels, Niners, Cougars, Lakers persuasion, but I did find some treasures here and there. One of the booths that I thought was the coolest was the Championship Ring booth. I guess for some of the guys who don't care about their rings, or are low on cash, sell them, and you can buy them. There was a kid at the booth who was wearing an Angels  hat. I of course started to chat with him, and he showed me the 2002 Angels Championship ring. Heck, he even let me try it on.

I told him that I hadn't seen a ton of Angels stuff and that I was thinking of buying a Tim Salmon autograph, if I could find one. Low and behold this young huckster had one. We negotiated, and I walked away with an authenticated autograph of my third favorite Angel. We met up with JJ and he told me there was a vendor who had a Steve Young autographed picture from his BYU days. As soon as I saw it, I knew I had to buy it. It's a great picture of him running the ball against UCLA. In the end I ended up with an Angels/USA lapel pin, a Tim Salmon starting line up action figure as well as a Vlad card and Steve Young card for Nikki Sixx, and another Steve Young card for me. I felt good about my purchases and even managed to come in under my budget.

They even had the Honus Wagner baseball card. The last time it sold it pulled in 2.8 million. If only my Wally Joyner collection would be worth that.

After we looked at everything and were completely exhausted from walking all over the Baltimore Convention center, we headed to heart of Baltmore to Chaps Pit Beef for some lunch. We saw a lot more than we expected to in the parking lot of Chaps, and there are still a few questions and one in particular that need to be answered.

Our manly day was not over, as we headed back to Arlington, grabbed Scott, and Dan and headed to Bailey's to watch UFC 117. 

It was just the kind of manly day a guy needs once in a while.