So you want to pay for a pizza...

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Posted By: Julie

This morning, I got an e-mail from the ACLU (they get a small amount of money from me every month) graphically demonstrating how my identity, other personal information and the knowledge of what my maternal grandmother ate for breakfast most mornings could be STOLEN from me if I simply pay for a delivered pizza with a credit card.

My imagination immediately wandered to another, similar, scenerio. not identity thieves, but the F.B.I. Not a pizza, but Japanese baseball cards:

(two agents, a young one and an older one, are looking at my file)

"Hey, Joe. Look what Julie Vognar's into with her new credit card."
"Mm..and why are we watching..mm...a 69-year-old unemployed woman?"
"Father refused to serve in WWII. Son refused to serve in the Gulf War. Husband was conveniently confined to a mental hospital the date of his physical for the Vietnam War...'

Trio of draft dodgers. And she herself?"

Nothing remarkable, just quirky. Buys a lot of Chinese stuff, belonged to the Richard III society, gets weird old novels on Amazon, and lots of...baseball cards."

"For her son? Her husband?"

"Nope. Belongs with maximum esprit de corps to the Vintage Baseball Card Forum on Network 54."

"Good grief. Any other women there?"
"Nope. She's it.

"So what'd she buy?"
"3 1949 Japanese cardboard airplanes with batters in them."

"Lemmie see."
"
"
"Hey. Those are cute."
"More than half a K."
"You're sh***ing me!"
"Baseball cards are expensive."
"But those are JAPANESE."
"Yup. 3 Japanese HOF players from right after WW2: Kawakami
,
Os***a,
and Betto.
"How do YOU know?"
"It says so right here! Besides, my dad was in the army of occupation. He remembered Kawakami.
"The only Japanese player I know--besides the ones over here--is that guy who hit all the home runs. You know, with the real short name?
"Oh."

"Oh?"
"Saddaharu Oh. Over 900 home runs.
Humph. probably still wasn't as good as Ruth."
"Probably not."

"Does she vote Green? Socialist? Communist?"
"Democratic, usually."
"That's bad enough...but I think we ought to drop her; she's not going anywhere. Jeez...3 little cardbaord Jap airplanes.

(Os***a and Betto:
)

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Posted By: John/z28jd

This is why this board needs to be able to keep threads like this on top without bumping them.Usually on other boards they have a little thumbtack and certain posts that the moderator deems important can be stuck at the top till he so choses to remove them.

Im pretty sure i read that network54 is working on being able to do this.I hope they hurry because this thread will be talked about for awhile.

Thank you Julie,I appreciate it.

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Posted By: John/z28jd

This isnt the only thread that needs to be kept near the top,no offense to other people.The B/S/T thread among others should be there too,as well as many others.

Heres a picture of my dog,a rottweiler of course.Damn dog went after a huge mastiff today,he doesnt like other dogs near the house.Good boy

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Posted By: Gary B.

Julie, I swear, after reading your posts sometimes, I can't figure out if you're brilliant, insane or maybe some of both - one thing's for sure though, you definitely got STYLE...

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Posted By: Julie

.......

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Posted By: Julie

White man speaks with forked tongue!

++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The airplanes are from 1949; the two dwarfish figures from 1947; Betto from late 40s, Oh's flamingo pose and the Ruth poster photo from '90s phone cards; Oh batting from 1978.

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Posted By: Jimmy Leiderman

Brilliant post!

The Japs got creamed in WWII and after that, they make small baseball kamikaze pilots... they are insane, not you!

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Posted By: Julie

they SEEM TO TAKE THEMSELVES LESS SERIOUSLY THAN WE DO! That is patently absurd! But there's so much characature in their cards, and so little in ours.

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Posted By: steve k

Personally, if I was not allowed to resell them, I wouldn't give ten cents for those Japanese cards. But it was a very interesting and entertaining post.

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Posted By: hankron

.

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Posted By: Max Weder

If we're going to start going to the dogs, let's make sure there's at least a baseball around.....

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Posted By: Joe P.

Reinforcing my favorite group of people.

They all play in Left Field.

Bravo! Julietta Bravo!

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Posted By: Julie

is that supposed to be a long haiku, or what? Thanks for all the appreciation!

Cards came today--they're quite small (each fits in an American modern-size Mylar). They ARE cute. The price would have been lower, but my opposing bidder had already won 18 other little (non-baseball-realed) comic fellows in airplanes from the same set, so he wanted these to complete the set. I wanted them worse.

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Posted By: John/z28jd

David if you and Henry ever make it to the east coast we should get our dogs together for a little play-date.Im sure they would get along well

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Posted By: jamiew

julie, what is that japanese ruth card you have? i really like the look of it!

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Posted By: Julie Vognar

I don't see many phone cards of any kind here, but they're always plain old cards. The Oh in the "flamingo" pose and
the poster of Ruth (from the 1934 tour of Japan) are I think phone cards from the early '90s. They're plastic, and you can see the little sami-circular dent at the bottom. Each time the card is used, a tiny, tiny hole is punched in the card--one has three, the other isn't used.
They were very cheap--they're not in any Japanese baseball card catalogue that I know.

If you're interested, call Gary Engel (661-255-6744) after the National, or e-mail him at japanbb@aol.com and ask if he ever gets them in. He's the one I won the three airplanes from--and he read my post here at the National and said how much he liked it! (must have a laptop there, or have wandered into an internet cafe).

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Posted By: Julie

good or bad qualities of the Japanese--but no one has directly said anything about a person's right to privacy...

By the way, Who Let the Dogs In? (Molly Ivan's new book...)