Picked Pockets Postal Problems!

 If you've been sending cards via the mail (or pretty much buying anything from places other than Amazon), you've probably noticed that the USPS hasn't been performing as well as most of us would prefer.  For me, I'm waiting on quite a few trades to arrive...and a smattering of recent eBay purchases!  I had also been waiting on an envelope from Julie over at A Cracked Bat.  Julie had actually sent the envelope once and it somehow ended up back in her possession so she had to resend it.  Like I said, the USPS has some issues currently!  

Luckily for me, this is a story with a happy ending because the envelope did eventually find its way to my house...and inside it was four cards that I claimed from one of Julie's Pick Pocket giveaways.

I try to be kind of stingy with my claims on Julie's page...but all bets are off if I see she posts a Barry Larkin card that I need!  

I promise this card is actually green in hand!

That's the Emerald parallel of the 2000 Metal base set.  It's not often I see people giving away Larkin cards that I need so you know I had to jump in immediately when I saw this one!  

The other three cards I claimed mostly to help make postage worthwhile for Julie - all of the guys below are ones that I thought (or hoped in the case of free agent Bauer) would be productive members of the 2021 Reds team.  

Unfortunately, the Reds have made it clear they have no interest in paying Bauer and now there are reports that the Reds are basically trying to trade away everything that isn't nailed or bolted to the floor.  

I have a distinct feeling that 2021 will be a terrible year to be a Reds fan...but really all I can hope is that the year 2021 is actually a better year overall than 2020 was.  Baseball is kind of the least of my problems right now!

Many thanks to Julie for the generous giveaway (especially that Larkin)!  I also want to wish all of you reading this a Merry Christmas Eve!