Do-It-Yourself Success

What, you say?  That isn't a baseball card!  You are, indeed, very observant.  That is an alternator on a 2006 Ford F350.

I have been having problems recently where every time there is damp weather, the batteries on the truck drain and it has to be jump started.  I finally took it into O'Reilly's and had the batteries tested.  The batteries, as it turns out, were fine, but the voltage regulator on the alternator was shot.  But, rather than take it in to the repair shop and spend $500-$600 to get the alternator replaced, I plunked down $175 for a new alternator and did the repair myself.  It took some time to actually figure out how get the tension off the drive belt, but once I did replacing the alternator was a 10 minute task.  So, after having saved myself $300-$400 dollars, a opportunity presented itself to put that money to good use.

This all happened amongst my renewed interest in working on my autographed 1963 Fleer set, Iand the opportunity was right in that wheelhouse.  Off the card went.  Today, after nearly two months my shipment was on it's way back to me.  Alas, this is what greeted me:

After I restarted my heart, I opened it up and found that the consigner had packaged my card well and it was in perfect condition.  So, without further ado, after the jump is the 44th autographed card in my 1963 Fleer set:

That is right!  I sent my 1963 Fleer in to a Sandy Koufax autograph signing.  This is definitely the crown jewel of my collection.

I still have 3 cards out, one TTM and two to consigned signings. Alas, the two consigned cards don't look like they are going to happen. One is definitely not happening as the signing was  supposed to be two weekends ago, but was cancelled. The other consigned signing is having scheduling issues, having been postponed twice. I think the consigner is going to try for one more week to get it set up, but I am not hopeful at this point. 

But, by golly, this addition above makes me really happy, so I am not going to let issues on other fronts bring me down.