Me, me, its all about me!

I’m a Jersey boy. Born and bred. Some people thinks that’s a curse and others respect it. And no – I did not grow up loving Springsteen.

If you are like most people, you think Jersey is just urban sprawl from NYC.  A small part of it IS urban sprawl but not where I come from.

My town is just north of Philadelphia (on the Jersey side of the River) and between the Delaware River and Rancocas Creek.  It was a tiny town of about 1000 people.  And I think it’s not much larger now.  For a good portion of my childhood we had one stop light and it was a blinker. Later when we got the 7-11, we got a second light and it did the whole gamut – Red, yellow, and green.

My Grandmom lived on a small farm up near Trenton. She was surrounded by other farms ranging from 100 to 1000 acres. Small compared to Texas farms but its country regardless. I spent a lot of time there while growing up.

About 1 ½ hours north was NYC. About 30 minutes southwest was Philly. DC was maybe 3 hours south.  There is no doubt I am a small town boy in the shadows of the big city.

I am NOT a Yankees fan; Phillies all the way. The only way I’d root for the Giants would be that they became the Jersey Giants.

I went to college in Arizona.  I wanted to be an astronomer and the UofA in Tucson was one of the best schools in the country. It was also cheaper than going someplace closer.

After 5 and ¾ years, I got my 4 year degree in Psychology. Yeah, it happens. The dream of astronomy hit the reality of Calculus.  So I switched majors and spent a lot of time playing with monkeys.  I worked with squirrel and capuchin monkeys in the primate lab for 3 years.  When my friends ask for some psych advice, I tell them I’m only licensed to give therapy to monkeys.

After college I followed a girl to Dallas. Isn’t that always the story?
So I married her and we have 3 boys and a girl. They are cats named, John, Paul, Georgie, and Ringo; collectively known as the Mew Beatles.

I did a long penance in retail. Obviously I was working off some bad karma from a past life. Then I moved on to an even longer penance while working at the welfare office.  Finally I got a job in the private sector. Yeah for me.

I’ve passively collected autographs off and on since I worked at the bookstore.

There is something about ‘the thrill of the hunt’ in collecting signatures. It doesn’t affect everyone. Most of my friends and family couldn't care less. It didn’t affect me when I first did it. The autographs I got were for presents and I just passed the books or baseballs on. It was a unique gift and a conversation piece.  Later I started getting an extra copy for myself. That’s when the sickness started.

A lot of that collecting came when I got involved in baseball cards.  Card collecting grew out of the fact I needed something to do to relieve the stress.

I started going to local card shows and found I was seeing the same dealers at each show and I had already bought the cards I wanted from them.

So I started going to larger shows to find new dealers with different cards and at those shows they had players signing. Ooooh.  Now I had another way to waste my money.

A lot of the signatures I get are from big public signings.  I’ll see a website posting or a newspaper ad stating that some big name is hawking their book or appearing for a signing and I’d show up. As I mentioned I’m not hanging out at Whisky A Go-Go at 3 AM waiting for Paris to stumble out.

I started traveling to the National and attended about 10 of them in a row. It was fun for a while as it was in a new city each year. I would go early and check out the town and ball park.

After they started repeating cites, the luster rubbed off and I started attending ComicCon in San Diego.

San Diego is beautiful and I fall in love with California every time I visit.  Downtown is perfect with great restaurants and the ballpark is just a few minutes’ walk from the convention center.

Yes, I’m a geek and my friends are mostly geeks and I’ll refer to them that way. I have my 'baseball card collecting geek friends' (yeah, that’s a mouth full), I have my 'sci fi geek friends', and my 'autograph collecting geek friends'.

I'm one of those people that really does enjoy baseball. While it’s a social occasion I also enjoy the game too. I especially enjoy checking out a new ballpark. I'll arrive early and just walk around the concourses people watching and breathing in the ambiance.

Almost of the TV I watch is sci fi.  So that means no CSI or LA Law or the like. At one time I could boast knowing all of the Star Trek (the original) episodes by name and could recite them in order. Sadly, now I can only let you know which season they aired.

I do read a lot but mostly sci fi.  I mix in a few poker books as I fancy myself a poker player.  When I get too confident with my playing skills I‘ll have someone crack my Aces with Q/6 off suit just to prove I don’t know all that I should about playing the game.

Enough for now,

AH