The hardest part is letting them go

file photo of Chunky B

I still consider myself a collector, even as I am going through one of the largest toy purges in my toy collecting career. I guess largest isn't the right word, how about hardest. Just last tonight I decided it was time to let go of some more things I never thought I would part with, I guess the catalyst was I was sorting through a tote of Star Trek toys and I looked over at the stack of totes I still need to go through and I thought, why am I storing some of this stuff. I mean I enjoy my collection, but some stuff I think I am just storing for no reason. I don't plan on opening some of it and I really don't plan on displaying it, so why am I holding on to it?

I couldn't answer that question really, so right then I decided it was time to make the cuts that hurt the most. I knew there were some loose toys and some packaged toys that I was holding onto out of some weird collector obligation, I gathered them up, reluctantly at first, and shot pictures of them and posted them at really good prices. I say really good because of my first round of stuff, eight auctions with low buy it now prices, five lots sold just as fast as I could post them. I was actually posting one and went back to revise it when I got two notifications that it sold to two different people. Don't ask me how that happens. I got it all sorted out though.

At first I was kind of disappointed, not that they sold or sold so fast, but that when I was ready to write this post I would only have three auctions going and undoubtably all my die hard toy collecting brothers would look at them and think "yeah, wow! Really letting some stuff go". My plan was to put lots up in groupings of ten or so, or for that matter as many as I could before I got tired of posting them. I plan on making some more cuts. If you remember this picture...

There were about 24 totes there and a couple boxes of toys. I can say that two of those totes is miscellaneous items that are not toys, so subtract those and that leaves lets say 22 totes. Probably most of my fellow collectors out there could easily double this number, but I used to work at UPS in college so I can pack a tote. That picture was taken around 2007, so the number of totes have fluctuated over time, emptying a few, refilling a few. This year I started a few little purges, maybe loosing a couple of totes here and there bringing the number down to around 19 totes, but recently I really doubled my efforts to clean house. My recent efforts have emptied 7 totes off that number. So I am sitting at 12 totes now, plus you have to take into account those little shelving units I am sorting into, those are probably where my first few totes of things went, which I am going to say have been a life saver sorting things to sell. It's so easy to pull a drawer and get a quick view of what i want to keep and what i want to thin out.

I still have a long way to go, I want to get that number of totes down to maybe 6 or eight, almost half of what I have now. Also I want to get the little shelf units to a more manageable point to store my keepers. So why all of a sudden this great purge? The purge to end all purges? A few reasons.

My Focus and thoughts on collecting have changed.

1) While there are a few Items I think I will always keep in their original packages, for the most part I am opening up things that I don't have already opened and enjoying them.

2) Loose items I have that are in great condition and can find another home I am letting go, as with some of the packed stuff that I can tell myself to let go.

3) The reason I say I am still a collector, I am planing on picking up a few great pieces for my collection, and also a few select pieces for my focuses; Batman, Stormtroopers, Classic Trek (Spock!), Vintage Star Wars, and a couple others I don't want to reveal at this time.

What does all this mean? Hopefully a more streamlined collection, better judgement on future purchases (which I doubt), and maybe help fill some holes in other peoples collections. So as long as this little Jawa is hanging around on the blog...

Click HERE for the Utini!

I will be in a continuous house cleaning frame of mind. Rest assured I have a few things coming in the mail I can't wait to get my hands on and shoot pictures of.

Sunday Afternoon Toy Purge

Okay, so first, no I haven't lost my toy collecting mind. I did though promise some nephews we saw at a wedding a few weekends back that I would send them some Batman stuff. I needed to weed out some of my extra things and thought this would be a great opportunity... then things started to go a little crazy and I decided to fill the box with a sampling of some other things that they might enjoy.

Before you all look at the pictures and pass out, no I am not getting out of collecting toys, this is just keeping with the whole need to get more focused. I still plan on keeping an ongoing open Batman collection, I kept a few of my favorite things from my packaged collection... just a lot less now. I still have my Stormtroopers starting to take over a second shelf thanks to Reis ; ) Plus I still have a ton of other items in the loose collection. This is just a continuation of a process I started a year or more back.

I succeeded in filling the box in the background to the brim and saving on using any packing material!

I wanted to make sure they had a few Batman characters to open, plus I had some extra Aquaman for each of the boys and of course some Trek plush (heh, gotta try) and I think that may be my last Cantina Musician.

One of my favorite Batman figures. I had an open one so I sent this guy to a new home, plus a few other loose heroes.

The boys are very into the "old" Batman the Animated Series cartoons. Since I have the series on DVD I had these individual episode DVDs kicking around and packed those in as well, plus a few of the older Toy Biz Marvel guys, why not.

Last is a bout 30 plus loose GI Joes and Cobra with a few more Heroes thrown in for good measure. I bagged them to keep the accessories together.

Man if that does not make their day (by the way three boys all at the right age for this stuff) I do not know what will. Perhaps I may have sparked an interest in some other heroes say Aquaman, Spider-Man, some Trek possibly?

Next post maybe I will post about some stuff I found and kept, ha ha, stay tuned.

Jabba, you've lost weight!

Ha ha ha, this just makes me laugh. Yesterday I caught word on the interwebs that Giant AT-ATs were being purchased at WalMart for 49 Bucks. I couldn't resist, I had to check the Wally World by work so I took a little 15 minute break to scope out the nearby big blue for some AT-AT goodness... lets face it I know I'm getting one and if I can save a few bucks , why not. Well zippo, no AT-ATs to be found, but plenty of other Star Wars stuff including the extremely rare Jabba's Palace set pictured above with weight watchers Jabba.

The funny thing was I saw this tucked behind a few others of the same set and from the top I was thinking "which long neck alien is that?", ha ha it's Jabba!

Okay this sort of stuff has really ticked me off in the past and this is actually the second time I have seen a swapped figure at this WalMart, but now it's like this guy or gal is not even trying. What a wonderful world, the lesson here is I will not be buying any boxed toys at this location and really inspecting the bubbled and window boxed stuff carefully.

One for the WTF? column

Soooo, I found myself at Target and they have some of the same old figures, but there was a Princess Leia in Boushh Disguise hanging on the pegs, I thought about it for a minute and left it, passing an end cap with another one. I went ahead and kept walking, After I collected the items I came for I decided, what the heck, pick up the Leia. Somewhere in my mind I figured the one on the end cap was the better and it was closer, so I walked back by and grabbed it, not giving it a second look. I checked out and made my way home, just tossing the bag on the kitchen counter when I came through the door. Hours later I decided to open her up and at first glance totally missed the re tapped blister. The thing that seemed off was that the little Battle Game Card was tapped to the insert with a piece of masking tape... huh, that's weird. Oh well.

I pulled the figure form the package and was sort of disappointed about the cut joints on the elbows, the figure was taped and banded like all the other figures I had picked up before, so no worries... but what was the deal with the Battle Game Card??? Oh well time to remove the proof of purchase, wait why is it taped in a hole the same size as the POP? Holy crap I had been had. I immediately logged onto Rebel Scum to do some research, crap they haven't updated their archives with this figure yet, a quick search of the assortment number and I was lead to the figure I had just bought. That threw my first hypothesis right out the window, that the UPC was clipped from another package and replaced so our smooth criminal could gain an extra buck... see I checked my receipt and I did pay a dollar more for this particular figure than what was marked on the shelves... at least I think. That's all a bust now though, why would someone go through the trouble to duplicate the barcode???

I checked over the contents of the package, the figure seems like the one that goes in there, it has the tiny thermal detonator, the helmet, weapon / staff, the stand, dice and the card... something is missing??? THE EXTRA WEAPONS ARE GONE, true I would probably have just tossed them into my extra accessories box, but hey I paid for those!



So this is what I came up with. The pleasant gentleman or lady (but lets face it I do not think a lady would do such a thing) bought this figure, carefully cut the blister on three sides, took out the inner figure tray out and removed the little baggie of weapons and then tapped the card back, since it would be held up by the extra weapons baggie. Then slide the figure tray back, but not before cutting a piece of gloss card stock, poster board or photo paper that had a scanned and printed duplicate of the barcode and placing it back into the hole they cut the original barcode out of. I will add the Xacto skills here are really impressive. Why? I mean really? Because they wanted the extra weapons for the little army of clones they are massing in their sand box? The original barcode will come in handy to mail away for that Rocket Firing Boba Fett so they can sell it on eBay latter because they have already mailed away for twenty of them and plan on getting rich off selling them in the next year or so.

I think I am more amazed at the time and effort in this crime, and lets not mince words it's a crime, fraud. After dissecting this package and examining the work done I have little more to do but toss this persons hard work into the recycle bin and enjoy my hopefully new Princess Leia in Boushh Disguise, and of course blog about it. I do feel a little ripped off and really dismayed from all this. In general most collectors I meet are above this sort of thing, but this does not give me hope for the future of collecting toys or even Star Wars toys for that matter (at least in this area), this person was out to rip off an unsuspecting child or grandparent and they got me. I will admit I was in a hurry and did not pay as close attention as I should have, but really should I have to do that, over a eight dollar toy? Really have we come to that? Looks like Mos Eisly is not the only retched hive of scum and villainy.