[JollyElm]

"I only regret that I have but one long, boring thread to give for my hobby..."

I present to you 2022's Collectorisms Part XIV - Section 2




881. Populrarity
A card whose ‘scarcity’ is due to the number on the slab having a small population, rather than the card itself being a truly rare piece.

882. Sniffsnuffery (or Having a Nose for Noes)
How you can immediately tell something is amiss with a supposedly vintage card, because it simply doesn’t smell the way cards from that era do.

883. Dud Ringer
Someone who won’t stop insisting that the individual pictured in his old photograph is a very noteworthy and historical person, when it clearly is not.

884. Snobbyist
A collector who takes his involvement in the leisurely pursuit of cards much, much too seriously.

See also: “Careful of that ceiling fan!” - a polite way to tell him to get off of his high horse.

885. Phonaticism
Surging headlong into negotiation battles at card shows with your cell phone - and the vast amount of past-sales data and other effective ammunition it holds - leading the charge.

886. The Popman Always Rings Twice (proverb)
The supposition that PSA willfully gives cards lower grades than they deserve, for the express purpose of grabbing additional revenue from collectors who are fated to resubmit them in an attempt to receive higher numbers.

887. Rolodexterity
Whether fees are involved or not, a dealer/collector putting his far-reaching hobby contacts and client lists to work to help a somebody chase down an item he’s been seeking.

See also: Finder’s Flea - a fellow collector who has the ability to help you locate something you’re after, but won’t commit to helping unless he’s able to personally benefit from the transaction.

888. Acronymble
A card that will hold the same monetary resale value regardless of which TPG’s holder it happens to be housed in or crossed over to.

889. Woodwinding
The use of OBO (“or best offer”) as a coda in a ‘for sale’ post.

890. “Sammy Slippers”
A collector whose first thought about attending an upcoming show is, “Man, I gotta wear the right shoes, so my aching feet and back don’t send me hobbling towards the exits after ten minutes.”

891. Return on Infestment
Making a killing on card sales, because the people overpaying for your stuff are part of the tidal wave of newbies recently jumping into the hobby with a lack of collecting knowledge, but plenty of cash to throw around.

See also: “Like shooting fish on a bubble” (idiom) - the ease of recording quick profits following the intense swelling of the market during and after the pandemic.

892. Backpattery
The universal desire of receiving an abundant amount of complimentary pats on the back from other members after posting a card in the ‘new pick-ups’ thread.

See also: Haulpapering - when you open the ‘new pick-ups’ thread and see a member’s joy over his latest addition, and then you see his screenname under “Last Post” in other threads and know he has just posted the same card in those as well.

893. Slabo-Masochist
A collector who finds pleasure in seeking out cards housed in newer slabs where the graders took a special delight in inflicting harsh pain and humiliation on submitters.

894. Gilly Route
When members take the path of using letter-like symbols and such to camouflage their real names, while still leaving them identifiable.

See also: Guise and LOLs - when one of these disguised names is done in a humorous fashion.

895. Shelf Papering
A seller exclaiming “Under Book!” to describe the asking price of his card.

896. Iwish Exit (slang)
When you quickly bail on an auction after the bidding has gotten much too high, much too early, because you can’t even dream of having enough money to ultimately win it.

See also: Battering Scram - an early bid in an auction so high that it’s clear intent is to chase everyone else away.

897. Schmucker Punched
The resentment of seeing a vintage die-cut, perforated card - that was designed to be punched out by a kid - which was ACTUALLY punched out.

898. Qualifya Obscūra (Latin)
A graded card listing where the seller hides the acronym for the qualifier in a random part of the title to avoid making it obvious that the card has said qualifier, such as “1960 Topps PSA 8 #563 Mickey Mantle All-Star Vintage Hall Of Fame OC NY Yankees.”

899. Lackbluster
The dopey playacting strategy of approaching someone about a card and then purposely downplaying your actual interest in it - “Well, I may, sorta, could possibly be interested in it” - to get him to sweeten the deal or lower the price to make it worthwhile for you to take away such a ‘humdrum’ card.

900. Raccoonteur
A collector who loves to share entertaining stories of his experiences foraging through garage sale tables or the discount bins at card shows.

901. eBayviously
The “Duh!!”-worthy common sense that when someone asks for help seeking out a card, you never have to refer him to eBay, because it’s naturally the first place he looked and where he will continue to look.

902. Integerity
When card purchases are made strictly as investments, the familiar phrase of “buy the card, not the holder” is flipped on its head to now become “buy the number on the holder, not the card.”

903. Nitprick
Someone intent on doing deep dives into people’s posts to invent something to bitch about.

See also: Thread Lice - members who seemingly always need to scratch the itch of bringing negativity to the threads they visit.

See also: Lesser of Two Weevils - when two annoying members are going after each other in a thread and you have to decide which of the pests you should side with in this particular battle.

See also: Scold Shoulder - when someone acts like an ass in a thread, and you debate whether you should call him out on his BS or just ignore it and let the fool have his fun.

904. Double Post-Op
After someone inadvertently ‘double posts’ and you feel the need to examine both of them to see if they are actually word for word identical or if differences can be found.

905. WiseGIY
An eBay seller basically telling you to go grade-it-yourself as he uses "see scan for condition" as his only assessment of the card he’s auctioning off.

906. Scarredboard
After selling a card to someone, the heartbreak of seeing him showing it off and taking great pride in his new pick-up, and you’re left wondering if you made a huge mistake in letting it go.

907. Heatnik
A spirited collector of Nolan Ryan cards and memorabilia.

908. Pausterity
The decision a collector faces of whether to buy a card (that he can’t afford) right now, to finally make it his forevermore, or to put the purchase on hold in the hopes of finding a much more reasonably priced one down the road.

909. Slabstract
A card sitting inside of any strange holder that was not issued by one of the commonly-accepted leading TPG’s, and usually by a company you’ve never heard of before.

910. Voice Train-Rec
When grammar, misspellings and/or general unreadability make it obvious that someone used their phone’s text-to-speech function and didn’t take even a second to read what their post actually says before blindly hitting ‘send.’

911. Franticizing
The urge to hit a card show floor running, darting around to the tables with the goal of trying to unearth and get to treasured dream cards before anyone else has the chance to ‘steal’ them away from you.

912. Wiffle Ball Scholar
Someone whose opinions on all things baseball are taken with a grain of salt, because his vast experience in playing the game amounts to nothing more than being easily struck out by his little niece at family barbecues.

See also: “Joebuck Yourself!” - the universal exclamation of frustration when once again the last person on Earth you would ever want calling a game happens to be the person calling the game you’ve tuned in to watch.

See also: Bobcostasshole - any athletically-challenged, self-satisfied, lecturing narcissist sitting behind the mic.

913. Blunderlined
Cards that were printed with annoying factory ‘crop’ lines clearly visible.

See also: Wallenda - when the crop line floats high above the top of the card’s image.

See also: Trip Wired - when the crop line is strung across the very bottom of the card.

914. Circle Backache
When you spot a card you want at a show at the right price and you don’t immediately grab it, you know full well when you decide to return to that dealer’s table later, it will be long gone.

915. Cost Suppressant (refer to #25)
The deliberate removal of the asking price of a card in a thread after it has been sold.

See also: Sticker Stifler - a seller who chooses to edit out the price of his card to make it now read something to the effect of “$SOLD.”

See also: Dollarsense - the argument that leaving the sales price in for everyone to see is beneficial to the entire collecting community.

See also: Stetsman - someone who abides by the principal of leaving his asking price in and unchanged following a sale.

916. Dope Springs Eternal
The sad fact that no matter how many effective safeguards are put in place, there will always be people falling victim to card-buying scams that are blatantly obvious to everyone else.


And section 2 comes to an end...so now you have time to hit the all-u-can-eat buffet tables of your life and then sleep like a prince!!