Bean Counting

October 6th, 2024

I spent many hours this summer in the attic, emptying out boxes that had been sealed in some cases for decades, and disposing of lots of things that we didn’t need to keep anymore. I ended up reducing the attic storage by a factor of about 75%, which was very liberating. In a few years I’ll do another pass and likely toss out more.

The last step of this years clean-out was today, specifically taking care of this:

This is our Beanie Babies collection, purchased during the fad in the late 1990s.

A lot has been written about the Beanie Babies phenomena, but the quick history is that these little stuffed animals became popular in 1996 and very quickly it seemed everyone was collecting them. They were sold almost everywhere, created long lines and shopper hysteria when new ‘waves’ were released, and spurned an entire industry around them as people latched on to the idea they were not just toys, but investments that would one day make them rich. And then in 1999 the whole fad fell apart and by 2000 almost no one cared about them any more, and the world moved on.

We bought them for a few years, then put them in a box and forgot about them until now. Had you asked me how many we had I would have said a few dozen, so I was quite surprised to find we had 111 of the things:

It is surreal to think back on that era. People were legitimately insane for Beanie Babies (there’s at least two good documentaries about them), and in particular went crazy for the teddy bear types. I always found the bears repellant, but we somehow managed to get 9 of them:

People were selling some of the bears for hundreds of dollars in those days. Beanies were about 10% of all eBay sales during the height of the fad, and by 1998 the madness was worldwide. We never bought in to any of this, since it was abundantly obvious since with everyone buying them there wouldn’t be a sellers market in the future 🙂

Some of our Beanies are unusual – including one that isn’t even an animal – but these mostly come from the end of the fad when all the normal animals had already been made.

I don’t like any of these and can’t remember ever buying them. In fact both of us were surprised by some of the ones we own that we don’t find attractive in any way. I suppose we just bought them because they were inexpensive.

That said, one of ours has a $15 price tag on it!? It’s hard to believe we ever paid that and indeed I don’t recall every buying one on the secondary market (like a toy show) so this remains a mystery.

McDonald’s got in on the action as well with Happy Meal ‘Teenie Beanies’ toys several times during the craze. We have 18 of these, from the 1996, 1998 and 1999 series. As with the full sized beanies, these were extremely popular and sought after at the time. In 1996 the first series was the most successful Happy Meal promotion McDonald’s had ever had to that point!

As you can see the McDonald’s ones (on left) are about half the size of the normal toy (in the middle). At the right is a ‘Beanie Buddy’, and no I don’t know why we own that either.

A small few of ours have ‘tag protectors’ on them to keep the red cardboard tag on good condition. But we also had a pack of dozens of protectors that we never bothered putting on, which perhaps shows how much we valued this ‘investment’! Some collectors bought elaborate storage cases or even sealed them in lucite. It was important to keep the investments in tip top condition 🙂

So let’s talk money. In 1996 the suggested price of a Beanie was $5, and it seems this continued until at least 1998. We have one from 1999 with a $5.50 price tag, but that was probably just a store marking up due to demand. I think it’s reasonable therefore to estimate – at the low end – that we paid about $555 for our normal Beanies plus at least $36 more for the McDonald’s ones (Happy Meals were $2 in those days). The above photos therefore represent an ‘investment’ of about $591.

I’ll say again that some people truly thought these would make them rich one day, and such beliefs continue through the endless eBay auctions where sellers don’t understand the market died 25 years ago and never recovered.

The truth is Beanie Babies are worthless today. Every single one we have can be obtained for under $1 on eBay right now, and collections are selling for much less than $1 per Beanie. If you search you’ll find that the vast majority of auctions for these things don’t actually sell at all, since everyone has them in their attics and no one wants them! I’m sure there’s a few diehard collectors out there seeking holy grail error Beanies (and good luck to them), but it doesn’t change the fact that 99.99999% of the things now retain no value at all.

So our $591 we spent between 1996 and 1999 has now become… well maybe $50 if we successfully sold them on eBay, which is not what anyone would call an investment! But what if we’d ignored the Beanies entirely and spent our $591 back in 1999 on a true investment like the Dow Jones or Apple stock?

If we’d spent $591 on a DJIA mutual fund in December 1999 we’d have about $2458 worth of stock today.

If we’d spent $591 on APPL (Apple) stock in December 1999, we have about $171,800 in Apple stock (yes you read that correctly) today.

But we didn’t, and today we simply have worthless Beanies! We selected a ‘favourite’ each (the term is used lightly) – Legs the frog for KLS and a dubiously coloured Platypus for me – and put the remaining 16 kg of them into a different type of permanent storage:

Goodbye Beanie Babies. We’ll never forget you.

Ramen Universes Beyond: Pokemon

September 28th, 2024

I’ve covered this one before, but since the packaging on this version was different I thought it was worth a second look:

It’s another Pokémon noodle! This time it’s Eevee branded (the last one was Pikachu) and the lid promises much:

I translated it this time:

As you can see this product contains half a days calcium, a sticker (one of 18!) and some Eevee kamaboko fish cakes. Alas, it’s also seafood flavor…

Opening it revealed the sticker, nicely sealed in plastic to keep it protected. Which one did I get?

This is a legendary Pokémon named Koraidon. He’ll go on a postcard one day…

Instantly upon adding the hot water, the stink of fish fingers filled the air! It was quite repulsive, and only with great trepidation did I try a forkful. Of course I hated it, but KLS did too, so this one is an easy two thumbs down.

But the sticker is great 🙂

Garage Door Upgrade

September 19th, 2024

Our garage doors were in a terrible state.

The exterior handle dates them from a time before automatic door openers. The garage door guy told me they were at least 40 years old.

Look how dirty and wretched they were! The panels are actually made of wood (and glass): something else that dated them. They were extremely heavy, and when we lost power and had to open them manually it was a real chore.

Decades of snow and rain had started the wood rotting, and in parts gaps had formed. It was long past time to replace them! Today was the day.

The garage door guy turned up right on time at 8 am, and half an hour later he and his assistant had removed all the old hardware. Doors, springs, rails and weather seal: all gone. The noise was ungodly, but it was impressive how fast they worked given both were older than me.

Installing the new doors took much longer, and as you can see they came with shiny new rails. Only the motors remained from the old installation, although he opened and repaired the gears in one of them.

Interestingly the spring for the new doors is compact and installed above, which both takes much less space and is much safer. The doors are also quieter than the old ones.

And here they are. They’re metal, insulated and have sturdy plastic windows. They look great and I expect will outlive us. And no exterior handles 🙂

Coke Oreos Review

September 15th, 2024

Just because it can be done doesn’t mean it should be.

These are Coke Oreo cookies, a new limited edition flavour. Of course we had to try them!

The cookies are black and red, with coke-flavoured cream that contain popping candy to emulate the soda fizz.

There are three different designs on the red side of the cookie, and the usual Oreo back. The cookies have a lot of cream in them, so they’re more like the double-stuffed versions than normal Oreos.

When I opened the seal on the pack the strong smell of coke assaulted me, and the cookies actually do taste like cola! I’ll give them props for this success, but I find them distasteful, possibly because I’m not a fan of anything (lollies, any drink aside from Coke) that taste like cola. I ate one, and will never eat another.

Kristin’s opinion differs from mine. Here’s what she said: “The smell of the cookies is convincing and the taste is alright.” She will undoubtedly eat more than one.

And this collaboration didn’t end at cookies, since we also bought a bottle of the Oreo flavoured (we think?) Coca Cola. It’s only available in the zero sugar version.

This stuff is uniquely repulsive. It’s one of the worst drinks I have ever drunk, with a deep earthy taste reminiscent of the most wretched chicken ramen I have sampled. Even worse is the strong chemical aftertaste, which lingers on your tastebuds like a cold you can’t shake . There’s no chance I’ll ever try any more of this.

Kristin said: “It’s confusing!” 🙂

I think ‘they’ can make anything taste like anything else these days, but just because it’s possible doesn’t mean it needs to be done. I suppose these were worth a try, but let’s hope if they ever consider a drink collab again it’s Mountain Dew!

Retro Wax Packs (Part 5)

September 12th, 2024

Continuing the post from a couple of days ago, here’s four more ancient packs of trading cards…

Knight Rider (Donruss, 1982)

A few years ago I bought this entire series on DVD since Walmart had it for a silly low price. I haven’t yet opened it. But now at least I’ve opened a pack of these trading cards 🙂

Given this show was all about David Hasselhoff, it’s remarkable that I didn’t get a single card featuring him! And is that card in the top right the mysterious secondary girl character they wrote out after season one? As you can see the cards feature a lot of exciting KITT action, no doubt of interest to the kids that would have been the target customers.

The gum was permanently stuck to this card, and although it was rock hard it seemed less ruined by rot than the others I’ve opened recently.

The backs of all my cards are puzzle pieces, but the ones I got were so featureless it’s difficult to tell what it shows. Is that Michael Knight’s hand?

Overall a so-so set based on this single pack. I was a fan of the show at the time and probably bought have bought a pack had I seen them. I wonder if I did?

Fright Flicks (Topps, 1988)

This is an infamous card set featuring photos from many different horror films. Topps didn’t skimp on the gore and the set is depicts images of extreme gore that caused some of the films to be banned in the USA!

I had wanted a pack of this for years but it’s not easy to find today, and I paid almost $10 for this single pack. There are four pack designs and apparently the Freddy Krueger one is the most desirable today.

The cards in my pack nicely illustrate the variety of the set, with images from eight different films including some very obscure ones. How many of these do you recognize?

The gum was in near perfect condition and not stuck to the card. Of all the gum in these packs this was the one I would most likely have tried to eat were I inclined.

The cardbacks are unusual. They include the name of the film shown on the front, as well as a fictitious story of the supernatural. I think a summary of the film plot would have been better, but at least these ‘Did It Ever Happen’ stories are well written.

I got a diecut sticker with a nice shot of the Predator on it, and the back of only one of my cards was a puzzle piece. I checked and there are only 11 stickers in the set and I’d rank this one in the top three. Will I ever stick it?

This is a great set, and if I’d known about it at the time maybe I would have at least bought several packs… or maybe not since I was 16 and I’m sure trading cards were horribly uncool at that age!

Star Trek The Motion Picture (Topps, 1979)

I have dim memories of owning some of these cards as a child, even though I didn’t really understand this film when it came out. I like the purple pack design!

I love the design of these cards. As with most of Topps products of this era they show the influence of the Star Wats sets, but the white borders and dramatic font works well together. It’s interesting that one card (middle right) is a ‘behind the scenes’ photo, which were very rare in card sets in those days.

The gum was rotten and brittle but loose in the pack and hadn’t damaged any card. In the bin it went!

All but one of the backs of mine are puzzle pieces, and based on the borders there are at least four of them to assemble.

One card contains a (prophetic) Shatner quote. I wonder if any cards in the set contained a film synopsis?

The sticker is die-cut and a little boring, especially with the copyright info and number included (I would cut both off if I stuck this). There’s a lot of stickers in this set, and only a minority are spaceships. As it turns out I’ve owned one of the other stickers for years:

Isn’t it beautiful? I daresay Star Trek fans in 1979 probably bought these card packs in droves just to get the fantastic die-cut character stickers 🙂

This is a wonderful set, and I’d love to crack open an entire box. Given it’s collectibility though, I imagine that’s all but impossible these days.

Moonraker (Topps, 1979)

I’ve had this pack for over a decade, and it’s been aging carefully in a box. Finally it was time to break the wax seal and see what was inside!

Much like the Star Wars series, there’s no bad James Bond films. Lesser men may mumble about the qualities of Moonraker, but for this fan it’s always a cracking watch! The cards illustrate the film well, with the typical Topps design from those days.

I believe this is the oldest pack featured these past two posts, so it’s interesting the gum was intact, apparently not rotting, and arguably still edible. Should I have tried it?

The backs are a mix of puzzle pieces, a puzzle guide and a synopsis. I like the line art of Bond in the space suit.

And here’s my magnificent sticker. There were 22 in the set, only five die-cut, and only three of those featuring Bond so I got lucky (although this is arguably the worst of the Bond stickers).

Amusingly my pack even included this misprint card! Surely this is worth a pretty penny these days? I think I’ll sell it for a nice profit to Bernard 🙂

And that ends my recent opening of ancient card packs. I can’t think of any old wax era packs I haven’t yet opened here on the blog, so I doubt there will be a further update like these. However that doesn’t mean this series is entirely dead, since I may have a few other packs to open one day…