Ok people, here are the convention grabs as I promised, but first a little context: I´M FLAT BROKE. I was before the convention too, but since I needed to go to give out some cars that some people that came from other states had bought me, I figured I could as well try to trade some stuff, so I loaded a 48 car-carrying case with some of the best of my repeats and for-sales and worked the trading art mercilessly. And it came out better than I ever expected! So, for sunday I loaded another car-case, this time a 24-car unit, and also took with me some cars still in their blisters in another bag. If saturday was good, sunday was even better. I came back home with almost 50 cars, but the total expenditure was about... 15 bucks. Here's the loot.
First there be loose cars. All of these were trades; the Mistery T-Bird was never sold here, I had never seen the MR2 in red, and I traded the loose 2005 Treasure Hunt Passion for a blister-packed 2009 Rockster $TH I had lying around, which is probably the ugliest TH ever. It was a fair trade.
Playarts!!! I still can't see why I like this brand so much, but some pretty good pieces fell in my hands, including yet another variation of the futuristic cab-over, this time a tanker and mint; the Isuzu 117 is a little rough but I had never seen it, and the real star is the 240Z. All of them were trades.
Majorettes and a token Matchbox, the futuristic dump truck in red, which I traded with a friend; as for the Majorettes, AT LAST, AT LAAAAAAAASSSSSSTTT THE FREAKING CITROEN AMBULANCE WITH IT'S REAR DOOR!!! You don't have an idea of how many YEARS I've perused that damned door. I've got like 4 of those, all of them with no door. The Mercedes fire-eater, also finally complete with water-cannon, and the trash truck is awesome, I had never seen it, and best of all, absolutely mint. All of them were trades, also.
Now some hot wheels, and in this pic we have the first car that cost me something, the gray monstrosity with six wheels. Yes, I know, but it's a made-in-Mexico car in very VERY good shape and it was only like 2.50 bucks! All others were trades. Of special relevance are the funny cars, specially the blue one, very hard to find and like new; finally the T-Bird stocker in decent shape, I had never seen the Porsche in red, and I had that Vette when I was a kid, it was awesome to get it back, and absolutely mint!
Tomicas, all Japan-made, all trades. Finally the gullwing Mercedes fell in my hands; I had never seen the Rolls in that color, and the Jag will be eventually restored... maybe.
Random stuff. The groovy, trapped-in-the-70s Supervan from Zylmex, the Yatming Coke truck and E-Type Jaguar, and another one of the cars that cost me money, the Buick cop car from Corgi, from the city of Metropolis, mint and only 4 bucks.
Now we have the cars that fell into my hands in blistercards... but they aren't trapped any more.
The Garage Olds was a trade with a good friend, the Greenlight Javelin was also a trade for a horrid Hot Wheels Preferred Dodge Sidewinder.
Notice the mini-jack that came with the Javelin.
I traded these JLs for HW Bluecards; the fave is the Cord 812 with model-specific wheels and exhaust pipes that do connect to the engine; the Larson Vega does have a tunnel ram under the hood, and I had never seen a die-cast Typhoon so I grabbed it regardless of the funky colors.
Ah, these have a good story. These are the Hot Wheels Mexico Club club cars for 2009, I missed my chance back then because the Cyclone casting was very scarce here and we couldn't find the 50 cars for the planned run; recently, the missing ten cars were found and we were finally able to finish these customized cars based on Garage-series HWs. The special story with these and me is that I made the illustrations for the blister cards, so as you can imagine, I was eager to have them. These are some of the few cars in my collection that will stay on their blister cards for good.
A friend of mine had these blue cards; I traded him the ex-Corgi Land Rover and Transit for other blue cards, and then checking out a box he had lying around, I noticed that the price he had for the rest of what you see in the picture was something like 1.50 USD. It was a steal so I bought five of them, rounding out my total expenditure for the event.
The Vette and Mercedes are ex-Corgis that I had never seen, they are very well done and the Vette even opens its hood. I had been looking for the gold Hot Bird (Trans Am) for a while, and the red Mercedes is still trapped because I think I already have it loose, I have to look for it. The other mostrosity that's still in the blister was bought for its bubble top, as it will be used to restore a Mexico-made Johny Lightning Topper Custom Turbine from the 70s.
So that was it. Next year I'm doing the exact same thing. Low budget collecting rox.
I've passed up quite a few R33s though, I should probably get around to getting one of those...what I'm waiting for though is a stock R32, without flashy paint jobs or body kits or anything.
