Found in My Basement: College Papers and Tax Returns

It's been several years since we did a thorough cleaning of boxes. With the older two boys away at camp, we decided to dig into some boxes which have been sitting in our storage closet for years. The best find was a gift card for $100 that we received when Pedro Tulo was born in 2014, and although the expiration date on the card expired, the funds did not, so I called the company and received a brand new card in the mail. We donated toys that my kids have outgrown and have seen better days but may still be useful for preschool-aged kids. We threw away and recycled a lot of stuff. 

As you can tell from the title of this post, I found many folders filled with college papers and tax returns. While I'm not sure how long you're supposed to keep tax returns (it seems like the answer is only 3 years), I have some dating back to my childhood. Why do I have tax returns from when I was only 10? It's not like I was working at Hills or Kmart. Anyway, all tax returns from the 20th century and the 2000s are now gone. Fun fact: I made $1,877 working as a soccer referee in 2005 or 2006. That was definitely before kids when I had a lot more time and was physically able to work multiple games on both days of a weekend. I haven't come close to making this amount in a year since then. I also found this W-2 tax statement proving that I worked at Blockbuster.

On to the college papers. Did you ever want my thoughts on Secretary of State Warren Christopher from a 1997 paper? How about a 1995 paper titled "The Unification of Germany and Its Economic Consequences?" I was quite generous with the margins and font size of this paper about NAFTA. Really needed to make sure I had enough pages!

Just one more item to share. While I wrote about being a summer intern for Congressman Mike Doyle, here is a letter of recommendation from him. Can I still use this or is there an expiration date?

Found In My Basement: Missed Opportunity

The Moose recently had to do a project discussing his family history. I unsuccessfully searched for a family tree I made for my own elementary school project, but it wasn’t needed as he got more information from talking with his grandparents. In the meantime, I came across the book The Odyssey which I read in 10^th grade. (Or at least I was assigned to read in 10^th grade.) Inside the book was this folded coupon:

 
Since I still have the coupon, I guess this means that I never redeemed it for the free quiz answer. Who knows where this could have led if I turned the coupon in to the teacher? Maybe this could have improved my 10^th grade English grade. This could have led to increased confidence in reading and vocabulary resulting in better SAT verbal scores and helping me get into an Ivy League school. Naturally, I would have made connections with the brightest minds of my generation and got a job after college making 7 figures a year. I could be on Wall Street or a think tank or even running my own business. This really could have been some type of journey or maybe another word for adventure that I can’t think of at the moment.

Found in My Brother's Basement: NHL All Stars

In January 1990, the National Hockey League hosted its all-star game and activities in Pittsburgh. Although we didn't have tickets to any events at the Civic Arena, my dad took me, my brother, and my best friend to the hotel (probably the Marriott City Center) across the street on the Saturday before the game. I'm not sure what exactly we expected being at the hotel. I guess our hope was that players would go to and from the arena through the hotel. We weren't alone as there were dozens if not hundreds of people joining us in the lobby. I'm sure that the hotel staff was thrilled!

Sure enough, we did see players. While I'll always choose Mario Lemieux over Wayne Gretzky, Wayne was gracious in signing autographs for at least an hour. Meanwhile, Mario ran through the lobby as quickly as possible, signing only a handful of autographs. My brother was one of the few of the lucky ones. We got autographs from several other players too, so today, I'm happy to share a brand new found in my brother's basement!

I guess we thought that we might forget who signed the autograph or were unsure if we could read the signature. That's why you see the hand-written names near the autographs.

Thanks to Wayne, Mario (sort of), Mark Messier, Al Iafrate, Joe Nieuwendyk, and others for taking time to sign autographs for kids.

I should also mention that the Gary Anderson autograph was from a different event. Plus, I'm pretty sure the Will Clark autograph was part of the card.

Found In My Brother's Basement: Gretchen Carlson

My brother moved recently and found several autographs addressed to both of us. This is an autographed picture from Gretchen Carlson, Miss America 1989.

I have no idea where this is from. I don't remember meeting her. My dad worked at the Monroeville Mall in Pittsburgh, so it's possible that she was there for an event, and he got this autograph from her. No clue. 

Most people can't name more than a few Miss America winners, so I think it's pretty neat that the autograph is by someone people know. This is now the second time I wrote about a famous Miss America winner. The posts are only 16 years apart!

Found In My Basement: Harry Potter

I tried reading Harry Potter to The Moose (now 9) several times over the last few years, but he was never really interested. I don't think we made it past the first chapter or two. Since we're stuck at home during the pandemic, I tried again a few weeks ago and now we're only two chapters away from finishing the first book, "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone." He still doesn't have the patience to read more than a chapter or so a day, but he seems to be enjoying it. (Of course, he does have the patience to sit and watch hours worth of Dude Perfect videos. Those guys seem to yell A LOT!)

Anyway, now that we're almost done with the first book, I thought it would make sense to find the other books so that we can continue reading the series. Many people have bookshelves filled with books easily accessible. Not in my house! While we have bookshelves in the kids' rooms, those generally contain books appropriate for preschool and early elementary school kids. Any other free space in our home has been overtaken by toys and games and now learning areas as we prepare for The Moose (4th grade) and Pedro Tulo (1st grade) to begin the school year at home. Books are generally in boxes in various parts of the house, mostly in the basement storage closet. So I spent Sunday trying to find the Harry Potter books.

As you can see from the picture, I was successful. Not pictured is the amount of time it took to find the books and to move things around the basement closet. I also found this Pittsburgh Steelers commemorative bag of potato chips with a coupon for $10 the purchase of $50 at Dick's Sporting Goods. Unfortunately, the coupon expired in January 2003. I'm throwing these chips out with the garbage tonight.

You might be wondering why there are only five books pictured of the seven-book series. The first book is on the couch, but I'm missing the fourth book, "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire." When I went to England in 2000, I bought this book at a London bookstore not long after it came out as a gift for my mom. She got me into the Harry Potter series, and I read the first three books during my time in England, particularly traveling to and from Lancaster on the weekends. I finished the fourth book on the flight back to Pittsburgh, and my mom still has it today. What's neat about this edition is that it's in British English rather than American English. Oh, here's a picture of Ziggy wanting to see what I was doing.

By the way, this blog is so old that I can still read posts from when the sixth and seventh books came out. I wrote two posts of my eagerly awaiting the sixth book to arrive via UPS that would basically be tweets today. I also shared predictions for the final book, and briefly how I dressed up as Dean Thomas when this book was released at midnight at a Harry Potter party.

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Found In My Basement: Roberto Clemente's Player Evaluations

A good friend of my in-laws is a huge Pittsburgh Pirates fan. He even got to be the Pirates alumni manager for a day at a Spring Training game about a decade ago where Terry Francona (the Phillies manager at the time) ribbed him since they were from neighboring towns in Butler County. He once mailed me an envelope filled with various Pittsburgh Pirates information such as scorecards and old articles that I just found earlier this week while going through boxes which haven't left the back of the closet in years. He also included a copy of these player evaluations of Roberto Clemente as a teenager.

Pretty cool!

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Found In My Basement: Desert Storm Cards

When I was in junior high school and early high school, I was really into collecting baseball cards. My dad took my brother and me to various card shows, and we regularly bought packs of cards from different stores. I feel like any allowance or other money I got went right into cards. Baseball and other types of sports trading cards were a booming industry during this time (late 80s to early 90s). I would also look through the Beckett guide to see card values for Topps, Fleer, Donruss, Upper Deck cards and sets. A friend and I even sold cards at the Eastland Mall flea market, and my brother and I had lemonade stands where we also sold (or tried to sell) cards.

I’m not sure when it occurred, but sometime during the time I collected cards, there was definitely a market over-saturation. It may have coincided with the Gulf War. I’m not doing a history of the Gulf War here, but this was arguably the first televised war. Millions of people watched CNN, seeing what appeared to be a video game with rockets and anti-aircraft and artillery light up the sky over Baghdad. To honor (celebrate?) the Gulf War and the patriotism that seemed to be everywhere, both Topps and Pro Set created Desert Storm cards. Naturally, I got them and still have them.

You got to learn about politics, current events, world leaders, and geography! Are these worth anything today?


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Found In My Basement: 1980s Pirates

It’s a long story, but we had a leak in our home over the summer, and as a result, we need to replace our hardwood floor. My home currently looks like a scene from the TV show Dexter without the blood. Anyway, before the floor people arrived, we needed to move the smaller items. This included so many books and toys. As part of this process, I also came across my scrapbook from growing up and wanted to share this page today.

Autographed pictures from Pittsburgh Pirate greats! Or at least Pittsburgh Pirate goods! I have no idea how I acquired these pictures. It's likely that my dad took my brother and me to some type of appearance featuring John Smiley and Jim Gott. I wonder if they discussed writing "Best Wishes" on all of the pictures before the appearance. Bill Madlock must have been in such a charitable mood that he autographed the picture twice. My favorite of this group is probably catcher Junior Ortiz. It's not autographed or even in color. Was he just somewhere passing them out like ads for a new club opening?


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Update: My first Found In My Basement blog post was published on August 16, 2010. Why am I mentioning this today? It's because I included this exact same picture in that blog post. Apparently, I've run out of blog ideas and am recycling content from several months before the first episode of Game of Thrones aired!

Found In My Basement: Sammy Sosa's 63rd Home Run

In September 1998, the sports world centered around Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, and the single-season home run record. I lived in San Diego at the time and attended the Cubs-Padres game where Sosa hit #63.

The interesting part of the home run is that Sosa's grand slam basically won the game for the Cubs, the Padres were in the playoff race, and yet, the crowd went crazy. The scoreboard even flashed to celebrate the home run. (The Padres players were not happy about the scoreboard operator essentially rooting against the home team.) Of course, McGwire ended up winning the home run crown, Sosa won the MVP award, and the players never took any, um, unusual substances. The Padres won the National League title, but lost in the World Series. Stupid Yankees.

Blog post/credit to the San Diego Union Tribune.

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Found In My Basement: Clinton Defeats Bush

I'm attempting to do a major clean-up/organization of boxes I haven't opened in years, which means that I'm bringing back the popular(?) Found In My Basement series. Enjoy my first entry in this series in nearly two years!

In 1992, the city of Pittsburgh did not have a major newspaper. Prior to this, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette published a morning paper while the Pittsburgh Press came out in the afternoon. The idea of an afternoon paper today seems ludicrous. Anyway, there was a strike by the newspaper delivery truck drivers (I remember that there was a strike; I didn't remember that it was by the truck drivers) that left Pittsburgh without a major newspaper for months. So if you wanted news, you had to watch the local news or the national nightly half-hour newscast on CBS, ABC, or NBC. Perhaps you could check out CNN or get a USA Today though the best bet may have been to pick up a suburban newspaper. You couldn't get news from the internet in 1992, and there weren't 10 stations with 24-hour news coverage.

While I briefly mentioned that there was little to no newspaper coverage of the shooting at my high school, there also wasn't a major Pittsburgh newspaper that covered the 1992 election. Yet, since my dad picked up newspapers of major events (something that I still try to do today), here is the November 4, 1992 edition of McKeesport's The Daily News showing the 1992 election results.

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Found In My Basement: Steel City 2009

Years ago, Nicholas of PSAMP had a series about unlicensed Pittsburgh sports merchandise. While he no longer writes much on his blog (though he may be the most active person in the world on Twitter), this post would have fit perfectly in his series. Based on the Steelers and Penguins success at the end of the last decade, here is a shirt to honor these teams and two of its stars.

I'm pretty sure that this shirt was a gift from my parents. Amazingly, with the amount of turnover on sports teams, both Harrison and Fleury still play for the Steelers and Pens respectively.

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Found In My Basement: Rusted Root T-Shirt

I did a little spring cleaning recently and managed to compile a complete bag full of clothes to donate. I also found dozens of clothes, particularly T-shirts, that I'm not willing to give up. Occasionally throughout the summer, I plan on sharing pictures of some of these clothes. (I'm sure that you can't wait for this!)

First up is this Rusted Root T-shirt from a concert I saw on some mountain or ski slope around State College, PA in the fall of 1995. I don't remember much (if anything) about the concert except that everyone sat on the grass/blankets on a fairly steep hill.

For those of you not familiar with Rusted Root, well, shame on you. They were by far the biggest band in Western Pennsylvania in the mid-1990s. They were huge among the high school and college scene, and at least to me, were right there with the Dave Matthews Band. Although the band sold over 3 million records (albums? cassettes?), they never seemed to hit the mainstream unless you count Send Me On My Way being played in Enterprise car rental commercials.



Rusted Root still tours and were actually at Washington DC's 9:30 Club on Wednesday night. My guess is that they're not selling this T-shirt at the show.


Bonus Fun Fact #1: Despite growing up in Pittsburgh during the height of Rusted Root, I never actually saw them perform in Pittsburgh. I saw them at State College, Ithaca & at the Celebrate Fairfax festival in 2010.

Bonus Fun fact #2: The father of one of the band members officiated my wedding.


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Do Pretzels Go Bad?

I recently discovered an unopened bag of Rold Gold pretzels in my basement closet. (Yes, this truly is a "Found in My Basement" blog post!) My excitement in finding my favorite snack food was tempered by the fact that the bag shows a use by date of June 2014. While I don't use milk or eggs beyond the expiration date (well, maybe one or two days after the date if the milk smells okay), would an unopened bag of pretzels be stale or unsafe to eat 8 months after the expiration date?

Meeting Benjamin Netanyahu

I visited Israel during winter break of 1996/the first day or two of 1997. It was an amazing trip. I was part of the leadership bus consisting of college students throughout the country. Most of the people on the bus didn't know more than a few others, so there weren't the cliques that you might expect. I became friends with a couple from the University of Houston and went to their wedding a few years later. My assigned roommate attended Texas A&M, and I remember him trying to bargain for cheaper ice cream at Ben & Jerry's since you're expected to bargain at retail stores in Israel. Obviously, this did not apply at Ben & Jerry's but the interaction between my roommate and the employee was hilarious. I made friends with people from George Mason University, Arizona State University and San Diego State, and in this last case, she vouched me, helping me get a job there.

Unfortunately, I lost all of my pictures from this trip. I don't know if I accidentally threw them away packing up after college graduation, but they have been gone for 18+ years now. However, I recently found a newsletter that included this picture of me with the current Israeli Prime Minister and the leader at the time, Benjamin Netanyahu.

I honestly don't know why I was picked to meet Netanyahu, and more importantly, why the Prime Minister took time out of his schedule to address a group (though a large group) of American college students. I think I probably said hello, but I doubt we said more than ten words to each other. I'm positive that I was much nicer to Netanyahu than I was to former California Governor Gray Davis.

Netanyahu is in the news quite a bit these days. He's currently running for re-election in Israel and may or may not address Congress in the near future. Whether or not you agree or disagree with any (or all) of Netanyahu's opinions and policies, how often can you say that you shook hands with a country leader? I mean, sure I got a holiday card from the Gore family, but Al Gore was only the Vice President at that time, and it's not like we actually met.

Peter Pan 1993 & 2014

NBC is airing a live version of Peter Pan tonight, and I plan on watching it...eventually.* You may not know that I starred in an award-winning musical production of Peter Pan 21 years ago. I played Twin #2, one of the Lost Boys (some may say that I'm still a Lost Boy). I probably had a dozen lines and even had a solo in the song "I Won't Grow Up." Sure, I earned the solo because my voice was so far off from how well Twin #1 could sing, but a solo is a solo. Since the kids seem to like throwing things back on Thursdays, here are some pictures from the 1993 production of Peter Pan. Yes, I'm in there somewhere.

I have no recollection of those animals in the middle being in the show.

Anyway, I'm interested in seeing how NBC pulls off the live musical version of Peter Pan. Christopher Walken as Captain Hook is a brilliant casting move. I'm not sure about Allison Williams as Peter Pan, but if it ensures a cameo from her father, I'm all for it!



* I rarely watch anything live these days, and there is a 0% chance that I can commit three hours on a Thursday night to watch Peter Pan. I'll still be putting the kids to bed when the musical begins at 8:00. Thank goodness for the DVR. I love you, DVR (though we still have some catching up to do)!

Ultimate Mix CD

While I have plenty of mix tapes from my high school and college days, I think I only have one mix CD. And it's a good one. This is the ultimate pump-you-up mix that will also ensure that you'll drive a little faster on the highway.

1. Jump Around - House of Pain

2. It Takes Two - Rob Base & DJ E-Z Rock

3. Bust a Move - Young MC

4. Baby Got Back - Sir Mix-a-Lot

5. Humpty Dance - Digital Underground

6. Ice Ice Baby - Vanilla Ice

7. Fantastic Voyage - Coolio

8. OPP - Naughty By Nature

9. Gettin' Jiggy With It - Will Smith

10. Lose Yourself - Eminem

11. Hot in Herre - Nelly

12. What's Love - Fat Joe & Ashanti

13. U Can't Touch This - MC Hammer

14. California Love - 2Pac & Dr. Dre

In hindsight, I would probably replace Gettin' Jiggy With It with the superior Will Smith song Summertime (by DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince). Otherwise, I still enjoy it.

As always, you can click here for more items Found In My Basement.

Christina Aguilera: Found In My Basement

In the summer of 2000, I won a contest where I received two tickets to one of nearly a dozen Columbus concerts or events. However, as I mentioned last week, I was in England for most of that summer and unable to attend just about every event. There was one concert, though, that I could see when I returned, and this is the ticket stub from the concert:

Yes, I saw Christina Aguilera perform live at the 2000 Ohio State Fair. She was a genie in a bottle. She knew what a girl wants. She also wanted her fans to come on over baby. She was not lady marmalade or dirrty yet. All I remember was that there were hundreds if not thousands of screaming pre-teen and teenage girls. My friend and I were completely out of place. She also performed a cover of Free's All Right Now and most of the crowd had never heard of the song before.

As an interesting side note to this concert, the opening act when the tour started was a little group called Destiny's Child. At some point during the summer, Destiny's Child got big, and they were no longer opening act material. I wonder what ever happened to them. Anyway, Christina's opening act was a group called soulDecision (thanks WikiPedia!) that seemed like Destiny's Child-lite.

As always, you can click here for more items Found In My Basement.

13 Year-Old Ketchup (Found In My Basement)

When I was in high school, my friend and I worked as videographers at several Bar and Bat Mitzvah parties. We were definitely not professionals and got paid as such. We videotaped the receptions, including the speeches and dances, and gave copies of the tapes directly to the families with no editing whatsoever. Years later, my friend's sister got married, and their parents asked me to come out of retirement to videotape the wedding and reception. While I don't remember getting paid much, they gave me a potpourri of Pittsburgh memorabilia including this bottle of Heinz ketchup to commemorate the opening of Heinz Field.

I'm not sure if you can tell by this picture, but the date on the bottle states September 16, 2001. However, because of 9/11, there were no NFL games that weekend. The first regular season game at Heinz Field was actually October 7, 2001. Therefore, perhaps this ketchup is a collectable worth hundreds or thousands of dollars!

As always, you can click here for more items Found In My Basement.

Sheffield Wednesday vs. PSV Eindhoven (Found In My Basement)

As part of my graduate program, I spent the summer of 2000 in Lancaster, England with several trips throughout the UK and Ireland. My internship supervisor was a Sheffield Wednesday season ticketholder and offered to take me to a game. Even though my program ended, I traveled back to Lancaster just to meet up with my supervisor to attend a friendly between the Netherlands powerhouse PSV Eindhoven and Sheffield Wednesday, who had just been relegated from the Premier League, and unfortunately, remains in the Championship League today.

This is what I remember about the game:

- Despite the recent relegation, folks were upbeat about the season.

- I ate some type of chicken pie from the concession stand, and it was terrible.

- The final score was 2-2 (though I'm not 100% sure of this now).

- I slept for nearly the entire car ride back from Sheffield.

Why am I bringing this up? Besides the fact that the Netherlands play in the World Cup today, I found the Sheffield Wednesday-PSV Eindhoven program recently. Here is said program:

You may recognize Ruud Van Nistelrooy on the PSV roster. He did not play and actually went to Manchester United not long after the game.

As always, you can click here for more items Found In My Basement.

Opening Day 1988 (Found in My Basement)

Since today is opening day for most of Major League Baseball, I thought now would be the perfect time to share this 1988 Pittsburgh Pirates Official Magazine and Scorecard from the Pirates home opener against the Philadelphia Phillies that I attended on April 11, 1988.

Why yes that is 1987 National League Rookie Pitcher-of-the-Year Mike Dunne on the cover.

The Pirates starting line-up on this day was:

LF Barry Bonds
2B Jose Lind
CF Andy Van Slyke
3B Bobby Bonilla
1B Sid Bream
RF R.J. Reynolds
C Mike LaValliere
SS Al Pedrique
P Doug Drabek

While Bonds hit a home run and the Pirates won, what I remember most about the game (box score here) was the incredible performance by the legendary Vicente Palacios. In the top of the 6th, the Phillies loaded the bases with no outs against Drabek. Jim Leyland brought in Palacios who retired the next three batters without allowing a run. Three Rivers Stadium was rocking!

Now, the fun part. Check out some of the pictures and ads from the scorebook.

I wish I owned that Starter jacket.

I really liked John Saunders.

A car phone for less than $20 a month? What a deal!

I'm pretty sure I have the exact same sweater today that Mike Diaz wore more than 15 years ago.

Are Quinn and Banana selling popcorn at PNC Park today? (Sorry, that was mean. I spent many, many mornings listening to B-94 and regularly tried to win cases of pop on Thirsty Thursdays.)

Let's Go Bucs!