Taking a Look at my Man Cave - A Work in Progress

So, I thought it would be a good idea to show everyone what I have finally been able to do with my 'man cave.'

This room is the first room that you step into if you are coming from the driveway into our new house, so it was a staging area for boxes for the first few months that we have been here. We finally were able to get rid of a bunch of stuff via a yard sale (and plan on having another very soon). I had a free weekend this weekend, so I hung a bunch of stuff up.

Bear in mind that the room is still taking shape, so there are boxes and stuff still piled in certain areas. I hope to get rid of several boxes at subsequent card shows, but for now, I wanted to show how things have been coming along...


As you come into the room from our living room, you'll see a few of the movie posters, etc that I have. I hung up the Family Guy Blue Harvest and Scarface posters first, but I have a few other movie posters that I would like to hang up as well. There is a beat up china cabinet against the wall that will be sold at the next yard sale because I don't have time to restore it (or a hutch to put it on). Once it gets out of there, I'll have more room, haha.


Our good friend Babe-O-Licious gave my wife the awesome NHL All Star banner from Atlanta for Christmas. We went to that All Star game, so it is awesome that we were able to get our hands on one of the banners.


Here you can see some event posters that I have collected over the years. The 1938 World Series poster is a replica of course. The two wrestling posters came from the grocery store I used to work at. They would put the posters up on the Pepsi machine that we had outside and my manager let me have them when the event was over. The pom poms came from Babe in a collection of Panthers gear that she gave me for Christmas one year.


Here is a better view of that corner. My wife's octopus from the Red Wing games is what is sitting atop my curio cabinet. Inside the cabinet are all baseballs that I had signed in person at various minor and major league games. A few notable baseballs in this curio are Don Zimmer, Mike Bordick, Chris Hoiles and a team signed ball from the Charlotte Orioles (possibly 1984) that a friend from work gave me.


Here you can see Chris in his PJs pointing at old pictures of my Dad's race cars. The china cabinet to the left is one of my prized possessions. Inside it are all of my HOF signed baseballs as well as balls signed by star players, MVPs, Cy Young winners, etc. Please forgive the pile of mess on the table, this is everything I had loaded up for the last card show. I wanted to keep it all in one place in case I decided to do the July show. I decided not to and need to put the stuff away somewhere. I'll get around to it.

Also inside the china cabinet is my dad's helmet from his championship seasons of 1992 and 1993. You can see a connecting rod signed by my dad to the right of the helmet and a piston signed by fellow racer Bill Kuhlmann (given to me in 1993). Inside the helmet is a burnt piston signed by my dad.

To the left are baseballs signed by Orioles (Brooks, Cal, 2 Brian Roberts and obscured by the door frame is Jim Palmer). This shelf houses my HOF balls. The shelf above has Cy Young/MVP winners and other notable players such as Don Newcombe, Marty Marion and Bryce Harper. Not sure if you can make it out, but there is a Phillie Blunt tin box that belonged to my great grandfather. The copyright date on the tin is from the 1920s. My mom rescued it from my dad's shelf in his race shop.

Finally, here is the newest china cabinet that I got last weekend. It came from an elderly couples house that my grandparents purchased in 1989-1990. They bought the house with the intention of moving my great grandmother in, but she, instead lived her final years in their spare bedroom. My parents had the china cabinet in their 'brooder building' (where they have been breeding their exotic birds). I was able to thoroughly clean it with Murphy's wood oil. It looks awesome.

Inside it are my die cast Shirley Muldowney dragsters. My brother Philip picked me up 3 of them while my wife bought the fourth one. I also have my bobbleheads in here (Cal Ripken, Jim Thome and 2 generic Orioles). My Nolan Reimold bobblehead is on my file cabinet in my office at work.

There are plush mascots of the Lansing Lugnuts and Montgomery Biscuits.

There are two additional die cast cars: Blaine Johnson (mom got it for me after Johnson was killed in 1996) and Mark Thomas' Ethanol Funny Car (Mark gave it to me in the mid 90's - he is an awesome man). I walked up to him in St. Louis in 1989 and got his autograph. The next day on the way to the track, he met my parents at the gas station and gave them a stack of signed cards because he remembered us from the day before. Since then, we have kept in touch. He is also the winningest pro driver in IHRA (International Hot Rod Association) history.

So, there you have it. I have a lot more to hang on the walls and organize before I consider the room complete. Of course, it will be an ever evolving endeavour, so things will always be moving in and out of it. I hope you all enjoyed the glimpse into our new house. I plan on adding another post once I consider the room more toward completion.