That box of eels got me thinking

I've been thinking a lot lately about timing. Not the art of it in a comedic sense, but in terms of the right time. The right time to get the band back together. The right time to take the wash to the laundromat. The right time to start blogging about baseball cards again.

It's that last one that keeps haunting me. And the funny thing is, though I think of it a lot, I can't seem to get words to page on any topic related to baseball cards. This may change; I haven't written anything of consequence in months, maybe even a year. But maybe it's passed, the right time, that is. Maybe the time for writing about baseball cards was years in the past. Maybe it's the right time to do something else.

Back in around 2003 or 2004, I got the idea to make a coffee table book of my collection of souvenir postcard folders. I even went to the special collections room at the Boston Public Library in Copley Square to view the Tichnor Brothers collection of original art and postcards. I was going to write a brief history of souvenir postcard folders as an essay, and slap it in front of the endless color plates of the coffee table book. My interest eventually waned in the project, and I never got it together.

I have a massive collection of souvenir postcard folders; it's one I'm most proud of. Maybe there's still something in there. And when the timing's right...

The perpetual brand

I'm in the group (and it's probably a pretty small group) who believes that it's not the end of the world for businesses to end. Take the Montreal Expos, for example. It was sad to see the Expos brand die, but it wasn't the end of the world. In fact, I think it would be a good thing for brands to self-destruct after 35-40 years. It would create room in the marketplace for completely new ideas and competition.

I dislike the New York Yankees, partly for their arrogance; partly their collection of high-priced talent. But I mostly dislike them because their brand is ubiquitous. I wouldn't mind seeing the New York Yankee brand dissolve and a different one take its place. The same goes for Coca Cola or any other number of world-stretching brands. Are we so naive to believe that a brand shouldn't have an end date? That it should be perpetual?