2009 Upper Deck Series One and Two combo blaster recap

My irrational longing for card #U35 picturing Matt Wieters led me to this lone blaster at a Target for $19.99 - it seems like the only baseball blasters were Fan Paks and one blaster of 2009 Topps T-206.

I had a $25 gift card [which was passed down to me for my birthday as an impromptu present from my father] burning a hole in my pocket - I looked for the Upper Deck Series 1&2 combo packs blaster box at another Target and couldn't find it.

When I finally found one, it just felt right to pick it up - though I could be looking for a base card [maybe worth $7-$10 right now] of the next Eric Munson and not the next Thurman Munson.

There are 10 packs in each blaster featuring 18 cards per clear plastic wrap pack - including two Generation Now inserts, two Upper Deck Update cards and one 20th Anniversary insert.

The Upper Deck Update cards seem like UD's response to Topps' inclusion black/Throwback parallels in retail blasters - as far as I know, the Update cards [50 in the set] from Upper Deck only come in Series I&II combo fat packs and in blaster boxes.

I started ripping once I got in the car - after nine packs and 162 cards in, I was down to my last clear plastic wrap pack and conceded this break might very well be a 'bust,' since I hadn't pulled the Wieters card that had been the object of my lust.

Seriously, was I going to be stuck with the packaging - as the only tangible thing picturing Wieters I could keep?

Seriously, why do I care about a base, non-autograph, non-serial numbered or limited parallel card of an overhyped top prospect - who did have a solid, if unspectacular rookie year.

Instead of thumbing through the cards from the front, for the last pack, I thumbed from the back - the first Update card was Mat Latos and second Update card, in the final pack was Wieters.

Last pack

36 Daniel Cabrera
99 Johnny Cueto
116 Todd Helton
221 Jason Kendall
400 Jesus Flores
421 Mat Gamel
435 Chicago White Sox - Team Leaders subset
U35 Matt Wieters
GN 27 Joba Chamberlain - Generation Now insert
U21 Mat Latos
GN 13 Chase Utley - Generation Now insert
2131 Pluto - 20th Anniversary insert
#630 Ryan Speier
646 Dallas McPherson
623 Seth Smith
881 Jason LaRue
976 Prince Fielder
871 Khalil Greene

I didn't faint or anything like that but was relieved I had the card in my fat, grubby hands - frickin' mission accomplished, Chief.