お久しぶりです！ Or, “It’s been a while!” And yes it has. For that, I apologize. It’s not for lack of desire so much as I really just haven’t had much of anything of interest to share lately with you. As much as I want/plan to mod and work on my car, at the moment it’s just been put on the back-burner a bit. This is mostly due to the fact that I decided to sink my funds this summer into some of my other hobbies that also tend to be expensive because I had needs there that needed to be filled and no time to put them off. It happens, and it’s not a bad thing as it’s not like I had to pay bills or stuff, it’s just that I put money into other fun stuff that happens to not be visible here. Either way I’m happy, so it’s all good. Anyway, I did just recently get a small trinket of interest that I thought I’d share with you today, and I do have another post planned that I simply have to wait a bit before posting as I need to photograph the process and I’m not quite ready to do that yet, so there’ll be at least one more interesting item for you in the near future. For now though, let me show you what I have today.
As if you haven’t already noticed from the photo, it’s a keychain – specifically, a JDM 2023 BRZ Super GT GT-300 keychain from the Japanese STI swag shop (the link takes you to the general JDM swag shop, so click the STI link there to see those goods. I figured you’d want to see both. Use Google Translate to read the pages in English.). The size of the keychain is about 3″x1.5″ and about 1/8″ thick. It’s made from acrylic and the design is encased in it completely. I didn’t snap a photo of it because I wanted to show the part#, but the rear design is simply the STI logo in red on a white background. The quality is pretty high for what it is, and it’s a nice, lightweight keychain that is rather unique and rare – at least on this side of the pond. To get my hands on it, since the JDM swag shop won’t sell directly to the U.S. I did a search for the part number and found a handful of Japanese sellers on Rakuten that carried them. This was perfect as I can use Buyee there to get the item with no problems. I’ve mentioned Buyee in the past as I’ve used them to purchase my Beatrush shift knob along with other non-automotive items and they’ve always been honest and reliable. The only rub is that the international shipping cost on a small inexpensive item like this can often be more than the item itself, so you really have to want it. That said, you can get cool rare things pretty easily, so if you don’t care about the cost, go for it – I did! Speaking of the cost, when all is said and done, the keychain cost me $37 USD total, of which slightly over half of that was the international shipping fee I mentioned. Expensive? Well, yes, but I don’t care because I think it’s cool, so there you go. If you also think it’s cool, do a search on Buyee for the part number in the photo below and you can get your hands on one as well. Happy hunting!
