"Manning up" for a move (Full Version)

All Forums >> [Casual Banter] >> Off the Grid



Message

CallaFirestormBW -> "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 11:50:39 AM)

Ok, so my Darling and I are getting ready to move. It wouldn't be so bad, except that I've managed to collect almost 1500 books. I love words... I love the taste, smell, texture of books, and am admittedly addicted to the ideas that they present. It breaks my heart to part with even -one-....

... so when we moved into our current apartment, we had 35 boxes of books. Now, we have nearly 50, and I don't want to pay for the frigging boxes to pack them all up.... so now I have to 'man up' and let go of some of my precious written pets!

What about y'all... have you had a little, piss-ant thing in your lives that just made you want to sit down and tell 'em all to go to hell, but you knew you had to 'man up' and just do what had to be done?

I don't need to know what to do. I know what I have to do, and I'm going to do it... but it just breaks my heart to part with a single idea (even though, frankly, the books are starting to take up more room in our home than the people, and that just isn't right in any case).

Calla Firestorm



pahunkboy -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 12:12:08 PM)

me too!

I tho write IN my books. I scribble, highlight and make notes.

They are now in the one living room. I cant part with mine either.  Here is a hint. Some books are time dated.  Toss THOSE first.  Next go for the serverly raggedy books.

There are used books stores and groups that trade them.

So make 2 piles for now.   I hear you.



subtee -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 12:15:44 PM)

~sniff~

I can't help. I'd take them all and leave the people.

~Bibliophiletee



slaveboyforyou -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 12:15:52 PM)

I'm a packrat, and it's hard for me to get rid of anything.  I have a lot of books too, and I don't like getting rid of them.  I had to force myself to donate a bunch of hardbacks to the library a few years ago.  Paperbacks are a little easier; I just trade them for other books at the used book shops. 



pissdoll -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 12:20:44 PM)

i love donating books.....

it sucks to HAVE to give things away, but it's great to know that other people will have the opportunity to read things that changed your thoughts and touched your heart.



RCdc -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 12:32:03 PM)

You should come to our house tee - You would be in biblophile heaven...
 
the.dark.



subtee -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 12:41:36 PM)

Good grief, could you be any more attractive?

~drool~



LadyEllen -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 2:22:33 PM)

Throw out all the fiction which isnt classics or literature - or donate them

How would it look then?

E



bipolarber -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 2:55:38 PM)

I had to go through this when I moved out here to Arkansas from Denver. I must've given up half of my library, just to be able to fit the furniture into the truck, along with the boxes of books...

Try this:
1) pick up a book.
2) ask yourself, "Have I read this?"
3) If yes, then ask yourself, "Is it a favorite I can't live without?"
4) If yes, then ask yourself, "does it have any sentimental value?"

If the are something you really want to read, or have read and may never find again, or is autographed, then keep it. Otherwise, divest yourself of that particular book.

5) repeat, 1,500 times.

Be ruthless.
Look on this as not giving up your books, but rather as "pruning the shelves" to make room for MORE books. [:D]



DMFParadox -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 3:12:02 PM)

I had a library. Then I lost my roof. Long story... A list of some of what was lost:
Complete set of mark twain, every volume signed by the author, pages frequently uncut; very good condition.
Complete Hemingway.
Complete Charles Dickens, no book younger than 1879, gold leaf, full color sketches;
A Robin Hood dated from the SIXTEEN HUNDREDS;
Complete Rudyard Kipling (I absolutely loved the Jungle Books, I read them so many times as a kid...)
Children's Classics series;
about $2000 worth of roleplaying books--D&D, White Wolf, SJ Games, Rifts;
thousands and thousands of paperback Sci-Fi/Fantasy books;
Machiavelli, 48 Laws of Power, Power: How to Get It, How to Use It, and a bunch of other social engineering manuals;
15 different bibles including my family bible; 2 Qurans, the complete alistair crowley, Golden Dawn books, a lot by Shakti Gawain, the Bhagavad Gita, and any other religious text I could get my greedy hands on;
9 years' worth of college textbooks;
family photo albums.... and more.

It still hurts. It hurts so, so badly.



subtee -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 3:18:32 PM)

You're killing me.

I'm so sorry



bipolarber -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 3:20:31 PM)

DMFParodox,

Sorry for your misfortune. A friend of mine (a science fiction author of some repute) lost his library recently as well, this time due to a house fire. Sure, he was insured, but how do you replace all the stuff you've collected since you were a child? He lost his complete collection of original Lovecraft pulp publications, Amazing Stories, Weird Tales... an original three volume set of Frankenstien... and the list goes on.




CallaFirestormBW -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 3:36:40 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: LadyEllen

Throw out all the fiction which isnt classics or literature - or donate them

How would it look then?

E


It would look like it wasn't going to happen. *grins* I write in the Science Fiction genre, and I won't get rid of the collections I have from the authors who have inspired me and are still inspiring me, and I won't get rid of stuff that I still learn something from every time I pick it up or stuff that I really want to share with my offspring so they can see where mom got some of her weird ideas... what I -am- making myself do is get rid of both non-fic and fic that I've read once or twice or a half-dozen times, but that either doesn't really speak to me any more, or that I didn't really get anything new out of the last couple of times I read it. That will probably knock 3-500 books off the shelves... which is pretty impressive, if you think about it, being about 1/5 to 1/3 of our total collection. We'll still probably have to move 30-35 boxes of books... but at least it won't be 50-60 (I realized I missed two complete bookshelves when I was trying to count from the office!)

*smiles*
Calla Firestorm



LadyEllen -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 4:21:22 PM)

How about renting a storage unit for the ones you dont want to put in the new place?

Or is it the moving of them rather than the storing of them at the new place thats the problem?

As for me, I cant bear to part with any books - my ex used to look after elderly people and when they eventually passed away their relatives would throw out the books so I had choice of them; the one book I always took to keep was the Bible these old dears had - odd for a heathen perhaps - but of all the books, they were the ones of greatest value to the deceased and I couldnt bear to think of them in a landfill somewhere. Yes, I'm a softie (just dont tell anyone)
E



CallaFirestormBW -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 4:45:51 PM)

It's more the issue of moving them at all. In either case, I'd have to have the boxes, and then pay $100+ a month for a climate-controlled storage space (we live in Houston -- we'd lose them in less than 6 months to mildew and rot if it wasn't climate controlled).... nope... I know what I have to do. It isn't like I didn't have to do crappy, tough stuff because of moves before...

When my ex got moved from Georgia to El Paso, we had a slew of cats. One was preggers, and one had just had kittens. I -adored- the one who had just had kittens. She was the sweetest cat I'd ever had. She even nursed these other peoples' kitten whose mom had died.... OTOH, Harlequin, the pregnant one, was a bitch queen and a half. I hated her. She was mean, nasty, and a pain in the ass. We had rescued her, and I'd found a home for her and -everything-. We were going to take Selina with us, and take Harley to her new owners on the morning I was supposed to leave... so what did that bitch cat do? She gave birth the night before we left, in the travel-crate we'd gotten for Selina and the kittens... kicked them all out and had her kittens in there. I ended up having to give Selina to the family that was originally taking Harley, and then take Harley with us to Texas.... and then the wench wouldn't even nurse her babies. We had to hold her down and make her feed them...

I think I hate moving -- not to mention that everything has to be -organized- before we move (my Darling insists on it)... and I feel lost without my daily dose of chaos and the comforting presence of my piles of 'horizontal surface disease'.

Just whining...

CFB



LadyEllen -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 4:52:39 PM)

Seems to me you dont need to man up at all - you need to stop making a big deal of it all! So there!

Dont know if you get them there (but you must?) but you can get strong filing boxes (about 20 x 15 x 15 deep) for cheap - bit of a puzzle to fold them but they're strong enough for books (I've used them before). Viking (the stationery people) do a pack of six for about £10-00 over here so I wouldnt guess more than $20-00 for a similar pack? They deliver too.

And when you've finished hauling books about, you can fold the boxes down flat again and either keep them to use in the future or take them to work or sell them to some office somewhere?

E



kiwisub12 -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 4:55:05 PM)

Fabric and books - were the first things i moved into Sirs house.  Clothes i didn't need since i don't wear them here, so were down on the list of necessities.

My excuse for keeping books i enjoy is that they go out of  print and then you can't get them any more. [:D]
I have sci fi books from when i was 10. Love them.



CallaFirestormBW -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 5:13:19 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: LadyEllen

Seems to me you dont need to man up at all - you need to stop making a big deal of it all! So there!

E


Ok, so your right *LOL* But I felt the need to whine about all the poor literary material disappearing from my shelves (the agreement with my darling is that, now that we're moving, I can't keep more books than we have bookshelves for.. and that doesn't mean double and triple stacked...), and I justify it by saying that I don't do it all that often. *grins*



LadyEllen -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 5:22:26 PM)

"one who has too many books for his bookshelves, should get more bookshelves".

Mind you I also thought you could maybe list all the books you have, and send the list to Sarah Palin and let her decide which ones to keep - she's something of an expert apparently.

(oh, I am so nasty for someone who sentimentally keeps other people's Bibles)

E



Twicehappy2x -> RE: "Manning up" for a move (10/8/2008 5:29:22 PM)

You have my sympathy. Parting with books is like parting with well loved friends.
 
I gave tons of books to my kids, and donated a bunch to the Library.
 
I only held onto those i could not bear to part with including the Belgariad, the Mallorean, the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Darkover books, the Dragonrider books and anything by Asimov, Heinlein, Ellison or Bradbury



Page: [1] 2   next >   >>

Valid CSS!




Collarchat.com © 2025
Terms of Service Privacy Policy Spam Policy
2.929688E-02