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Post by lagatta on Jan 10, 2010 5:21:47 GMT
I have a bunch of magazines in German for studying that language. I have read through all of them but of course want to re-read them as I haven't really memorized everything (yet). I moved a couple of years ago (into the co-op where I now live) so I got rid of scads of things then but there is always more. Guess I should cull the cookbooks too. Some (given to me and I suspect regifted) are really not of much interest.
I do have new ones I'm poring over: The Ethnic Paris Cookbook, and Spécialités hongroises.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 10, 2010 5:35:01 GMT
I will need to cull my books one of these days. That is HARD!
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Post by Deleted on Jan 10, 2010 9:22:37 GMT
I will need to cull my books one of these days. That is HARD! I need to do this too. Fortunately,my local used book merchant takes trade ins. I once traded back a book. This is an area I find one really does have to be ruthless.
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paristraveler
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Post by paristraveler on Jan 10, 2010 21:39:14 GMT
When I was in the States I was amazed to find there is a tv series called Hoarders. I didn't get to see it, but it's documentary/news-type reports on various hoarders. My mother wanted to see it, too, but was getting annoyed because every time the commercial came on, someone would glance at her and murmur something about the basement. Has anyone seen it? I just watched that show yesterday, on some cable health station. It was very sad and made me understand some of the reasoning behind it. One lady tearfully said that her dad was in the military and they had to move every two to three years. She could take her stuff with her, but couldn't take her friends. This understandably took its toll. I must have missed part of it, but at some point she said she came home from school and her dad was burning up all her stuff. From then on, she couldn't let go of anything, ever. I had to live with a hoarder for a couple of years, right after the car accident that made my career disappear and my sister sold my parents' house out from under me and believe me, it was terrible. He couldn't abide a clean empty countertop, and would have to place a box of some kind of shit or other on top of it. I love a clean, shiny room (not compulsively so, but reasonably) and I just couldn't stand the crap he brought home. I could barely get up and down the steps to the basement carrying a laundry basket because of all the crap in the way. I eventually left him because of it and before I could afford to leave and go live somewhere else, I told him he had my blessing to go get himself another girlfriend because I was no longer interested in filling that role. Nice of me, huh? I moved out as soon as I could and swore to be on my own from then on. And I have been. And I like it that way.
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Post by spindrift on Jan 10, 2010 21:49:45 GMT
Paristraveller - I know what you mean about living with a horder....I couldn't do it either. Twice I cancelled my wedding dates... he covered every available surface with twee little ornaments that, although expensive such as Lalique, were unendurable to me. He had glass shelves made on which to place his collection of Herend porcelain. He also had a collection of antique clocks all ticking out of unison together and striking the hour...OMG He also hoarded teddy bears
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paristraveler
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Post by paristraveler on Jan 11, 2010 0:44:58 GMT
Paristraveller - I know what you mean about living with a horder....I couldn't do it either. Twice I cancelled my wedding dates... he covered every available surface with twee little ornaments that, although expensive such as Lalique, were unendurable to me. He had glass shelves made on which to place his collection of Herend porcelain. He also had a collection of antique clocks all ticking out of unison together and striking the hour...OMG He also hoarded teddy bears I feel your pain, spindrift. But, at least it sounds like the stuff he collected was halfway decent and wasn't out of dumpsters! But, I do understand. Too much of a good thing and all that. I'm soooo glad to be free of that. And I'm glad you are too. Who needs an albatross like that around their neck?
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Post by rikita on Jan 26, 2010 20:30:05 GMT
well my bf's mom moved into a home a few weeks ago, so recently i helped a bit pack stuff there... well i suppose a lot of the things there were due to her being sick and thus not knowing anymore what is worth keeping, but i suspect she had hoarding tendencies before, already. on first view the flat looked normal and not too ful, except for the huge amounts of "cute" little dolls, decorations, plastic flowers, figurines, etc. etc. - but every single drawer you opened (and there were a lot of drawers) was filled to the point of almost bursting, mostly with cutouts from magazines, opened packages of tissues, half burned or unused candles, cards, and similar stuff... in between all that there were also important letters so we had to go through them all...
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Post by Deleted on Jan 27, 2010 6:41:52 GMT
That doesn't sound too unusual, actually. Especially the cutouts from magazines -- the older people get, the more they absolutely love to do that.
I used to hoard US one dollar bills in preparation of trips to Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia where they are extremely useful for small purchases. (Most people, especially the small vendors, never have enough change in dollars for larger bills, or at least that's what happened to me the first time.) I would arrive over there with about $80 in one dollar bills and actually rarely need to use most of them. On my final days, though, if I had to pay $10, I would pay in $1 bills which would be an instant and appreciated success.
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Post by bixaorellana on Jan 27, 2010 6:46:17 GMT
That doesn't sound too unusual, actually. Especially the cutouts from magazines -- the older people get, the more they absolutely love to do that. Where do you get this stuff? I'm kind of old, and never catch myself eyeballing the magazines & wondering where the scissors are. Also, I know some genuinely old people who have nary a clipping to their names.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 27, 2010 8:33:35 GMT
I have been through the drawers of many many old people.
(No, I am not a burglar.)
Bixa, when you get old you might start doing it.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 27, 2010 11:47:06 GMT
That doesn't sound too unusual, actually. Especially the cutouts from magazines -- the older people get, the more they absolutely love to do that. Where do you get this stuff? I'm kind of old, and never catch myself eyeballing the magazines & wondering where the scissors are. Also, I know some genuinely old people who have nary a clipping to their names. Ahem,I have several folders of magazine clip outs from a friend who moved to Mexico many years ago... (Still have some of them I might add...)
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Post by bixaorellana on Jan 27, 2010 17:39:30 GMT
I was young when those were clipped, plus there was no internet! Guess some OLD person kept the clippings. <-- new favorite smiley. it occurs to me that I've not sufficiently displayed my smug nature on this forum.
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Post by Kimby on Jan 27, 2010 18:09:00 GMT
I'm already a clipper, and I'm not old yet!
Printed materials are definitely my downfall. I'm a self-appointed archivist and find it hard to toss things I might want to reference in the future. (If I can find them, that is!)
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Post by bixaorellana on Jan 27, 2010 20:26:20 GMT
I am wisely hoarding my words on this subject, to avoid any snappy comebacks.
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Post by rikita on Jan 28, 2010 0:45:53 GMT
yeah but the amount was quite astonishing. also she kept all the cross word riddles she ever found anywhere, though she wasn't doing any anymore. but well, she also had lots of photos and photo albums there, so ia am now the proud owner of several large prints of pictures of my bf - from 20 years ago. he says he is just glad they are b&w, as back then he had tried to dye his hair blond and it turned out a strange orange...
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Post by bixaorellana on Jan 28, 2010 8:07:04 GMT
Gad, Rikita -- you could take this story to the "characters" thread. Well, except this sounds more like a pretty sad illness.
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Post by rikita on Jan 29, 2010 0:49:02 GMT
yeah well... alzheimer's is pretty sad, and i didn't mean to make fun of her, if it sounds like that... it was just amazing to open the drawers and all... but well, actually looking around here, my place is pretty stuffed with things other people might consider useless too...
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Post by bixaorellana on Jan 29, 2010 6:37:26 GMT
Oh heavens, Rikita -- you did not sound as though you were making fun of her. I was afraid my comment sounded insensitive.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 29, 2010 7:55:24 GMT
It was when my parents STOPPED cutting out articles and saving coupons that I knew that something was wrong, especially the coupons. They had always been avid savers and when they would do their 'major' shopping, they would proudly display the receipt -- "Look, we spent $140 but we got $31 taken off in coupons!" And then one time I came for a visit and the coupon folder was empty...
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Post by Deleted on Jan 29, 2010 10:35:21 GMT
While on holiday returned to my old habit of buying books and collecting local reading material,maps,magazines,guides...
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Post by bixaorellana on Jan 30, 2010 18:06:35 GMT
Got your scissors sharpened?
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Post by bjd on Jan 30, 2010 18:58:20 GMT
I used to have subscriptions to a few magazines and before I threw them away I used to cut out articles that I thought might be useful at some point -- this was when I was in my 30s or early 40s. Then one day I realized I would never look at this stuff or use it and pitched it all. I eventually got rid of most of the subscriptions too.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 30, 2010 22:07:18 GMT
I have retained a few clippings of unusual travel articles about places that I have promised myself that I will see before I die -- for example, Cox's Bazaar, Bangladesh.
And I think that I have kept a clipping about Auroville, India from 1973, but I did go there, and it only took me about 20 years.
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Post by lagatta on Jan 31, 2010 1:51:27 GMT
rikita, she must be very young to have Alzheimer Disease...
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Post by rikita on Feb 1, 2010 1:17:56 GMT
well actually, my bf is quite a bit older than me, and he is the youngest of three children - so his mother is actually about the same age as my grandparents...
well, coupons aren't that common here - becoming more common though, my little brother recently found coupons (with these folded lines so you can easily break them apart) in the flyers in the mail, so he made a whole stack of them and gave them to me as a present. he of course has no idea what that is, as no one in our family eats at mcdonalds, or uses coupons, but he thought they looked pretty and that i was bound to like them...
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Post by Deleted on Feb 4, 2010 12:39:59 GMT
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Post by traveler63 on Feb 4, 2010 14:42:55 GMT
I am a hoarder of magazines, specifically cooking magazines. I receive 2 a month and I now have to go through the ones I want to keep for a while. Knowing full well that I can go to their on line sites and find the recipes that I have used before, however, I just love looking through them when I need one to cook rather than just sitting at the computer.
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Post by spindrift on Feb 4, 2010 15:59:38 GMT
I'm now going to google 'Cox's Bazaar, Bangladesh'....never heard of it. It sounds tempting.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 4, 2010 17:40:57 GMT
I am a hoarder of magazines, specifically cooking magazines. I receive 2 a month and I now have to go through the ones I want to keep for a while. Knowing full well that I can go to their on line sites and find the recipes that I have used before, however, I just love looking through them when I need one to cook rather than just sitting at the computer. Same here,cannot read a magazine online,same as books on kindle . Have to feel the paper in my hand. Maybe I should save for when the paper ones become obsolete. I am two hours into this 'purge' and it is moving,but,the designated piles to go are beginning to be outnumbered by ones chosen to stay.Maybe, I just need more shelves....
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Post by spindrift on Feb 4, 2010 20:38:53 GMT
My book shelves are groaning. I've purged them and cannot bring myself to throw away any more. There is a stack of newly bought books steadily rising on the lowest shelf. I think it's good to hoard books....I have much pleasure just looking at their titles.
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