Thursday, March 5, 2020

tsundoku

I encountered  a new to me word yesterday tsundoku.  The art of buying books and never reading them.  I suppose I qualify as I can never pass up books at garage sales...and at the thrift shop I have to give the book section a wide birth.  During the big sort upstairs I ran into several books that I had not read....I recall some from 25 years ago.  I packed them up and they will go on the garage sale I intend to have sometime in the Spring when and if it ever warms up.

I looked to see if I could find a word to describe my magazine hoarding problem...no such luck...no fancy word...Yes I have been hoarding magazines.

In the living room we have an old copper boiler that was overflowing with magazines.  All ones that we had read and MAY or MAY NOT read again someday.  I sat on the floor and sorted through them only keeping The Minnesota Conservation Volunteer and Woodcarving Illustrated.   Good bye to Martha Stewart Living, Rachael Ray, Food and Family, Reminisce, Farm and Ranch Living, House Beautiful, Country Living, Woman's Day, Car and Driver...six grocery sacks full that were really heavy...off we went to recycle them.

On the way home Far Guy said "I have a few Train Magazines upstairs...I replied "I have a bunch of Farm and Ranch and Martha Stewart Living in the huge file cabinet upstairs."

In the old copper boiler I also found two small rice bags that I had been looking for and a blue ball that Little Elvis or Miss Miney must have dropped in there.

I emptied out the stainless steel boiler that stores all our extra "throws"  and I washed them all.

It felt good to have the boilers all cleaned up again!

Far Side

30 comments:

Sam I Am...... said...

That word applies to me too and I have never heard it before. It sounds similar to the Sudoku puzzles I do. Oh, and magazines? You did really good! I have so many...years of Oprah and Martha Stewart, organic gardening, Mother Earth...I could go on and on! They're on the porch and in the basement so I will get to them eventually. It will be really difficult to part with them. You are a better woman than I! Those Reminisce magazines look good! With all that's going on in the world I just want to escape to those "good ole days"! Have a good day!

Araignee said...

Oh, dear. I think I suffer from that too. A few years before I retired I bought shelves and shelves of books for future reading thinking I would be spending my time propped up in a chair with a mug of tea. I'm still waiting. Retirement is harder than working. There are no weekends or vacation time. It's all go.

linda m said...

Since I have difficulty seeing when I read I don't read much anymore. I do have about 4 books that are stored and never read tho. I should borrow you sometime to come and clean out my place of all the old unused junk. Hahaha

Val Ewing said...

It took me a long time, but I did get all our magazines finally tossed. None of them were worth keeping. I did that with all my books too. I only have a couple of poetry books left. Oh wait, I have some books on identifying trees, bugs, mushrooms, and field guides. Those I will keep!
I need to get back at the shed and get more things sorted there.
Sounds like you have been very busy! Love those copper boilers!

Victoria Zigler said...

Sounds like the sorting is going well. You'll have a lot to sell in the Spring.

DJan said...

I knew you would find something to do with yourself yesterday and not lounge around with nothing to do. That's a great word find. I only keep old Parachutist magazines, everything else is tossed after reading. :-)

Harold said...

I used to fit that to the tee, but then a couple of years ago, we lost my brother-in-law suddenly and had to do what we had to do, we promised each other that we would not put anyone else through that experience. Over the past few years my book library of unread books has gone from several hundred down to about 10, of which most will be read this year. I do find that I tend to accumulate ebooks now instead of physical books and have quite a few in my Kindle library that need to go away too, because I will never read them either. Strange how one thought leads to something else. The way of the world I guess.

Rita said...

Reminisce! That is such a fun magazine. I got rid of all my magazine stash when I moved here...and over 100 books, too. I still have too many--LOL! ;) Good for you getting things cleared out! :)

Sara said...

I have a magazine problem too. Your list made me smile as I've subscribed to Farm and Ranch Living since it started - even though we moved OFF the farm in 1988. Quilting magazines, golf magazines, National Geographic, various cooking mags, and South Dakota magazine. I go through them all periodically to give to schools (Nat Geo), pass on to family (golf & cooking) or recycle.

Terry and Linda said...

I was bad about Magazines also. Then last year I went....no more! NONE! I didn't purchase any at the stores nor did I send for a subscription. I am down to just three now that I love reading...I may stop those next.

I have a bad problem with book also...that's on my to do list. Sigh.

Miss Merry said...

I am slowly removing magazines, too. I had all the years of the original Taste of Homes and Quick Cooking. I had also posted the annual cookbooks so that was double the recipes. My kids kept begging me to toss them, but they are such great magazines! I posted them on our local facebook garage sale site and people were fighting over them. Signed, #BookAndMagazineHoarder

MJM said...

My magazine hoarding started early. When I was in sixth grade and my brother two years ahead of me, we would sneak down to the local spot where people dropped off bundles of magazines for recycling and drag home a bundle or two. Never knew what we were going to get. My brother discovered Playboy (Mom didn't let him keep those) and I discovered Mad magazine. I did get to keep those. Nowadays when I go to drop off my own magazines at the recycling center I have a hard time resisting those bundles that other people have left behind....might be something I've never seen before!

A Percussionist's Notebook said...

Tsundoku: Yup, that's me. If there are degrees of Tsundoku I'm probably a Brown Belt and working my way up. Magazines? How about Megla-maniac?

Betsy said...

I have gradually let my magazine subscriptions go away because I didn't know what to do with them after reading them. Several friends and I used to each subscribe to one magazine and then we would share so we could save money that way. However, those friends have passed away and I feel guilty just tossing the magazines in the recycle bin. It seems wasteful. I wish I lived closer to you, I would have taken all of your Reminisce magazines!
Blessings,
Betsy

Red said...

That was a big job. Its surprising how much stuff we can accumulate.

Linda Reeder said...

If I buy it I feel compelled to read it, so I don't buy many books. In fact now I read almost exclusively digital books on my Kindle. We stopped subscribing to magazines a couple of years ago when we realized we were only looking at the pictures.

Cynthia said...

Oh, boy, I didn’t know there was a word for it! I’m definitely guilty. When we moved south I got rid of so many books and only kept a few. Now i only hoard on my Kindle. That’s good because you don’t have to dust them and no one can see how many you have!

Shirley said...

I learned not to hoard when I married Ted. We moved 13 times in 10 years! Now that we have been in the same house for 3 and a half years I suspect it's time to do some sorting again.
Hope you don't get any more snow!

Bonnie said...

Uh-oh, you have brought up something I am guilty of - saving magazines. I inherited it from my Mother who had a house full of them when she passed. I have always been bad but finally I have learned to recycle all of my magazines, except quilting magazines. I can't yet get rid of those because they all have patterns and such that could still be used.

L. D. said...

We have a basket like container that holds all the magazines that come in the mail that we didn't ask for. Advertisement like things and catalogues. I get disgusted when it gets full and throw them all away. We can't recycle them right now but by next year we will have a new sorting plant. We had to toss a few years worth of art magazines when we moved.

The Furry Gnome said...

I think I must suffer from tsundoku!

Maebeme said...

I tend to buy a lot of books too, though I generally get around to reading them. I've got a box in my bedroom, most of which I've read, but I do know there are couple in there that still need to be read. Must do so before this spring's book sale!

You did very well with your clearing out of the magazines! I don't buy them anymore because I tended to keep them, especially ones with recipes.

diane in northern wis said...

You sure are good at cleaning things up around your house! I love old magazines too....and if I get into an antique store....I love looking at the old magazines...and the old ads in them and sometimes stories of the old movie stars when the movie stars were cool! Wish I had your energy! Take good care.

marlu said...

It's definitely close to spring....all this sorting and cleaning going on!

Jo-Anne's Ramblings said...

I used to have heaps and heaps of magazines and I have a love of books and used to have heaps of them as well but not anymore

At Home In New Zealand said...

Cutting down on the size of one's library is not an easy task. I once had a huge collection of ancient gardening magazines that I fondly thought I would sort through and cut out relevant information but I never did. Now I rely on half a dozen books and the occasional Google search. Takes up so much less space and is much easier to find what I want!

Granny Marigold said...

I had a plan to read and then recycle one magazine a day for this past winter. I failed miserably. I got so caught up in reading ( they are old gardening magazines) that I may have thrown out ten at the most.

Jacqi Stevens said...

That word is our family's theme song. We have books double bunked on bookcases in every room of the house...except the bathroom; I draw the line there. Not sure I could ever give them up, though...

Debi said...

I used to have magazines stacked up too. Then I found a friend who was very willing to take them off my hands... now they are stacked up at her house!

Lisa said...

Oh wow! I wished I lived closer to you. (Well not really cant handle all that snow) I would have taken those magazines off your hands. Especially the reminisce ones. I used to love them but can't find them around here anymore.