04 January 2011

Unbookening

Checked out 7 books from the library
Got 2 to review
Borrowed one
Received 9 for Christmas
(19)

Returned 12 to the library
Gave away 7
(19)

It was pointed out to me that my real reading resolution for the year should be, "find a place to move all your books, and while you're at it, you can live there too." I'm pretty sure in the years I have lived in this apartment I quintupled my book collection. QUINTUPLED. It's a delightful word till you are giving your roommates notice and thinking, "How many boxes is this going to take? Oh, lord."

I admire people who can live out of a suitcase, and at various points I have. And this isn't going to be one of those hyperminimalist moves because (I hope) I'm only going across-town-and-a-bit. (I may have to hire a mover anyway, being a weakling.) But I'll probably be leaving a few dozen books behind at least, and that makes me regretful. It's a little late for Operation Read It Or Move It.

2 comments:

Elizabeth said...

It's not weak to hire a mover: it's just the efficiency of capitalism. You hire someone else to bake your bread for you, because they're better at it, and it's more efficient for you to work at what you're good at, then take that money and buy groceries with it, than try to plant the wheat, harvest it, grind into flour, etc., yourself.

Ditto with movers. They're a lot better at it than the rest of us. Let them do it.

(I was sold on movers when my undergraduate research lab moved in the summer of 2005. We spent a week timidly trying to package up glass jars of chemicals so they wouldn't break, then the movers came and accomplished more in two hours than we had all week.)

Ellen said...

You raise a good point; they ARE better at it. I don't have a lot of glass jars, but I might have attempted to do this one on my own if not for my bed. Can't put that in 20 boxes and take several trips with it.