Inventory

I have begun to make an inventory of The Books, a process that is driving home the reality of just how many I have here. A hundred children’s books don’t even take up one of my book shelves and I have filled many, many shelves. It may seem a bit much to make a list of every book I’ve acquired in this deal but there are a couple of reasons why it might be a good idea. 

The first is taxes. From the beginning I have considered selling off some of The Books and since I paid next to nothing there will likely end up being some profit. Maybe not a huge one but probably something. That money will be taxable income and needs to be declared on my income tax return so it’s a good idea to keep track of exactly what I have and what I dispose of it for. 

The second reason is that I’m a nut. I’d like to be able to look back and see what has passed through my hands and what I did with it.

A Book Crossing Find

A few weeks before The Books entered my life I discovered a website called Book Crossing. On this site members can register copies of books with unique ID numbers that allow the books to be tracked as they are passed from person to person. Once a copy of a book has been labeled with a Book Crossing ID number it is passed on by either giving it directly to another person or by doing what's called a "wild release" where the book is left in a public place for total strangers to find. Needless to say I was enchanted by the whole concept but before I could really get into it I was bombarded by the Rescued Treasures books.

What I was not expecting was to find a book tagged with a BCID sitting in my house.

The book was called Onwards and Upwards by Arabella Weir and it was just by chance that I noticed the number inside. I was moving books around to make room for the furniture my brother was bringing and getting hopelessly sidetracked by reading covers of books. This book was giving me a hard time because the first page was sticking to the inside of the cover, preventing me from reading the description on the dust jacket. I carefully pulled them apart. There, written in pen, was a BCID number.

I was stunned and couldn't believe my luck. Normally when books are numbered the ID goes on a label that is glued to the inside but there was no label in this book. I suspect that it had one originally but someone along the line removed it. That would explain the stickiness. It was a good thing the person who first labeled the book had the good sense to also write the number in pen on a page.

The fun part about bookcrossing.com is being able to see where books have been. In this case the book was registered by someone who lives in Cincinnati, Ohio and it looks like it has been about three years since someone reported on it's journey.

All book lovers should check out this website.
www.bookcrossing.com

From Home

My brother showed up yesterday with some of my things from home. I was looking forward to getting the rest of my furniture but you know what else he had in the truck with him? MORE BOOKS!!!!

Move Over Books

I haven't lived in my apartment very long and when I moved I had to leave my larger furniture at my parent's house till a truck could be arranged to bring it. This was a lucky thing when The Books came along because it meant I had room to fit them in. But tomorrow there is a chance for my brother and a friend to bring a truck up so you know what this means....

Time to move The Books again.

Little Extras

As I unpack various boxes I am realizing just how much I was given that I didn't ask for. Last night as I attempted to sort some books I also uncovered an extension cord, a picture frame, a "High School Musical" dry erase board and a spoon. This was unexpected.

How did they get in there? I have my theories. I can vaguely remember the day when I was packing The Books to bring them home and the children who were helping me kept asking, "Are you taking these ones too?"

"Yes," I would say, with only a slight glance in their direction to make sure they were pointing at books. At that point we were on a deadline and I only cared that I got out of there in one piece.

Then there were also the adults who worked at Rescued Treasures, the store where all this went down. By the end they were only trying to get rid of things and each thing they could give me meant one more thing they didn't have to throw in the dumpster.

"You want these floor mats?" they would ask.

"Sure," I would say.

"Hey Bill, what are we going to do with these?" I would hear in the background.

"Give them to the lady with the books," someone would respond. It didn't really matter what it was because by that point I had stopped paying attention. Again let me say that my goal at that point was to get myself out in one piece.

So now that a couple of weeks have passed I can dig through and find out what I really ended up with. Looks like I have an extra spoon.

Piles and Piles of Books

When I first brought The Books home I was in a big hurry. Rescued Treasures, the store I got them from, was closing down that day and they and they needed to be moved as quickly as possible. The solution at the time was to bring the boxes and bags into my livingroom and dump them in a big pile on the floor then take the boxes back for the next load. This happened right before Halloween so when I was done I had to quickly get as many books onto shelves as possible and shove the rest of the pile into my bedroom to keep trick or treaters from thinking of me as the crazy book lady. To be honest that may have happened anyway since I insisted on giving away books along with the candy but I wanted to at least try to minimize the crazy part of my image.

After Halloween I had company come to stay with me so there was a bit more shuffling around but also some distraction so books have been slowly popping out at interesting times. For example, I was in the livingroom one day and heard my friend Alicia shout, "THE POPCORN DRAGON!!!" from the kitchen. Turned out she had found a book she loved as a child.

And yes, I have books in my kitchen cupboards.

I've noticed though that as things slowly get rearranged The Books seem to be condensing and fitting into corners I didn't realize I had. I have mixed feelings about that. There is a real danger of living in something that looks like a house again. The fact is I need the space for living and whatnot but there was something pretty darn cool about having a pile of books heaped up on my floor. It was like some twisted fantasy come true. If things had stayed that way I may have eventually dived in and rolled around in them.

As I said to a friend, this is what happens when little girls grow up watching movies like Beauty and the Beast or Bedknobs and Broomsticks. Those both had fantastic library scenes and created what I thought were unrealistic ideas about someday having a library in my own house.

The Books

By a cosmic fluke I have ended up acquiring hundreds of books unexpectedly. (See Background for how this happened.) The Books are now clogging my small apartment as I attempt to deal with them while carrying on with the rest of my life. This is a mixed blessing as I always dreamed of this kind of thing happening but didn't see it coming and certainly don't have the room.

This event has been so epic that I have decided The Books deserve a blog of their own.