Perhaps your DB could have used my hard-cover, six volume set of Wintston Churchill's The Second World War to take up another two feet. I got it cheap at a yard sale - over DW's protest - by agreeing that I'd get rid of it when I'd finished, or in two years, whichever came first.

Alas, at the rate I was going, it would have taken me longer to finish than the war took itself. So, I had to let it go to another home. I love pithy Winston Churchill sentences but six volumes felt unpithy.


Love it!!

Finally checking into this thread, after day of being constantly in motion at the office, and discovering why I like you people so much.

When I moved to my current apartment, I moved 36 cartons of books.

Now ask me how many cartons my mother is still storing for me at the family home. In particular ask about the guest room bed at her house, which has no mattress, because it is filled in with cartons of books, stacked to a certain height, with an antique coverlet over them. (It simulates the look of a mattress quite well, I must say.)

I fear I am the only person in this thread who hasn't seen Harry Potter. I have never seen any of the Harry Potter films & have not read any of the books. No grudge-holding here, just a lack of interest & a lot of other books on my list ahead of it. (Ask me how many of those 36 cartons I've read & how many are part of my Mount To-Be-Read.)

Birchie, I keep meaning to ask you about the Murdoch telephone hacking thing. Do you think this could actually bring down Cameron's government, or are they distancing themselves from the Murdoch empire as much as possible? We have several former newspaper reporters at my office. My boss advanced quite far in the Associated Press before jumping ship, quite presciently, as it turns out. So that whole story has us riveted.

So embarrassed to say I read all the Twilight books and went to see the first movie. We, DH, DD and I, then watched the second one and laughed our heads off as we finally saw how stupid the series was (and as soon as DD home, we'll watch and laugh at the third movie which is being DVRd right now). But the HP movies are much more complex and I'd love to read them if only I had time. So many books, so little time.

Oh, and the Murdoch thing with the whistleblower being found dead. So much drama!

No, you are not the only one, I have not read a single HP book or seen any of the movies. I love to read but HP just doen't appeal to me.

Nice how many of us are "book" people. I had more books than anything else when I met DH. He complained that they were taking up a lot of space (he used to read but not much since I've known him) and I did give a bunch away when we moved to this house.

I kinda dread having to get rid of all my mom's books when my dad leaves that house. There are 3 rooms full of floor-to-ceiling bookcases. Our local libraries and charities don't accept books any more. I can't see myself throwing them out (most are hardcover versions with easier to read typefaces) so I don't quite know what to do with them.

It seems that every time I sit down to read DH shows up after about 20 minutes and starts clamoring for attention. I'm so glad he has the band thing twice a week. Gives me a chance to sit and read! My cats are really good pets for that. They curl up beside me and purr as I read.

On the weight front DH brought home (and hid) ice cream Sunday night. I found it yesterday morning and we finished it off last night after a lot of bickering about the eaves disconnects I now have to get done. Next time he does this I will just throw it out. We both agreed that it would make us sick (and it did - twice for DH) but sometimes we still fall into "it cost money so we have to eat it" mode.

Good Tuesday all!

Dagmar and

Dagmar - Your local libraries and charities don't accept books?!?!?!? This astounds me. I wish I lived closer, because I would take them! Well, some of them, I'm sure.

Books are a continual source of budgetary woes for me. I'll impulse buy books in a heartbeat, which is something I would never or rarely do for pretty much everything else (save music). Darn my lack of self-control - maybe I need a "book tracker" as well as a calorie tracker? And, like you saef, many of these books are just added to my pile of "to-be-read" books.

I plan on attacking some of that book pile during my three weeks off. It's three weeks on paper, but of course there's work to be done: a couple of faculty meetings toward the end of the time, syllabi to put together, and my office is in desperate need of being organized. I'm also working on a research project for presentation at a professional conference. Sounds vacation-y, huh?

I am making a trip up to Louisville, Kentucky to visit family (my sister, her family, and my parents all live there) as well as to Indiana to visit a friend. So that will be a nice time.

silverbirch - I, too, am interested in a Brit's opinion of the phone hacking case and resultant fallout. Every day it seems a little more serious to me.

alinell - Thanks for the info about Last Pass. I'm slightly paranoid about having all my info in one place, but that might be a trade-off I'm willing to make.

Jessica - I like the ThinkThin bars, they are pretty yummy and make me feel nicely full. They do have sugar alcohol though, which causes tummy upset for some.

--me too! In fact I just impulse bought this one The Elements of F*ing Style. My friend posted it on Facebook and it looked amusing. It'll be interesting to compare it to the original which I've owned for years!

I sell some of my excess books on Amazon.com. Helps offset the amount I spend on new ones. Of course, it means I have to be prepared to package them and mail them in a timely way, but that's pretty easy for me.

Jay

I sell some of my books on amazon.com too. I also trade books on paperbackswap.com. I love them! You post your books that you want to get rid of. Others request your books and you mail them. It is free except for the postage. I have a big wish list going....whenever I get to the top of the list (for popular books), I get the book in the mail. As a librarian, with a house full of avid readers, you can only imagine how many books we have in our house. They are in every room. Truly need to organize and purge them.

I was going through my bookshelf last night after this discussion and found that DH and I have four copies of one paperback Star Trek book, two new and two lightly used. I need to check out selling them on Amazon or paperbackswap.com!

JayEll and Michele, how do you estimate/price the shipping? I have books coming out of our ears and I often think about selling them.

ETA: I'd encourage ya'll to give the HP series another try. Truly the books are far greater than the movies and the uproar. There are lovely elements and they are full of inspiration, good vs. evil, laying down one's life for others, timeless themes.

Or to quote Stephen King:

"Harry Potter is about confronting fears, finding inner strength and doing what is right in the face of adversity. Twilight is about how important it is to have a boyfriend."

Love that.

Shannon, was it one of the Peter David ones? Imzadi, Q-Squared? I fear I'm exposing my nerdly roots . . .

DH and I are also bookies. That is obviously not the correct term but I don't know what is. We turned one of the rooms in our house into a library and are running out of shelf space again, but there is only room for about one more bookcase in there. I organize the books by topic, then subject, then alphabetical by author. DH can't figure out my system for some reason and just sticks things everywhere, then I get annoyed when I find something like "A Concise History of Mexico" sitting in between a bunch of fantasy books.

We've sold books to Half Price Books before to get rid of them. At this point I think the only ones we want to get rid of are duplicates. DH sometimes will buy a nicer edition of something then they just pile up.

And I second the recommendation to read the HP books. They are quite good. It's a bit difficult to get through books 4-5 because Harry is being an annoying emo teenager, but worthwhile. I'm a big fantasy fan though. Currently reading Carol Berg's Bridge of D'Arnath series. DH meanwhile prefers Russian literature, classics, and history. He's reading a chemistry textbook from the 60's right now.

Love HP too! Great characters and story lines. I can't imagine anyone not liking them.

Pricing for shipping-- Amazon gives you a shipping credit (I think it is 3.99 per book). If you ship media mail (slow), it covers the cost. I don't like to sell on Amazon because you don't make much, however it is a book that is in demand, you can make some $$. That is why I trade most of them on paperbackswap. You have more flexibility-- you don't have to ship immediately--- you have a few days. I LOVE it!

Anyone have any good recipes (easy) using a polenta tube? I have some polenta and I'm looking for something to do with it.

Also, I'm very worried about my upcoming road trip. For the past several months, I've had severe muscle cramps and spasms in my legs if I'm in the car over an hour. I've told the doctor and they said it could be related to my thyroid being underactive (which it was), so I've been on an increased dose for about 2 months. The last time I was in the car for about 1.5 hours (about a month ago), I was in excruciating pain. I'm scared this will happen again. We'll be in the car for 6 hours Thursday to get to the first college, then another 4 hours to drive to the second town. The next day we'll have at least an 8 hour drive home. I've told dd I may just have to make frequent stops to get out and walk around as that is the only thing that seems to help. Anyone experience anything like this and have any suggestions? If not, just wish me luck!!