Roots and Grubs

That library thing you do

Posted by mamster on Tuesday, July 3, 2007

Over at 43 Folders, Merlin is decluttering. If you’ve got a clutter problem, Merlin’s got your back.

Clutter of every kind has been the default state of my physical world forever. Although no official record of the conversation exists, I would not be surprised to learn that I tried to talk the staff who delivered me into letting me keep my first diaper; just because — y’know — you never know when it might come in handy.

I’m good at tossing out most things, but when it comes to cookbooks, I turn into a whiny “I might need it someday” person. This summer, once again, I have “weed cookbooks” on my summer projects list. This time, however, I have a plan.

Are you familiar with LibraryThing.com? It’s a place to catalog your books online. You can tag, share, rate, discuss, and all that, but I have in mind something simpler. My cookbooks, which fill an entire large Dania bookcase and then some, fall into two categories: (1) books I actually cook from or refer to regularly, and (2) books I feel like I might refer to at some point if I’m writing an article.

The second category doesn’t really belong on the shelf, but I worry that if I don’t see the category 2 books while reaching for the category 1 books, I’ll forget the category 2 books exist, and then when I go to write that article, I will not be able to find any information about the topic whatsoever. Because there are no web sites where you can, like, search for books.

You can see that I should just dump these extra books. However, that’s too painful. So I’m going to enter each category 2 book into LibraryThing, give it an “ex libris” tag, and then it’s going to the library book sale or out on the curb. Keep your eye on my curb.