too many books+ too much sleep+no energy = not much is getting done!

a photo of Kitten Tea
Haven't done a lot of reading lately; every time I try to sit (okay, lie down) to read, I fall asleep. I went to bed early last night - 12.45 (okay, it's early for me!). I got up early - 7:30 a.m. {hella-early, for me}. Took a nap at 9:30. Woke up a 12 noon. At 2:00 p.m. , my back was killing me, so I lay down to read. Woke up at 4:30 p.m. Since I slept the day away, I'll probably have a hard time going to sleep tonight. I don't know why I do things like that. Not even on purpose, I just drop off if I'm not moving around. It might be a sign of getting older.

If I can't sleep tonight, maybe I'll be able to finish Magic Strikes (Ilona Andrews). Lately I've been wanting to re-read some of my books, even though I have a huge, humongous, rediculously large TBR pile. My TBR pile is split up in three locations. two shelves (about 40) in the garage {these are books that really don't interest me that much. some of them I have started and put aside when something more my taste came along} I have a whole (narrow) bookshelf in my room (about 50), and about ten books inside my bedside table. There are also books interspersed through out the house that I haven't read yet, about 15. That's about 110 books, not including books that are still in boxes from my move. I don't have enough bookshelves to put them in. In fact even if I did have enough book shelves I wouldn't have the space since I share a house with my family and it wouldn't be fair for me to overload the common living area with my bookshelves.

I have to {one day, and just the thought makes me tired, since I am lazy, lazy, lazy} get the books sorted out and make some hard decisions about which books to keep and which ones to give away. The last time we moved (5 years ago) I did get rid of a lot of romance books that I had been holding onto for the previous 15 or 20 years. I must have given six or seven BOXES of books to the local thrift shops.

It's tough for me to let go of things. Especially books and clothes. When I was growing up, my mother didn't have extra money for books. She only bought new clothes for my sister and my little brothers. It was expected that my sister would hand down her clothes to me. Unfortunately, since we are 13 months apart, we were close to the same size. My sister rarely handed clothes down to me. My father (they were divorced since I was a baby) would end up buying me clothes. He was the one who would buy me books also. I remember that part of our trips to see him {he lived 110 miles away from us, so we would usually only see him on vacations} would include him taking us to a huge bookstore in San Jose.

I was never crazy about clothes shopping (his wife would usually take us) because I had such a bubble-butt that I thought all the clothes looked funny on me. But I loved the trips to the bookstore. It was huge. There was a huge childrens section. At that age (around 10) we were really into Nancy Drew books. My sister also loved anything about horses. We read a lot of Black Beauty books. My father also loved to read {although his taste ran to science books, biology, anything that was like a textbook} and would think nothing of plopping down over $100 for books. That was back in the early 1970's. I think that $100 then would be equal to about $200 or even $300 now. I remember we always left the store with armfuls of books. It was great.

After we were too old for my father to buy books for (it's sad when you outgrow being spoiled like that, but everyone has to grow up) we had to go the the library for our fix of books. Then when I started my own family {way too early, I was married and had my first baby by the time I was 19, when I was 29 I had four children} there was only enough for me to buy one or two books at a time, usually from the grocery store. Then, much later I was able to go to the bookstore whenever I wanted, to buy as many books as I wanted. That was wonderful for me. Unfortunately, that phase of my life has ended. I am back to saving money for books, and buying only one or two at a time.

Because I had to (most of my life) watch my pennies, it is hard to get rid of books and clothes. My first instinct is to hoard them. But the reality is, I am probably not going to re-read a lot of the books that I have packed away, so I need to get rid of them. There are clothes also, that I don't wear. I need to get rid of them too. I have recently off'd a large amount of clothes to the goodwill, but I need to seriously go through my closet. I am hanging onto t-shirts with holes and stains because I liked the design on them. Silly, when I don't wear them. We have a large closet space, with three sliding panels. Most of that space is taken up with my clothes.

Now to gather up the energy to actually deal with this decision....yeah right. I can't even stay away for more than two hours at a time during the day. At night I have no problem staying awake. That's when I feel the most energetic, unfortunately most of the rest of the house hold runs on normal time, so I can't just start going through things during the middle of the night. No Matter, one day soon, (this summer) I will acheive my goal of thinning out the closet and books. I will, I will, I will, I will maybe.....

I would hold contests for my books, except the ones I would give away would be too old, and I wouldn't have the postage anyway. Maybe in the school year, when I have a little more money.