The World in Tonevision

Chronic Book Buying Syndrome

Yup. Still got it: that compulsion to keep buying books even though the to-be-read-shelves are not being emptied at anywhere near to the pace with which they are being filled up. At a glance, I would say that I have about 2,5 meters of to-be-read shelf waiting for me to finish it.

Does this stop me from browsing bookstores? Or from coming home with a steady stream of new volumes? Afraid not. Booksales are particularly difficult to steer clear of.

It has always been my policy that no matter how limited my budget, my book-budget should be unlimited as far as at all practicable, but after moving house in November I started to entertain a nagging suspicion that maybe, just maybe, there can be too much of even such a fantastic thing as books. However, in my collection is the complete series of Kinsella's Shopoholic books - very educational- and I know that justifying overbuying is mostly a matter of coming up with good reasons why you need stuff. Which should never be a problem.

So todays purchases were completely necessary, for the following reasons:

Barske Ramperim by Gustav Lorentzen: Baby Oscar doesn't have a lot of books yet, and Gustav Lorentzen was one of the great heroes of my childhood. Badass poetry seems to me a much better way to increase the little fellow's cultural capital than the Mozart setting on the babygym (which is in the process of driving me insane, little by little).

Asylsøker: Documentary photography about asylum seekers. Can't have too much documentary or too much photography, and the subject matter is very politically correct to boot.

Måtehold i grådighetens tid (Temperance in the Age of Greed): well, based on all of the above information this should be food for thought and very appropriate for yours truly...

if I can only find the time for reading it.

Efficiency - or the art of not overthinking it

We're in the process of moving house this week. Something I don't exactly love at the best of times, but which is just ridiculously taxing when you're 8 months pregnant, big as a house, working and writing a novel at the same time. But we had movers, so the moving of boxes was as painless and efficient as one could wish for. Due to a temporary lapse of judgement on my part I said "yes, why not?" when they suggested starting the move at 6am tuesday morning rather than ten, which was great for the moving van finding a parking space and for finishing early but not as great for staying on good terms with the neighbours in the place we were moving out from. It was too late by the time I thought of that. But, then again, what can they do? Kick us out? Ha.

Now that the boxes are all moved, all we need to do is to get some furniture (only a sofa, dining room table, bed, cot, six or seven bookshelves, and ten or so other things, nothing much really) from ikea, assemble them (easy-peasy!), and we're officially moved in!

As for electrical goods, we needed a washing machine, a microwave oven after a Very Bad Popcorn Incident with the previous one, and a TV. The latter feels a bit spoilt as I already own a very nice, comfortably lumpy TV with inbuilt quality control (that is, you turn it on, it turns itself off, you turn it on again, it turns itself off again and so on 3-15 times depending on room temperature, as if to say "are you positive you really need to be watching TV at this particular point in time" - which, let's face it, you very rarely really need). But my partner for some reason felt like this was a bit of a nuisance rather than an advantage, so I succumbed and we decided to get one of them fancy new flatscreens that don't take up a whole room to themselves either.

And this is where it gets efficent: due to being tired and pressed for time plus getting a little lost on the way there, we only arrived at the electrical goods store at 19.54 this evening. It closes at 20.00. In those six minutes, we purchased a washing machine, TV and a microwave oven. That's two minutes per purchase. One could argue that it doesn't bode well for the quality control that I haven't even seen the microwave oven, but only said to the helpful clerk that "and lastly, I'll take the cheapest microwave oven you have", but really. Why spend time poring over a decision that you don't really care about? If the TV will show soccer matches, John will be happy. If the micro nukes my oatmeal porridge and pops my popcorn, I don't much care what extra special pizza functions it can oven. And as long as my socks get clean, a washing machine is pretty much a washing machine to me.

I notice a pattern here, the two times in my life I have purchased a vacuum cleaner I have invariably bought the cheapest one available and left the shop within five minutes of entering. It works for me.

Ironically, I can spend hours and hours in almost any bookstore deciding which 10 euro book to buy, and then beat myself up for a long time if I didn't buy the one I should have bought. I suppose it's a matter of choosing one's battles.