"Discontinued"

"Out of Print"

"New and Improved" - but it's not, and I want the older one to still be available!

I have long been a book hound, since way, way before Amazon. And a person who likes re-reading favorite books. I vividly recall the days when it was difficult if not impossible to get an out of print book. Now it is much easier - for most of them. But when it was more difficult, that was a factor behind a lifelong habit of collecting and hoarding books. It gave me a sense of power.

I also have an OCD completeness quirk. I remember clear back in grade school, sometimes I'd be reading a series of books and the library would only have certain ones of the series. Maybe the public library would have some of them. But sometimes neither library did. I always thought that was stupid why the libraries didn't make sure all the books of a series were available for readers! When I was in college I learned to use Interlibrary Loan. But I still wanted not to have to give up the book that was so difficult to find. I even xeroxed some of them! And still have some of my pirated copies, which I'm going to replace with legitimate copies and then recycle the xeroxed ones - but only of the real "keepers."

I've come quite a ways in learning which books are truly keepers, too. If it's a popular author and I can find the books readily enough at the library, I'm getting rid of my copies of those if they aren't ones I'll want to read over and over.

Discontinued products - that's a driving force behind compulsive acquisition. And stores seem to discontinue things ever more rapidly. But I'm working on self-talk about this anxiety. Telling myself "Let It Go!" so much that I sound like Elsa in Frozen, LOL. Still, there are times when it's annoying to not feel pressured to make a decision on something I'd kind of like to purchase, but maybe could talk myself out of. The fear of it being discontinued tempts me to go ahead and buy it. Here, too, Ebay and Amazon are somewhat helpful. If I can tell myself not to buy the thing, and that if I later decide to get it I can get it online, sometimes I'll forget about it. It's like having an inner 3-year-old at the grocery store! Sometimes if you can distract them they'll forget about the candy bar. Sometimes. ;)

"New and Improved" - I hate change. Gee, is that a hoarder thing or what! But there are times when the newer version of a product really doesn't have a property I appreciated in the older one, or is cheaply made and a waste of money. So I hoard some things for that "they don't make 'em like they used to" reason. Toothbrushes - I want the old-fashioned straight handled ones and I found some on clearance, so I have toothbrushes for as long as I have teeth or am alive to brush them. But those don't take up too much space, so I am okay with that. Older style lightbulbs that don't bother my eyes the way CFLs and LEDs and all these newer kinds do - I have a hoard of those too. I wanted to hoard more but didn't have the money to buy them when they were being discontinued. But what I have should do, and again is not taking up a huge amount of space.

Okay, who else wants to cop to their experiences with these hoarding triggers?