The accumulation of stuff
It should come as no surprise that after 40 years of immersing myself in natural history that I should accumulate a lot of 'stuff' because of it. This has been driven home to me over the past couple of days because I have been emptying various cupboard spaces and populating new book cases that we have had built to accommodate all the said 'stuff'. Two things - I already knew that this mountain of 'stuff' was getting out of hand and my denial that 95% of this stuff was mine (and not my wifes or two daughters) was getting more preposterous by the day. So what is this stuff? To start with, over 350 books, all natural history themed (and let's not get started on the other non-themed books that I own and read). I did carry out a cull several years ago, but regretted it afterwards and vowed not to do it again. And then there are the annual reports and publications that I have been sent in lieu of being a member of numerous societies and clubs. They look nice all...