...are getting out of hand. The Terry Pratchett row has not only spilled onto the next shelf, but that shelf is fighting back. I can't fit anymore there, but I also don't want to break up what organization I've manged to create. I don't want to buy another bookshelf, but I fear it may come to that before too much longer.

I try not to take myself too seriously. I know that I'm basically a twit in the general scheme of things, but I have an Education, a Salaried Position, and an Interest in the Arts, and sometimes those parts of me do more talking and non-thinking than I really want them too. My biggest flaw in this regard is my book collection.

Now, every friend and family member I have is book mad, and has a collection of paperbacks that is probably easier to weigh than to count. I try very hard not to think about how much money I spend at bookstores, as a more exact figure than "lots and lots" will probably depress the greedy bastard that is at the heart of my soul. As a rough estimate I put it at around 10,000 over the last six years, which is just f**king stupid.

Despite the fact that I was an English major in college, bookstores worry the liberal in me. Yes, it can be argued that television stupifies the masses (hell, I'll even agree), but that doesn't change the fact that it is a relatively cheap way of distributing a lot of complex information very quickly to a hell of a lot of people. While for the most part that information tends towards what the lastest Disney Blonde is wearing, that doesn't mean the medium itself is worthless. ON the other hand, books are expensive, and getting more expensive as the years pass. Owning as many books as I do serves no purpose. Oh, it'd be fine if I still intended to devote my time to semi-professional analysis of those books. In fact there is nothing really stopping me from doing exactly that. But since I'm not reading for research, having heaps of paperbacks is pure conspicuous consumption, nothing more. And that bothers me.

Now, this isn't to say having an Education, yadda, yadda, yadda, is a bad thing. It isn't. Nothing can convince me of that, because my parents, teachers, and I made too many sacrifices to get me where I am today for me to now say it wasn't worth it, that it'd be better if I was half-killing myself to survive like my parents had to do at my age. What I am saying is that I'm letting myself act like an idiot, and worse letting myself think I'm superior to others because I have a high enough disposable income to waste on books. It's like being good-looking I suppose. I have never nor will ever really think of myself as good-looking, but I've seen other people let themselves be defined by their looks, let it set them apart from everyone around them. I can't really say that it was a bad thing, and indeed knowing when their physical attractiveness gave them an edge and how to exploit that edge is something only to be admired in my opinion, but still... I've wanted to ask them at times what it felt like, to be treated as a hollow object of only skin and air. I never did ask, because I was afraid they wouldn't understand the question.

I'm afraid of a similar process taking me over. I don't want to be a person that disdains others, that feels superior because I never watch television, like only drones would ever let themselves fall so low. I know that attitude it bullshit, yet I can feel it happening anyways. So I don't know. There has to be a way to act that would satisfy my own tastes and morals, but damn it if a part of me doesn't feel I deserve to feel superior, and I'm afraid pissing that part of my personality off would have long term consequences of its own.