Philotic Web

Collections are fun. They can be funny, silly, practical, non-practical, collections of items or of ideas. There are collections to be proud and ashamed of, collections that will last forever and collections that won't. Collections that will one day be worth millions and those that are worth the world to the collector. So really, if you collect stuff, tell us about them because collections are heaps of fun to compile and hear about. (Collecting dollars/pounds/yenn or any other type of money doesn't count, sorry).

I'll start with my two small but growing collections which share the same properties of being practical, not-mint-collector's items and highly enjoyable (what collection isn't?). They are my six coffee mugs (Red Dwarf, Pac-man, Big Bang Theory, Harry Potter (butter beer), Doctor Who (Matt Smith) and Doctor Who (season... I think doctor 5 logo). Hope to add Doctor Who (High Council of the Time Lords and an EG mug if they bring one out for the movie) and my ten t-shirts (H2G2 "You are here" TPV, Pi (the symbol made of the numbers), Wi-fi detector, "THIS IS WHAT AWESOME LOOKS LIKE", "NATIONAL SARCASM SOCIETY", Transformers, Killswitch Engage, something in French like "Where there is a problem there is always a solution" that my dad gave me, "42" and "Remember: The Enemy's Gate Is Down".

I have one other collection, it is my largest (most items) but doesn't take up too much space. It's my collection of decimal places of pi that I remember (in order, to all those smart aleks who just list the numbers 0 to 9 as "all the decimal places"), but I won't list them here.

I keep a collection of all my movie ticket stubs. Or try to, at least. I have ticket stubs from almost every movie that I have seen in theaters for probably the last six years (at least). I still have yet to figure out what exactly I want to do with them--some are taped on colored paper with information about who I went with, but a lot are just sitting in a pile or a binder back home in desperate need of organization. Unfortunately, most movie theaters I go to these days just give out tickets on plain receipt paper, which isn't nearly as cool and exciting as the cardstock-y ones they used to have.

Other than that, I don't really have any collections of things. When I was little, I had quite the rock collection and ton of stuffed animals, but I never really tried to collect any types in particular.

That's quite an impressive collection! Just about every movie for the last six years at least? That's pretty cool and even more absurd than my brother's collection of used up gift cards. I have also never had a ticket of the cardstock-y variety, I've only ever been given receipt paper ones.

Movie tickets here, too. My oldest is from 1997, I believe, but I don't have many new ones since I don't see movies here like I did in AZ. The one I did see here gave me the cardstock type, not a receipt but since I left my album full of tickets in AZ, I keep the ones that were in my wallet in a little lidded bowl.

I also have a collection, of sorts, of mugs but nothing themed, exactly. Boob and a penis, monkey, Cabbage Patch, Star Wars (Vader, Boba, and a Stormtrooper), horoscope, name/personalized, and misc. others.

My newest collection is take-home menus and tour guides/maps for zoos/museums for all the places I go that provide them.

Pretty sure I have others but that's all that comes to mind at the moment, unless you count my general SW collection of random stuff I'm gifted.

What's the great attraction with movie tickets? And I don't think I'd be able to stomach enough zoos and museums to build a collection of stuff from them.

Something else I don't understand is the attraction of old stuff to collectors, I mean, the older something is the more collectors seem to want it. I suppose rarity is part of it but it's still strange to me. The only thing I ever valued for being old was a 10 cent piece and only because I won a game with it. My brother and I would continually feed 10 cents into a vending machine and hit the change button until we came up with one that was older than our opponent's and then they had to start the process. I won with 10 cents made in 1967.

Anyway, you said "nothing themed". That's the only reason I collect mugs and shirts, for the theme or slogan. There'd be no point for me otherwise, not mugs for the sake of mugs, I have to like them over other mugs for a good reason.

I was trying to think of anything I collect. I finally thought of something: souvenir pennies. The kind you pay 50 cents for and get pressed flat. I have a little collector's book to keep them in. I have about 25, I think.

What's the great attraction with movie tickets? And I don't think I'd be able to stomach enough zoos and museums to build a collection of stuff from them.

Alea and Shannon could be the exception, so I don't mean to speak for them in particular, but typically things like tickets stubs and maps and other souvenirs are collected for memory storage. We assign memories from whatever place or event the item is from to the item itself, and then later retrieve those memories by interacting with the item.

I mostly offload memories onto photos, and usually other people's Facebook photos at that. I'm not sure that one can count other people's Facebook photos as a personal collection.

I don't have any collections that exist because I wanted a collection. I have a collection of action figures, which I retrieved from my childhood in my parents basement for a project, and they've since simply become decoration. I have collections of games, music, movies and books because they continue to entertain me, though the music and movie collections have mostly been replaced by Netflix and Spotify. If Amazon ever lets me subscribe to their Kindle collection, my books will be replaced as well. I have a collection of clothing because it's convenient and people look at you funny when you wear the same clothes every day. I have a collection of tea because I purchase it faster than I drink it.

So the tickets and that are like nostalgia tirggers for some people. Hm.

I don't think a lot of collections are intended to be so. I see a cool mug/shirt and think "Hey, that could go with my others." then one day I look at it and realise it's a collection.

P.S. My mother drinks tea faster than we can buy it. Deficit.

I'm another who collects movie stubbs. My oldest is 2002. I love getting the stubs from my local theater because they're different colors depending on the day, and they're a thicker paper. I used to have them pinned to a cork board and almost had the whole thing covered before I decided to take them all down and use the cork board for pictures and random stuff. Now I keep them in a little wooden box that's almost overflowing.

Other then that I think i'm starting a mug/glass collection. I have a tote full of different mugs and glasses that I have come across over the years. I've never wanted to have one set of glasses that all match, so I just pick a new one up here or there all the time.

Stuffed tigers!

Here's Atticus with our tiger collection when he was five days old.

Hmmm... Ocam's Razor would now suggest I'm the weird one for not collecting movie stubs.

Oh, and I'm sure the pic of Atticus and tigers is adorable.

I think a lot of people keep collections as "nostalgia triggers." A lot of people also just keep collections of things they think are cool. Collecting serves different purposes for different people.

I collect owl figurines. The collection started because my undergrad mascot is the owls, so people started giving me owls. Now I also try to find owls on vacation to add to my collection. And people keep giving me owls as gifts. I probably have 30 or so owls.

I also collect recipes. Right now I have them written on little sheets of paper. I need to neaten them up somehow.

If you like collecting recipes, here's a drink I came up with a while back (add alcohol if you must):

Ingredients
1. Mother
2. Coca Cola
3. Red cordial (pure, no water or other silliness)
4. Mentos
5. Solo(/Pub Squash/Lift)

Method
1. Make the Mother into ice cubes.
2. Half fill a glass with Coca Cola.
3. Add Mentos.
4. Add a dash of red cordial.
5. Fill another quarter with Solo (or whatever lemon drink).
6. Add three or four Mother cubes.

It looks weird and tastes weirder but I like it. Oh, and good on you for collecting owls, buying owl merchandise contributes toward blindness research.

Wow, I had never heard of Mother before, but apparently it's an energy drink owned by Coke! Crazy stuff. Does it taste similar to any other energy drinks to those of us outside of Oceania that we can substitute it?

...and here I was assuming that the instructions were to make your mother into ice cubes.

"Why are you trying to stuff me into the freezer?"
"Don't argue, mom, I'm just following the recipe!"

When I was a kid (maybe 9 or so) my eye doctor asked me what my interests were, I told him that I liked to collect things. He wrote it down in my medical chart and has been using it as a conversation starter almost every visit since then.

When I was a kid I used to collect (and label!):
-Rocks and semi-precious stones
-Sea Shells
-Bugs
-Stuffed animals
-Microscope slides of different insects, fibers etc.
-Book and bookmarks
-Old Keys
-Stickers
-Birthday Cards
-Movie Tickets Stubs
-Mixed CDs made by friends
-Everything Harry Potter... (bedding, mugs, craft kits, dolls, chemistry sets......so much more, just everything)
-Markers and stamps
-Coloring books
-The plastic push-up parts... (I used to make car wheels out of them)
-Pogs (lol anyone else?)
-Spice Girl trading cards + postcards
-Beanie Baby + Trading Cards
-buttons (like for sewing)

Of course I still collect some of these things.

Re: Mother substitute

Yeah, um... Red Bull should be fine. The taste is similar (though not as good). Using your own mum should be fine though.

And Cassandra, looks like you could start a collection of collections...

If we want to get into things we used to collect, I could go on forever. I also had collections of rocks, sea shells, key chains (that one is still in my junk drawer back home), stickers, TY beanie baby cards, old library receipts (before I kept track of the books I read otherwise), etc.

I also have a few other collections I forgot to mention before. Like my collection of bookmarks, dried flowers (haven't added to that one in awhile--I need a boy again), and letters I've received. My senior year of high school I saved every piece of mail I received from colleges. I had signed up for the College Board search program where they pretty much give your address to whoever wants it, so I got quite a bit.

And it's not really a collection, per se, but I am terrible at actually deleting any emails from my gmail account. Or files off my computer. I just know that someday I will need my fourth grade book report and that stupid forward I got from my crazy aunt. I may be a hoarder...but only digitally.

...and here I was assuming that the instructions were to make your mother into ice cubes.

And I thought it referred to Kombucha.

I collect DVDs/Blurays I guess, and books to an extent. my only real book collection is of Discworld hardbacks. I have all of them now, and I've managed to NOT start 'rebuying' them but in particular editions. So that's a good thing. I've reached the point where I have too many and I've started selling off books and films where I can. My new rule is that if I rewatch a movie and I don't think I'll rewatch it again within ten years, it gets sold. I probably have more than a 1000 movies, so that's just too many.

Books I'm theorizing I can start migrating to the kindle, I have WAY too many unread books on my shelf, the hope is to either sell them and replace with a digital edition or sell them and not bother to replace. However, since I haven't done this I don't have to face the actual facts of downsizing the collection. Ideally, I'd like to have all my books fit on the two shelves dedicated to books.

I'm not sure if I collect much now (I suppose I collect books, both graphic and written, but that's not that unusual), but when I was little I collected bones.

We would go on hikes all the time, and that often meant we would find bones around. Sometimes small animal bones, sometimes bigger: I once found a femur my parents were sure came from a cow or something. I never really identified them or anything, just arranged them in this wooden box. I eventually realized that it was kind of gross, and I didn't even clean them, and that everyone else thought it was kind of gross, too.

Hmm. I have always collected books, that's no shocker.

Okay, specifically, I have a collection of Lord of the Rings books. I have quite a few complete sets from various publishers and with various covers, going back to (I think) the mid 1960s. It just sort of happened, and then I ran with it.
I have a collection of Latin Grammars. You'd think after the first two or three that would about cover it, but I think I have five or six kicking around. I'd get other ones if I had money to burn.
We have a collection of teapots and mugs. Most of the mugs are unmatched, but they have stories and memories attached to them, they aren't just random (no matter how random it appears).
I have a collection of photos of baby Nom in front of various English landmarks and heritage sites.

Those are the things coming to mind, anyway.

I guess I collect audiobooks on my Viktor Stream (about 30 odd including H2G2 radio series) and good on the Discworld collection. I love those books.

I really like how people collect stuff and how their collections define them.

One collection I just remembered, as I sit down to a hearty banana lunch...I collect the stickers that come with bananas. Not the ones that give the grocery store code for the item, these have sayings on them that are cutesy.

LOTR memorabilia. The pride and joy of my collection is my museum quality Sting replica sword with glass case. I don't have it displayed at the moment because it requires near-permanent hardware. Not for apartments... Anthony collects Dragon figurines and statuettes. I've brought one home for him every time I've traveled without him (about 4 total). There's about 30 or 40 on our mutual display bookcase.

Also, manga. Lots and lots of manga. Like, so much we can't fit it all in one bookcase.

As a dragon fan myself, I request pics of the dragon collection. (Please?) =)

Ok!



The green ceramic dragon and blue glass dragon are actually mine, and the white one on the right came from Texas

Don Quixote and Sancho Panza are hiding in there as well, a little souvenir from Spain

And my LOTR collection (abridged)

Wow, that was fast, thanks! I think the big brown one in the second picture and the green one to the right of it are my favorites of those.

Wow, that was fast, thanks!

I'm home alone today with not much to do... so why not?

I think the big brown one in the second picture and the green one to the right of it are my favorites of those.

I believe those two are from the Todd McFarlane collection

I see a dragon that looks suspiciously like a penguin...

Yeah, it's a penguin. I make them myself!

Well, he's super cute!

Thank you! Ceramic penguins are a lot of fun to make, and super easy... if you have access to a ceramic studio

I see a dragon that looks suspiciously like a penguin...

Oh, Twinny. That made me laugh.