Are you a collector of anything?

[yonder_greens]

do you like collecting things? i like acdc so i have like a billion of their shirts, but how far will you take your collection? Obviously things like t-shirts, cds, hoodies, or even things like blankets are a must but do we really need things like this?


so what do you collect and how far are you willing to go to complete your collection?

[Robert]

This looks like spam. Post is pending deletion... depending on the future behavior of this new member.

[FrankenFretter]

Whether or not this is spamola, this is a great subject for a thread. I know a few collectors, some of whom are a bit overboard...

[Eric]

Fair point, FF.

I feel like it's born into me, so I fight against it every day. In fact, when my CD collection became just that -- a collection, not a bunch of albums I listened to regularly -- I threw them all away, or at least all of the burned ones.

I feel like stuff exists to be used, not admired, so I dislike huge collections. It's why I try to keep my guitars down to a reasonable number these days.

[Robert]

I collect dust.... I'm getting old!

Just read my youtube videos' comments! :thwap

[FrankenFretter]

Fair point, FF.

I feel like it's born into me, so I fight against it every day. In fact, when my CD collection became just that -- a collection, not a bunch of albums I listened to regularly -- I threw them all away, or at least all of the burned ones.

I feel like stuff exists to be used, not admired, so I dislike huge collections. It's why I try to keep my guitars down to a reasonable number these days.

I was dodging the whole "guitar collection" subject. I was actually thinking of the future Mrs. FrankenFretter's Living Dead Doll collection. It's totally out of control, and taking over our living room. I don't feel any guilt for my assortment of guitars (notice how I didn't refer to them as a "collection". Maybe they're more of a collective...and I have been assimilated).

I do have a friend who has owned at various times over 40 guitars. He buys most of them with the intention of reselling them at a profit, but keeps some that he really likes. I always enjoyed visiting his house, you can be sure.

I may or may not have some Star Trek collectables. There is a rumor that I do, but I'm not denying or confirming at this point.

[Spudman]

I've recently started collecting spam threads since I've already collected about all the guitars I'll ever need.:pancake

[riverrick]

I'm a hopeless collector...started out with stamps and coins. Then LP's and 45's. Casino chips, baseball cards, fishing gear, beer steins, now its guitars....Theres just not a cure...lol:spank

[Retro Hound]

If this is going to be a spam thread, I just say that I collect way too much as can be seen at my website: RetroHound.com (http://www.retrohound.com). I've stopped collecting and am trying to get rid of stuff now.

[deeaa]

Fair point, FF.

I feel like it's born into me, so I fight against it every day. In fact, when my CD collection became just that -- a collection, not a bunch of albums I listened to regularly -- I threw them all away, or at least all of the burned ones.

I feel like stuff exists to be used, not admired, so I dislike huge collections. It's why I try to keep my guitars down to a reasonable number these days.

LOL that's so like what I've done. Back in the day I realized I had over 300 CD's and no room for them - bought a 200 CD stand and resolved to sell off whatever didn't fit - so when I bought a new CD I had to jettison another. Worked for a few years. Then after half a decade I calculated I had something like 700 lying around, so I ripped them all to MP3, bought an iPod and put all the CD's in the basement. Well most of them, a few I sold and many I just gave away too...but I figured it might be a blast for my sons to dig up some ancient Iron Maiden CD's some 15 years from now or something.

DVD's I did the same...I threw all their covers in the bin and just kept the actual discs, put them in five 200-slot album style thingies. I oughtta just toss them too - I can't remember when I last watched DVD's now that I can stream/rent movies via Xbox and my digital receiver too, and in full HD.

With guitars, much the same. I constantly have this nagging feel I need to sell of one of my axes, but alas, it's hard it seems now. I have my 'best' axe which is reserved for home playing and studio, and then I have my main axe, for which I HAD to have a backup that is exactly the same (from my live days...I always feel a need to have two exactly same sounding and feeling guitars). That leaves the V, which I have twice been real close to selling, but whenever I play it it just looks and feels so cool I can't bring myself to close the deal. But if I had a very good price for it, it's a goner!

I have this old 3-story house and every now and then I feel totally disgusted I have such a friggin' collection of stuff...all kinds of tools and wood bits and a helluva lot of whatever, and sometimes I think it'd be such a great relief to just sell the whole property and buy an empty house and live happy.

BUT as it is, whenever I pick something up thinking I'll get rid of this, I come up with an idea that I need just that at the cottage/for that closet build/whatever...and actually, all too often when I do throw stuff away, the very next week I'm hitting myself over the head because now I'd need it. Like I threw away the door to basement because I felt it was always only in the way - and now I'd like one back because I have my amp there and would need to stop the sound somewhat...and no more door. And a new one would need to be ordered custom size and won't fit the style of other doors, etc.etc...

So I guess I AM a collector of...assorted things. Like various guitar parts from a dozen guitars, and a huge collection of wood bits...

[Katastrophe]

All I seem to collect these days is belly button lint.

[Eric]

LOL that's so like what I've done. Back in the day I realized I had over 300 CD's and no room for them - bought a 200 CD stand and resolved to sell off whatever didn't fit - so when I bought a new CD I had to jettison another. Worked for a few years. Then after half a decade I calculated I had something like 700 lying around, so I ripped them all to MP3, bought an iPod and put all the CD's in the basement. Well most of them, a few I sold and many I just gave away too...but I figured it might be a blast for my sons to dig up some ancient Iron Maiden CD's some 15 years from now or something.

DVD's I did the same...I threw all their covers in the bin and just kept the actual discs, put them in five 200-slot album style thingies. I oughtta just toss them too - I can't remember when I last watched DVD's now that I can stream/rent movies via Xbox and my digital receiver too, and in full HD.

With guitars, much the same. I constantly have this nagging feel I need to sell of one of my axes, but alas, it's hard it seems now. I have my 'best' axe which is reserved for home playing and studio, and then I have my main axe, for which I HAD to have a backup that is exactly the same (from my live days...I always feel a need to have two exactly same sounding and feeling guitars). That leaves the V, which I have twice been real close to selling, but whenever I play it it just looks and feels so cool I can't bring myself to close the deal. But if I had a very good price for it, it's a goner!

I have this old 3-story house and every now and then I feel totally disgusted I have such a friggin' collection of stuff...all kinds of tools and wood bits and a helluva lot of whatever, and sometimes I think it'd be such a great relief to just sell the whole property and buy an empty house and live happy.

BUT as it is, whenever I pick something up thinking I'll get rid of this, I come up with an idea that I need just that at the cottage/for that closet build/whatever...and actually, all too often when I do throw stuff away, the very next week I'm hitting myself over the head because now I'd need it. Like I threw away the door to basement because I felt it was always only in the way - and now I'd like one back because I have my amp there and would need to stop the sound somewhat...and no more door. And a new one would need to be ordered custom size and won't fit the style of other doors, etc.etc...

So I guess I AM a collector of...assorted things. Like various guitar parts from a dozen guitars, and a huge collection of wood bits...
Yep, that sounds pretty familiar. When I lived in an apartment, I always kind of dreamed of coming home to a burning house a la Fight Club. Let it go and start over. See what you actually value, not just what you've managed to accrue. Sure, things are important to me, but the only things that ACTUALLY matter to me are what's in my head and (more importantly) who's in my life.

That's why now if I find that if I'm freaking about about a possession or that I value one thing too much, it might be time to re-evaluate. I don't want to lose sight of how unimportant material possessions are.

[Heywood Jablomie]

A related question is where does collecting stop and OCD begin?

[Spudman]

All I seem to collect these days is belly button lint.

Um...I guess that could be cool.:messedup:

[sunvalleylaw]

I collect papers on my desk, but I am trying to cut down. I may try to sell some on ebay.

[gregsguitars]

I have collected R.G. and G. "The Grammer Guitar" (s) for over 12 years at one time I had over 50 of them, culled them down and actually brought the market value wayyyy up on these forgotten gems of Americana. I actually befriended Billy GRammer, have permission to use the Grammer headstock , sold to his family members and probably owned or bought every Grammer available on the market at one time or another.

[FrankenFretter]

I have collected R.G. and G. "The Grammer Guitar" (s) for over 12 years at one time I had over 50 of them, culled them down and actually brought the market value wayyyy up on these forgotten gems of Americana. I actually befriended Billy GRammer, have permission to use the Grammer headstock , sold to his family members and probably owned or bought every Grammer available on the market at one time or another.

That's impressive, Greg. They look like real beauties, and I'll bet they sound as good as they look.

How many do you have at the moment?

[gregsguitars]

Thanks for the kind words.
I presently have 3 left and 2 on the way, Greg

[riverrick]

I have collected R.G. and G. "The Grammer Guitar" (s) for over 12 years at one time I had over 50 of them, culled them down and actually brought the market value wayyyy up on these forgotten gems of Americana. I actually befriended Billy GRammer, have permission to use the Grammer headstock , sold to his family members and probably owned or bought every Grammer available on the market at one time or another.


very cool looking guitars....especially like the head stock:thumbsup

[Monkus]

Fridge magnets. Since I started travelling I tried to get a fridge magnet from each place i've been. i had over 1000. I've now cut down to only major cities and towns, that have their name on fridge magnets.

[Bloozcat]

I like to collect pieces of green paper with dead president's faces on them. I call it my Benjamin collection....:thumbsup

Actually, I don't "collect" anything obsessively or in excess. I do "accumulate" things of a certain type though...guitars, amps, speakers, stomp boxes, firearms, etc. But the accumulation of those items is more the natural progression of having a hobby that I'm really into rather than collecting for the sake of just possessing things. My possessions all have practical applications (read - I USE them!). They don't just sit in a case...

[kiteman]

I collect movie dvds. I throw the cases away and put the discs on spindles. Now I have two 100 disc spindles full and started on a third. :)

[Bloozcat]

Okay, okay...I (we) do have one thing we like to collect. We like buying Christmas tree ornaments from places we've traveled to. And, I do have about 28 or so Star Trek Christmas tree ornaments...that's as far as my "geek streak" goes...:rolleyes:

[pes_laul]

Detention slips:thwap

[Kazz]

Speaking of cds. I used to have a pretty large collection of the physical discs. When my wife and I got together we each had about 400 cds in our collections. If you can imagine 800 cds take up a lot of space and I am pretty well OCD so they had to be organized. I had all of my cds in alphabetical order by artist and for those that I had more than one cd of they were by release date. I noticed after we had been together about a year or so that the spines on the cd jewel cases where pretty heavy with dust. I went out and bought a pretty large for the time USB Hard Drive and we went to town ripping all of the cds to MP3. Once we got all of the cds ripped (we did not rip duplicates where she had the same cd as I did) we only ripped one copy. Then I put all of the cds in the next yard sale we had. Had one lady buy them all. I think we got 500 bucks out of them. Not too bad since the market for used cds is pretty slim but considering that we probably paid at least 10 bucks each for most of them...that would have been about 8 thousand dollars we had wrapped up in cds.

I used to collect shot glasses from my travels. My goal was to visit all 48 contiguous United States before I turned 40. Needless to say I will be 42 this year and I did not make my goal so I have extended it....I only need 5 more states before I fade away into old guitar player heaven. Anyway I probably had 2 or 3 hundred shot glasses I have driven what was old Route 66 many times and have been back and forth across the western united states 10 different times so I acquired lots of shots along the way. One day I got fed up with dusting them and there was a guy on a forum that I belonged to that wanted to start a shot collection so I bubble wrapped them all along with a custom lamp I made out of a Grey Goose Vodka bottle and mailed them off to him.

I still collect hats tho. The baseball type cap. I rarely if ever wear them (usually only if the wife makes me run out to the store before getting a shower in the morning will I put one on). I probably have 200 hats from over the years.

I also collect Tesla (the band) memorabilia and have set lists (most of the autographed) from all the Tesla shows we have been to since 2005. Our Daughter Hanna was named after Tesla's guitar player and my personal Rock God - Frank Hannon. He is very aware that she was named after him and considers it a huge honor. One day we got a package in the mail from Sacramento California. It was a very nice framed black and white picture of Frank holding his prized double neck SG *(story to follow) He had personally autographed the picture "Just for Hanna Marie, Love Uncle Frank"

In the back of the picture frame there was a hand written letter from Frank with instructions to give it to her when we feel she is responsible enough to have it and the letter talks about how proud he is to have had her named after him.


The double neck SG was given to Frank on his first tour of the Gibson factory. This was in 1987 when Tesla was on tour with Def Leppard and he went on the Gibson tour with Steve Clark of the leps. They gave Steve a new Les Paul that day and the Gibson rep turned to Frank and said he could pick any guitar that he wanted. Frank is a huge Jimmy Page fan so he said "I will take that one right there" and pointed out the red double neck SG that looked identical to Jimmy's.

Back to the collection. We also have a tambourine that is autographed by all 5 of the original members of Tesla and the tambourine was played by singer Jeff Keith at the Reunion Show in Arco Arena

[kiteman]

Cool stuff Kazz. :rockya

[FrankenFretter]

Okay, okay...I (we) do have one thing we like to collect. We like buying Christmas tree ornaments from places we've traveled to. And, I do have about 28 or so Star Trek Christmas tree ornaments...that's as far as my "geek streak" goes...:rolleyes:

I have the first six from Hallmark. I stopped after that, but I also have many sets of the trading cards from TOS and STNG.

[Bloozcat]

I have the first six from Hallmark. I stopped after that, but I also have many sets of the trading cards from TOS and STNG.

I have one from every year except when they came out with the station Deep Space Nine, which wasn't an ornament at all. The thing had to sit on a stand. It was Hallmark's worst seller in the Star Trek series.

Now they have two or three different ones each year. I just pick the one I like best and the heck with the others. To have one a year makes it special. More than one makes it cheap commercialism.

I've got cool Les Paul, Strat, and Jazzbox guitar ornaments too. Bought those in Canada the last two years. We've got some really nice ornaments from dozens of places all over North America and Europe.

[grungemaster]

I collect mullets. Nuff' said.

[guitargrizz]

As far as quality collections go...I don't think I have any of those...

But this may sound gross, and I don't take this collection seriously...but after every can of dip that I finish, I throw it in a big bucket in my music room which is close to being full...disgusting, I know.

I also collect beer bottle caps, and the tops to cans. I'm attempting to fill up a gallon with can tops so that I can turn it in for a hundred bucks. half a plane ticket right there.

Quality collections that I have acquired though....I collected football and baseball cards forever when I was younger. I'm sure many of those cards will be worth something one of these days, and even so, I'll be passing them on to my son or grandson whenever he comes along.
Another collection I guess would be posters and music stuff to post on the wall in my music room. That's a vast collection though.

[street music]

I think that I have become a collector of purses and shoes, I just don't know where they keep coming from but I keep finding them in a closet that I share with this lady that I have been married to for 36 years.:spank :spank :spank

[otaypanky]

Did anyone happen to notice that Yonder Greens, the OP, joined the Fret June 29, 2010, posted this thread June 30th, 2010, 12:53 PM, then immediately signed off and has never returned?

[Ch0jin]

Did anyone happen to notice that Yonder Greens, the OP, joined the Fret June 29, 2010, posted this thread June 30th, 2010, 12:53 PM, then immediately signed off and has never returned?

Err no, thats what moderators are for :poke :)

Not an official collection or anything, but I do have quite an array of stubby coolers. An essential bit of kit in the warmer climates.