Vashtarah

Religious kitsch: glow-in-the-dark icons and statuettes, magnets devoted to the saints, religious prayer cards, etc. Most of this is RC in nature or Orthodox, as I really like the Orthodox icons. And I have made several rosaries for friends...all while being agnostic. I am not quite sure what the attraction is, but I love visiting those huge churches, cathedrals, and basilicas (and their giftshops!). I really regret passing up a glow-in-the-dark Infant of Prague for the Sacred Heart of Jesus...the Infant was far more rare and impressive...

RevDahlia

have you looked at www.archiemcphee.com? perhaps their tongue-in-cheek tone compromises the collectibility of the religious woogies they carry... but man oh man, do they have religious woogies.

as for me, i accumulate lots of miscellaneous junk, but i'm careless with my belongings so i break/lose stuff frequently and it doesn't have a chance to build up. this is a mercy.

my big weakness is camping equipment. i only go camping once a year, but i have more camping crap than anyone i know. it'll be useful, i guess, when society crumbles and we all have to go live in the woods until the shit dies down.

weird -- i'm obsessed with gallon-size zip-loc bags. i've got a bale of them, mostly slightly used.

i collect "jane" magazine, even though it's started to kind of suck. i've got every issue, in great slippery piles all over, mostly because i was traumatized by "sassy"'s disappearance and wish i had collected it more assiduously.

in high school, i knew a kid who collected his own fingernail clippings. ecch.

that's all i can think of. great thread.

Vashtarah

Thanks for the tip, Rev. That site has some very collection-worthy items, but I usually try to pick them up in places where they're presented with some degree of reverence...hehe. I might have to splurge on a Guadalupe bead curtain, though.

vicesboy

Well, I am confused between whether this thread is about serious collecting or compulsive hording?

Either way here goes, compulsions first...

Receipts or misc. paper. Everyday I accumulate a pocket full of paper. Reciepts, lists notes, etc. After clearing them out of my pockets, they remain in little piles around the house. These are not important receipts, for example, I just pulled one out of a pile. It's for a 2 litre bottle of coke at 7-11 from TWO MONTHS AGO!

Boxes for items we purchased. 'never know if we may need to return it'....even if we bought it 10 years ago!

Lady Shea forgot to tell you about the room full of african art items (zebra skin hanging on wall, little carved figures, masks, etc)

Camel bucks...from my cigarette packs, even though I have only cashed them in once in over 5 years.

Old shirts. Why can't we throw them away. They don't fit, they are dusty and dirty. We last wore them in High School. Yet, they are still there!

Ok...serious collections

Casino Chips - Get one every time we go to a casino and had a friend send me one from every colorado casino at the time.

Green Bay Packer items - Cheesehead, Brett Farve bobblehead, football shaped hackysack with GB logo, Leather Jacket, hats, shirts, beer glass and mega mocha coffee cup

Yes... we collect shot glasses, get one every time we visit someplace new.

lisarea

Lifecycle of a Shirt:

1. Wear to work.
2. Wear to grocery store, etc.
3. Wear around the house.
4. Wear to bed.
5a. Cut up for rags, then use rags to clean up cat vomit or something else so gross you throw them away.
5b Cut into strips, pretending that someday you're going to braid said strips into highly frugal rag rugs, then wait until the large, unwieldy bags of shirt strips finally piss you off enough that you throw them away in a fit of rage.

Note that the first four steps can be almost interminably long, depending on your tolerance. Many of my shirts never make it to step 5, in fact.

My brother used to do welding, so he had all these old shirts with burn holes in them--from everything from wayward embers to full-blown shirt fires, and I inherited these precious family heirlooms and wore them until they were effectively noncorporeal.

Gurdur

My own life cycle of shirts:

1) get new shirt

2) wear everywhere

3) homicidal angle-grinder attempts to attack me, leaving long tear in shirt

4) wear only when using angle-grinder

Viti

Shuuush...that's decor and objects d'art , remember?

oriecat

I collect Opii. That's the plural of Opus. I have stuffed Opii, Opii books, an Opus sticker on my car, an Opus shirt, an Opus phone. I'm forgetting something, I'm sure, and therefore I also have an Opus webpage, with my collection spelled out.

I also collect little figures of whales and dolphins - brass, glass, wood, whatever.

I also have two sections of a cupboard full of plastic bags. I hate it though, and always forget to take them to the store to recycle, since I will never need that many.

Hedwig - I also have a stack of Absolut magazine ads, from many years ago, that I can't bear to part with. Most of them are from my college days when I was studying art history and they were always on the back of my Art News magazine. (I think it was Art News) Some of them are so damn cool.

I also collect Twin Peaks stuff. I have the whole series on video, the first season on dvd, several books, copies of the shooting scripts or transcriptions that I printed out, a set of trading cards, something else?

RawData

My mother has a collection of Opii as well, in Medford, OR. Always looking for more. I draw Opus and have sculpted also (small figure for xmas tree ornament).
RD

Bree

I have that deck too, Hedwig, and I love it dearly. I love just paging through the cards and looking at the pictures - it is kind of like reading a book because each card reminds me of a different legend (some are more obscure than others).

I too have the petals of every rose Jek has ever given me. Some are on display (in huge empty vases) and some are hidden away. Glad to know I'm not the only sentimentalist here .

I collect penguins. Stuffed ones (not overly cute ones, you know the kind that have scarves and hats) and clay ones, porcelain figures, bathtowels, magnets, greeting cards - you name it. I also have the lipstick/lip balm problem - lots of "gourmet" lip balms (some that have penguins on the lid!) and a bunch of Burt's Bees - one for each pair of pants plus my purse and work jacket. Red lipstick is my bane - I think I have nearly every drugstore colour out there.