Saturday, December 11, 2010

December 11: Joe Said Make the Photos Bigger

December 11 Prompt: 11 Things. What are 11 things your life doesn't need in 2011? How will you go about eliminating them? How will getting rid of these 11 things change your life? 
(Author: Sam Davidson)



This is a joint blog from the Sands household.


1. Joe's enormous stacks of magazines that are scattered throughout our house, office, and bedroom, that I suspect he may never read.

Magazines

Joe says," See, now that's not so bad." 
(This is only one select, misleading pile of many. Joe lies.)


2. The textiles and fabrics I bought in Africa in 1998. I don't want to get rid of them, just turn them into something other than a pile of beautiful Kente cloth and batik stacked in the closet.

Cloth



3. Ugly gifts that people have given us that we will never use. Garage sale time. Your gift is not included in that pile. I promise. It was lovely and we often hold it in our hands and reminisce about the joy we felt when we first received it.

Place Holder



4. Joe's enormous piles of mail scattered throughout our house and office, that I suspect he may never file.

Mail Stack

Joe says, "Yeah, I guess you have a point about this one."


5. CD's. Joe and I are both avid music fans. When we got married and combined our CD collection, we could open and stock our own Best Buy. Now that they are all housed on our iTunes library, they collect dust and take up space in the basement. Lots of space.

CD's

Joe says, "If you click through to flickr you can take a closer look and see that a ton of 
these are duplicates that we both have."


6. Books. This one is heartbreaking, but necessary. I own way too many books. Our shelves are heaving with words.  The majority of them will not be reread anytime soon. It is time to cull down. Though the purchasing of new books has tapered off significantly, since I am in a deeply passionate and loyal relationship with the Midcontinent Public Library.

Books!

Joe says, "Mostly Kassie......mostly."


7. Joe's enormous piles of stuff in the garage that make it difficult to maneuver in and out of the cars. Every wood working tool, saw, drill etc. ever sold at Home Depot or in the garage sales of former wood workers.


8.  The smoking couch. Don't ask. I said that Joe should explain why he finds the smoking couch to be so superb. His comment, "It's so good, I don't even have to." Then he proceeded to try and convince me, yet again, even though he's had it for over ten years and we have discussed it numerous times, that it's cool because it used to be in the top floor smoking lounge of a downtown Omaha hotel in the 1930's and it has good lines.  He neglects to mention that the fabric is itchy and worn, and it's filled with some kind of dark, strange sawdust that leaks out of it at random times. He loves it more than a person should love old furniture. It's also twice the size of the piece photographed here. And it has built in ash trays. It's weird.


Smoking CouchSmoking Couch


Joe says, "This gets two photos just to show how awesome it actually is. 
It's probably the coolest thing I own and believe me I have a lot of cool things."


9. Unfilled picture frames that we continue to buy and shove in random places. They need to be filled and hung. There is no shortage of super fantastic photography to fill them up. Shockingly we still have some wall space left.

Photo Frames

Joe says, "I'm pretty sure we'll be using some of these for Christmas gifts."


10. The guilt that will overwhelm me in January when I look at this list and realize all of these things still need to be done.


11. The misguided idea that Joe's piles will ever be reduced, filed, read or eliminated. That's ok. I like him enough to put up with his piles of crap. And the smoking couch too, I guess. He's a damn good sport. Though he said something really funny, irritated and racy when I read him all the Joe centric items on this list and he wouldn't let me post it. He got kind of pissy, when I pretended to post it. He put his foot down and it was funny. Ask him, maybe he'll tell you.

Obviously, all photos by Joe Sands. Owner and operator of Joe's Piles of Crap.

12 comments:

  1. This makes me feel better about all Jay's piles of stuff...comic books, notebooks of "ideas", etc... :)

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  2. No he won't. Some things are sacred.

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  3. I have to side with Joe on the smoking couch. I quit over a year ago and I still would want to sit on that. In fact it makes me want to smoke. But I won't.

    I also have to *sympathize* with Joe on piles of stuff. And frames everywhere. And too many books.

    We have roughly the same problems. I can't change who I am, which is a person who never learned to file. I don't know the evolutionary logic which produced this strain of human, but it's like asking a hummingbird to stop being so anxious, or a lion to stop being such a good mascot for a movie studio.

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  4. I would laugh, except that most of the piles of crap in our little house belong to me. Oy.

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  5. How about framing some of that great fabric??

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  6. Um, Joe? I love you, but I'm sorry, that smoking couch is not the coolest thing you own. It's cool and interesting, but not the coolEST.

    Kassie, #11 is the best item on this list. I'm right there with ya, if it helps. Troy is also totally worth all the piles of mail, magazines, tools, etc. :-) And God knows he is extremely patient and good-humored about putting up with my quirks!

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  7. Most people know that I'm not much for piles of stuff but don't ever get rid of the smoking couch, it is way too cool to part with. Seriously, it could be the coolest thing Joe owns.

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  8. I love how most of the stuff you want to get rid of seem to be Joe's. :) And that smoking couch is pretty cool!!

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  9. ha! Great list! Great reverb post. I followed the links from Emily's blog and I'm so glad I did.
    fyi, "there is no try" was my mantra when I ran (beyond slowly) the tc marathon. Excellent wisdom, little dude.

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  10. I love the double action post and it's another sneak peak round your house, brilliant.
    You've inspired me to make a similar list, but where to start?

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  11. Two things:

    1. You can never own too many books. Trust me on that one; my house has two academics in it -- we have books everywhere.

    2. Don't kill me, but I think that couch is kind of awesome.

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  12. I think Joe could take that couch from pretty cool, but slightly grody to wowza, I wanna put my booty on that. Joe, do the makeover, as extreme as it may need to be. --Erin L.

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