If you’ve been following along elsewhere, you might be aware that Kris and I have been on a purging kick lately. We’re getting rid of all our stuff! Well, maybe not all of it, but vast quantities.

For one thing, I’m purging books. You know how painful this is for me. I’m sure those that helped us move the books three years ago are none too pleased to see them being sold (or worse — given away). But I’ve finally realized that it’s senseless to keep books that I never intend to read. Plus, we’re not far from the public library.

So, we’re purging many books. That means, of course, that we can purge bookshelves. I also bought a new desk, one that I can actually work at without experiencing pain. That means we have an old desk to purge. We’re purging old computer disks, manuals, and supplies. We’re purging our media collection.

Some of this stuff has just been thrown in the trash. I just want it gone. We’re selling other items on Craigslist. I’m selling some stuff online, too.

Surprisingly, it doesn’t hurt to get rid of my comics. I thought it would. It’s actually something of a relief to mail them to somebody who will read them. I’m not losing much on them, either. I bought them for an average of $25/book, and am selling them for about $20/book.

What did hurt, however, was selling our old RCA Victor “Living Sound” console stereo. We never used it — Kris thought it was ugly and wouldn’t let it anywhere in the main living area — but I always dreamed of having it sitting in our living room, providing its warm, rich tube-born sound. But I sold it for $25 yesterday to a guy who’s going to gut it to use as a computer-based music server. (He’ll wire the computer output to the console’s speakers — he loves the warm, rich sound, too.) Selling that thing hurt.

Imagine how awesome that thing would have looked with the chairs from Mac and Pam:

I knew there was something I was missing when I agreed to sell that console. It was a perfect match for those chairs. One of our projects for the next few months is to convert the study (the red room downstairs) into a proper Man Room. I could have made huge strides toward this goal if I’d put the console down there with the chairs.

I’m kicking myself now.