Values and Values: Thrift Store Dilemma?

I LOVE thrift stores: let me count the ways. They are good for the community, good for the environment, and, not least of all, good for my mental and financial health. What's not to like?

As in everything, there is a dark side to thrift stores. I don't think I've ever written about this aspect of the thrifts; perhaps I will one day.

Today, I was reminded of the dark side and reminded too of the potential for conflicting values, even in thrift shopping. Since I had a library book to return, I went to the Food Bank Thrift Store, which is very close. This is an odd place, and has had the oddest series of managers. Still: who could argue with the mission? It funds the Food Bank and also a free dental clinic for the needy. So I like to stop by when I'm in the neighborhood.

As I gathered a few items, I heard one of the volunteers explaining to new recruits the items they discard: Harry Potter and other books of witchcraft. I realize this is a common (mis)belief. They were discussing the books in a jeering tone. I paid and left without saying a word.

What do you do when your values conflict with the values of an organization you patronize?

Poor books! I hope they found a home and were not relegated to the trash heap.

Sic Transit Gloria Mundi: Selling Academic Books

I keep meaning to gradually de-accession my huge collection of books, many bought during my years in graduate school. If I work till I'm 65, say (I wish, I wish), I should get rid of about 10% of my books per year. Every now and again, I check the value of a book on Amazon, and think, oh boy, a pretty penny awaits.

For instance, I have this book somewhere.

And this one.

It's so hard to say good-bye to these books. I remember my sense of awe and wonder during those years, along with a panicked feeling that I might never find employment.

Today, however, I realized that my vast collection may, in fact, be mostly worthless. The English Club had a book sale. At the end of the day, a big FREE BOOKS sign was put up.

Many books were donated by a recently-retired colleague. Many of the books he donated were ones Mr. FS and I owned, staples of the graduate student/professor library of days gone by, the days of THEORY. No one wanted the books.

I didn't take them, since we already own them. How do these fare on the open market?


or this?

How depressing! That one doesn't even get a picture! This one was required reading.

Oh, it's all too depressing. But I do need to declutter. The vision (mental only, since I did not participate) of my in-laws getting rid of a 50 year collection of books is so painful. Mr. FS spent his last week in his childhood home packing boxes of books and taking the rejects to Goodwill, which rejected them.

Perhaps it is fate that I picked up this poorly-written tome recently for a quarter.

Strangely, this one seems to be worth more than some of the academic books. I could sell my copy for $2.64.

What lessons should I draw from all this?

Frugal Preppy: Preppy Frugal

In betwixt and between grading this and that, and reading George Herbert, I am continuing my search for frugal gems in (seemingly) non-frugal places.

Imagine my surprise when I came upon a plug for frugality in a preppy blog! The writer, known--natch--as Muffy, evaluates various preppy offerings and discriminates among the many shades of preppy, from the vrai to the faux.

For a whole lot of reasons, by chance and by choice, I am very, very far from preppyness, or preppydom. When I went to college in 1971, I couldn't understand why everyone at my purportedly left-wing college was wearing the SAME Norwegian navy sweater with little cream dots. Or why all the girls on my floor--save me--had Lanz nightgowns.

Anyway, I found a wonderful paean to frugality chez Muffy. With pictures of various items in both their new incarnations and their holey, fraying, mended older selves, Muffy avers that even the older versions are atill serviceable, and still (her word) loved.

And I love this acknowledgment of the preppy paradox: A frugality combined with an appreciation of more expensive items, and Why well-off people embrace and expect the use of well-worn items.

Love: that must explain why I am drawn to the still-worthy and serviceable, but sometimes worn, and definitely unloved items I see at thrift stores. In fact, over the past year, I've gotten two of those iconic LL Bean Norwegian sweaters at Goodwill: a grey with navy pullover for Mr. FS, and a navy with cream cardigan for me.

Speaking of paradoxes and love, George Herbert writes beautifully of both. Here is the last poem in The Temple):

LOVE (III)



Love bade me welcome, yet my soul drew back,
Guilty of dust and sin.
But quick-ey'd Love, observing me grow slack
From my first entrance in,
Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning
If I lack'd anything.

"A guest," I answer'd, "worthy to be here";
Love said, "You shall be he."
"I, the unkind, the ungrateful? ah my dear,
I cannot look on thee."
Love took my hand and smiling did reply,
"Who made the eyes but I?"

"Truth, Lord, but I have marr'd them; let my shame
Go where it doth deserve."
"And know you not," says Love, "who bore the blame?"
"My dear, then I will serve."
"You must sit down," says Love, "and taste my meat."
So I did sit and eat.

Depreciation Appreciation

A post on depreciation at Early Retirement Extreme got me thinking on the topic of depreciation. Never borrow for depreciating assets is a personal finance truism I've read more than a time or two.

As usual for me, my success with the big stuff has been minimal.

CARS: We used to buy used cars--believing the oft-cited "It depreciates by 20-30% once it's off the lot. We did the math on our used Camry and discovered that we had, in effect, paid for the first owner's depreciation! Desirable cars retain their value and don't depreciate as much as you'd think. We've bought two new cars: a 1998 Camry and a 2003 Civic Hybrid, both still chugging away.

With the small stuff, we've done well. Consumer goods depreciate immediately after purchase and basically retain that value...forever. Unlike the proprietor of ERE, we do not live a minimalist lifestyle. We love owning books and CDs and have a fashionista daughter.

BOOKS: We used to patronize wonderful used bookstores in the various university towns in which we resided. At the time, we thought 50% off books was great! Now, we rarely spend over $1.00, and that's for a hardcover. I guess if we wanted to have a yard sale, we could sell all our 25 cent books for 25 cents. But usually we donate them back.

CDs: These used to be a major expense, but swapacd.com (affiliated with paperbackswap.com) has been a blessing.

CLOTHING: Even fashionista college students can find most of what they want at a good thrift store (luckily, we have one). "Mistakes" can be donated back or--sometimes--swapped at the Buffalo Exchange, which has been around for years, but which we only recently discovered. Lucy Marmalade used credit garnered at the New Orleans store to buy a pair of Frye boots at the San Francisco store.

Oh, how we appreciate depreciation. Do you?

Using my Talents Part 2: Books for a Literacy Project

Yesterday, I wrote about using my somewhat embarrassing talent for frugality to start stocking up for Lucy M's dorm cooking next year. It just occurred to me that I have another, less embarrassing example.

Lucy M. is part of a student group that will be working in Marion, Alabama, an area with a high illiteracy rate. Lucy and her pals will be spending 3 weeks there this summer. They decided to partner with the local public library and develop a literacy project.

One idea involves a book give-away for kids who participate. The budget so far is $50.00. Gee, that will buy you about 10 books. Lucy volunteered me for the mission. She knows that nothing is more important to me than reading and she knows that I like nothing better than to scrounge for books in thrift stores.

So voila: within a few weeks of rather lackadaisical effort, I've amassed almost 100 books and I still have money in the budget. I've limited myself to books that look almost new. We're thinking of writing a short message in each book, along the lines of "I love this book and I hope you do too."

Can you think of any other good deeds one can do with the talent for frugality?

Decluttering and Plagiarism?

From Ecclesiastes:
What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again;there is nothing new under the sun.

And indeed there is not. I love reading books about personal finance, tightwaddery, decluttering, and the like, even though they all say pretty much the same thing. That is why I buy these books from thrift stores or check them out of the library. I do like owning a few; it is good to get an inoculation of frugality or decluttering now and again.

A few days ago, I picked up a new one: The 15-Minute Organizer by Emilie Barnes. Published in 1991 by a Christian press, the author thanks all her Titus women in her dedication. Chapters cover the usual suspects: decluttering, organizing, all problem areas for me, all blissful to read about.

Here is the beginning of her chapter exhorting you to declutter: We live in a world of mass production and marketing. We must learn to sort and let go of certain things, or else we will need to build a huge warehouse to contain everything . . .Years ago, when we got something we kept it until it wore out. But today it may never wear out before we tire of it. Yet it seems just too good to dispose of.

We often have things not because of an active decision to keep them but because we have not made the decision to get rid of them.

On an average, people keep things several years after their usefulness has passed. Perhaps we overbuy and have supplies, materials, and tools left over. The things we liked years ago are not what we like or enjoy today., but we hang on to them, thinking that someday we may use them again. (p.44).

Good advice. But it sounds awfully close to the exhortation in the very first decluttering/organizing book I ever read: Totally Organized by Bonnie McCullough. I picked up T.O. for 50 cents at a library discard sale. I didn't even KNOW there were books on such topics. Truly, this book changed my life. I still have problems, but at least I know what I should be doing! Thank you Bonnie. I probably read this book 50 times. That is why Ms. Barnes's prose rang a bell. Here is my beloved Bonnie McCullough:

It's hard to throw things out. In days gone by, when you got something you kept it for life or until it was worn out. But now we live in a world of mass production and marketing, and to survive you either have to build a warehouse or learn to sort and let go. We often keep things, not because of an active decision to keep them, but because we have not made a decision to get rid of them. On average, people keep things five years after their usefulness has passed. . .Sometimes we overbuy and have supplies, materials, and tools left over and they mount up over the years. . . .The things we enjoyed ten years ago are not the things we enjoy today . . . (pp. 122-23)

Emilie Barnes has more than 20 books to her name! I would guess that one of her uncredited research assistants did wrong here....but who knows?

Anyway, great advice ladies. And I suppose this has turned into a recommendation for Totally Organized. In addition to her advice on organizing, McCullough has a great section on budgeting and money management.

Free to a Loving Home: Books

The bane of the declutterer is the desire to find a loving home for all the discards. I myself suffer from this problem. Even though Flylady and her ilk urge us to LET GO, it's hard.

For me, it's especially hard with books. Most of the bookbuyers at the thrifts I habituate don't even look at the titles: they just scan with their phones, and wait for a "YES." But I have luckily found a few places where my books will find loving buyers.

First, I donate to the English Club at my place of employ. The money raised is used for travel to conferences.

When I went to the library today, I saw a sign that the Teen Club is collecting books for soldiers. What could be better than that?

Finally, Lucy Marmalade and the scholars in the "Fellows" program will be doing a three-week service project in rural Alabama, an area with over 50% adult illiteracy. The hardest books for me to unload are children's books. We are hoping that the library will take donations of books to be given away to children who participate in the program.

Last week I was playing with the tiny baby belonging to one of my students. The student was telling me that she loved to hold the baby while she fell asleep, even though all the books said it was wrong. ERGHHHH. I brought my very own copy of Penelope Leach's masterpiece to the next class. Finally, I found a good home for my beloved baby book.

I just packed up many books for the soldiers.

Free to a loving home.

What do you have problems with in the declutter department?

Frugal Karma: Two Episodes

You never know. Mr. FS and I have been walking on the Tammany Trace every day. Yesterday, he suggested that we walk in the neighborhood instead, even though we sometimes dawdle. OK.

So we set out and passed a yard sale. Now I don't do yard sales--too much driving and too much time wasting with uncertain outcomes. Too much stress as people watch you reject the junk they spent so much on. But this was KARMA.

First, Mr. FS declared that he would wait in the street, but eventually he sidled over and found just what he wanted: a SONY discman. $3.00!

Then I kind of wafted over to a table where I found a package of 7 yards of fabric cording. In the exact colors I needed. This was even more karmic because the roadblock to my getting some pillows re-covered has been choosing the cording. I tried two fabric stores and even with TLC customer service at the second one, I almost passed out from the "paradox of choice." Strangely, this cording is nicer than the ones at the store. And, even though the seller was asking for too much money for her clothing (some from Paris!), the cording was only $1.00.

Then we continued on our walk. We had to walk back to the yard sale because we had not a penny on our persons when we went on the walk.

Today, I wended over to Goodwill. There I found just the book I've been wanting to read: Flow, by Mihaly Csikszentmihakyi. Of course, I had to buy 4 additional books, since books are $0.39 each or 5 for $1.00. In one of the books I found a wedding invite to the fancy (Four Seasons Resort The Biltmore Santa Barbara) nuptials of Danielle Trober and Alexander Vouvalides. Also in the book was a card listing hotels with space reserved, helpfully listing the price range, from $$$ to $$$$$.

The juxtaposition of my budget blissful thrifting and the fancy route to (I hope) wedded bliss was interesting. Back to grading papers. Seldom is this an activity conducive to flow. But perhaps after reading the book, I can achieve this blissful state.

Things Found in Thrift Store Books: An Old Friend (?)

I have this plan--so far unrealized--to write a whole series of posts on "things found in thrift store books." I am always amazed at how I often find JUST the book I want to read, if not now, then in a month or so. Or even a year or so. Often, this is a book I never would have heard of. That's how I found The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, some time before it was made into a film.

Then there are the physical objects I find: airline boarding passes, notes, receipts, photos.

But recently I found a book that--fortuitously--bought to me someone I haven't seen in about 30 years. The book is called French Lessons. Published by the University of Chicago Press, it was written by a professor of French--Alice Kaplan--who is about my age, but is a fantastically successful academic, with a position at Duke University. The book, with ecstatic blurbs by reviewers in highbrow media outlets, is autobiographical: the author's father was involved in the Nuremburg Trials; the author meditates on such subjects as language, identity, and academic politics, ambition, and success--all things I would find rather interesting.

How could I resist? Especially since Habitat for Humanity was having an "all books 25 cents sale." Also, who else who frequents the Habitat for Humanity thrift store would buy this book? It was positively my duty to purchase it.

As it turned out, I found the book kind of a letdown. In spite of the author's interesting life and topics, the book was kind of boring. Oh well. I did read through the sections on her time in the graduate program at Yale, where she was involved with a fellow named Bill Golden, and suffered through the anxieties and politicking of a small and very political department. So I wended through the book in a rather desultory way. (Sorry about my poor review. Maybe it's me. The blurbs really ARE ecstatic, e.g. "most engaging Bildungsroman" blahblahblah)

Then, I perused the Acknowledgements, in this book at the end, rather than the beginning. There, in the middle of the top line of a page was a name that jumped out at me: Nicholas -------. Oh my: an old friend from college, who had gone to Yale in French, and who had--so I heard--left academics. We did not part under pleasant circumstances.

So, of course, I returned to the Yale section to see if there were any references to him. After a while, I realized that Bill Golden (whom she also calls Guillaume
Dore), the sometime love interest of the author, MUST have been Nick. Who else was "painfully thin," aggressively workaholic, had a New York father who had mysteriously lost all his money, had a beautiful French mother, who left her very young son with his father, so eager was she to get a divorce and return to France. Oh yeah--and who else also went to the Lycee Francais in New York City.

So I found out that Nick, who, last I saw him was in graduate school desperately desirous of becoming a protege of the famous professor Paul De Man (who was later revealed to have written for pro-Nazi newspapers in Belgium), wrote an overly detailed and lengthy dissertation,quit a teaching job mid-class, was doing something with computers, married someone who "understood" his complete self, and had an indeterminate number of children. And apparently was wearing overalls as he surveyed his yard post-academics.

Well, I'm not sure why I wrote all this down, except that it was a weird experience. I almost emailed the author to ask if Bill Golden was Nick! Then I realized the book was published in 1993--more than 15 years before I read it.

Of all the things I've found in thrift store books, this was the strangest. Perhaps my next installment will detail the inappropriate email a professor sent a student, that was folded into Terry Eagleton's Literary Theory.

So Readers: any interesting finds in books?

Selling Your Books: Best Way

Back from my almost 3-week vacation. Little internet access. Pure bliss.

I had planned to post a killer back-from-vacation essay, but, of course, the pressure to do so makes writing hard. Instead, a very prosaic one.

In the months since the economic meltdown of Fall 2008, there have been loads of articles in the mainstream press about how to make extra money. They all sound pretty much the same. One common tip: Sell your books. Common variation: Be a book scout. This advice is followed by a tip to sell to cash4books.net, because you can often sell a book you bought for a quarter at a yard sale for $5.25.

As it happens, this advice, as well as the example, comes from the cash4books website, which also features a picture of the successful proprietors and their adorable baby.

I typed in a few isbns for a test run, and cash4books wanted nary a one.

So, in a public service mood, I checked out a current and desirable textbook: the Norton Anthology of English Literature, Volume 1. The book is not for sale, folks.

But if I were selling it, here are the options:

Amazon: The lowest price is $40.00. You would have to pay 15%, plus a dollar in fees. Then you'd have to pack and ship. You'd get $3.99 for shipping from Amazon, which probably would cover this bulky tome. Maybe add insurance in case it got lost.

Barnes and Noble: $25.85 cash. They provide a prepaid mailing label! Pack and ship! Easy-Peasy.

Powells: I remember old Mr. Powell bringing a big cart of books to the Reed College campus in the early 70s. A much-beloved store. But they only offer $11.00 in cash and a teeny bit more in virtual credit... They also provide a prepaid shipping label.

cash4books: In spite of the great press these folks get, they only offer $14.46.

I have a beef with these journalists. First, do they take all the info from company publicity? Do they check anything out?

A lot of people must be taking their advice, because I see a lot of book scouts caressing the books at the thrifts with their cellphones.

And, once again, you can't buy my book because it has my precious teaching notes in it.

Books from Thrift Stores and Some Numbers

Last I reported on The Brothers Karamazov, I was on page 14 and fully expecting to give up on the novel, yet once more. But I am happy to report, dear readers, that I am now on page 644, with little more than 100 pages to go. I persevered because, if I can't get through this novel, who can? I am highly educated and love reading more than almost anything else. Also, based on my experience teaching, I am fearful that the skill of reading complex literary works may be dying out.

After the difficult beginning (and the novel is difficult all the way through), eventually one realizes that one is in the midst of a masterpiece. Truly breathtaking. And now, of course, I am reluctant to keep going, because I don't want the novel to end.

As I've said before I am lucky to like reading, and, certainly reading is a frugal pastime. My copy of The Brothers Karamazov is a nice one: it's the newish translation by the husband-wife team who also did the Anna Karenina that Oprah sent to the top of the bestseller list a few years ago. My book is the 2002 FSG edition that has a price of $17.00 on the back. Although I could get this from the library, it is a book I want to own. As it happens, I got it from the library book sale for $1.00. What a gift that someone donated this book!

Even better is the inscription inside the front cover in writing that looks a bit like engraving, a carefully scripted message to the next owner of the book:

Neal Pendleton Library

This book is the first that my beloved wife, Patricia, recommended that I read, after we first met in 1953.

What a wonderful message to me! And I just checked: Mr. Pendleton is listed in the phone book so he still lives nearby.

I love finding things in books. Mostly, I find boarding passes, usually stuck in an early page of an obviously abandoned book. Once I found a book inscribed to someone by the author, who was a few years ahead of me in college! I also found a cache of books that had been owned by a local author of some repute: in the books were photographs, receipts, and more. She was obviously a wealthy woman. Once, in the big Barnes and Noble in New York City (this was in 1977, before B and N stores were everywhere), I bought a used copy of The Crisis of the Aristocracy for a course I was taking. Out popped a receipt from the Reed College Bookstore from a few years before, when I had attended that college across the country in Oregon. And, one of these days, I may write about the inappropriate email sent by an English professor to a student, which she stashed in a book (Terry Eagleton's book on literary theory) that she donated to Goodwill.

Before I return to my book, let me share some other numbers.
Talbots stock: $5.43 (I would have tripled my investment!)
Edmund Andrews's Busted: Amazon sales rank of 63,459.

And so, Dear Readers, have you found anything interesting or surprising in used books?

My Frugal Birthday

Happy Birthday to me.

Let's see, I got birthday wishes from husband and son. That's good, because husband sometimes forgets. Dear daughter called and sent TWO emails, one promising me a year of haircuts (she's very good at cutting). So the family part is perfect.

Banana Republic sent me my yearly $15.00 gift card. This is sent to all who hold the BR credit card. It does not seem to be linked to how much you spend; I spend less than $100.00 most years. I bought a sweater. The frugal forces of the universe gave me a birthday during the very month that things are marked down!

I am 55 and so am now eligible for the 15% senior discount at Goodwill. The paperbacks have just gone from 5 for $1.00 to 5 for .85.

For my gift to myself, I went to Habitat and bought 4 pairs of clip-on earrings for .50 each. Habitat has a half off sale for the month of January, which I believe is in honor of my birthday. Thanks Habitat.


And my best present of all came from Washington DC. Thank you America.

Books at Thrift Stores: Episode 1

I have been buying books at thrift stores for many years now. I came to the game late. When I was in graduate school, I went to the Salvation Army. Their store was in a damp basement. There I saw Danna, the owner of a recently-opened used book store. She must have had 50 books on the counter (they were 2 for a nickel). When she saw me, she said, “Oh, I hardly ever come here. This is the first time I’ve found any books. Usually, they don’t have any good books.”

Needless to say, I became a regular. As far as I could tell, we were the only people who bought books there. I bought some for me and the rest to trade for credit at the other used bookstore. I’m sure Danna was relieved when I moved.

It’s harder to find good books now because many people sell them on-line. If you ever go to a book sale and see people waving a cell phone over a book, you can be sure they are subscribing to “Scoutpal.” The isbn number links to Amazon and tells the person what the book is going for. Last time I went to a Friends of the Library Sale, I was the only person of 11 customers who did not have one of these.

I wish the people who run the sales would get one of these. The resellers only buy those books that can be sold. The library retains all the books that the resellers might have taken a chance on in the years before Scoutpal.

In fact, you don’t even have to know how to read to benefit from one of these. You can just scan or key in the numbers. I see teenagers in Goodwill methodically using Scoutpal on every book, including the tomes of John Grisham. I always want to tell them that they would save a lot of time if they would just eliminate the Grishams, which make up the bulk of books in any thrift store. My guess is that a parent is sending off a teenager to help with the family income.

So while it’s hard to find good academic books (my favorites!), or cookbooks, there is an overabundance of good fiction and children’s books. These have very little resale value, so it is easy to get that Oprah book you missed, any best seller of recent vintage, or wonderful Scholastic books for kids of all ages.

Just a few I’ve gotten recently:

“The Paradox of Choice”: I read a library copy a while ago. The premise is that too much choice does not increase happiness. My son read my library copy. He is going to give this book, which looks unread, as a gift to a friend who has too many choices.

“Girl, Interrupted”: I had this book years ago and probably traded it in at a used bookstore. My daughter saw the film of this book when we were in Florida. I told her I would get her a copy of the book. Second day back, there it was!

“Beasts of No Nation”: My son will be taking a course on African fiction. This is on the reading list. A very lucky find.

Total cost: 60 cents.

Dear readers: What books have you found at thrifts? What do you do with them when you are done? Anything you're looking for?