Hi, my name is Bobert and I am a collectoholic...

However, I have been in recovery for 15 years, 4 months and 3 days and just take it "one day at a time"...

But with that said, yes, during my practicing collectoholic days I amassed quite a collection of eclectic stuff most of which now is boxed up and banished to the ferrowing (don't ask) barn...

Oh, yeah, G-silver, I have cuspidors... I think I have 3 but maybe four... I have one here in the house that I use for nothin' other than keeping my collection of old keys (maybe 500 of them) that I don't have a clue as to what they once unlocked???

I have another box or two with old toasters??? Like what is that all about??? I mean, why would nayone need old toasters...

Okay, I'll plug in the "TRUE CONFESSION" sign here and tell you folk just how bad it got for me during my practicing collectoholic days:

Back in the 70's and early 80's there were several urban renewal projects going on in Richmond and 1000's of old late 1800's homes were taken in eminent domain & boarded up for future demolishment (is that a word???)...

Well, I couldn't wait to get home from my social work job, put on my grubbies, head into these areas in my pickup truck and tools... Yes, night after night I, as well as other collectoholics, would break into these homes, would riffle thru the stuf that had been left behind, pry our archietuctural things of interest, etc...

This is where my toaster collection came from... People left some very intersting stuff behind... Old vaccum cleaners, old women's hats, dolies, drawn-work table clothes, silverware, lamps and shades, large furniture, books by the thousands...

Yep, you name it and folks left it and there I was, a reasonablely well adjusted social worker with 2 degrees on my hands and knees in a boarded up old house rumaging thru postcards, old ash trays, fountain pens, clothes, etc...

Well, that was porbably the height of my disease and, yes, it continues into the 90's until I just had to swaer it off before it consumed me...

Now I am stuck with literally hundreds of boxes of collected stuff out in a 35X100 foot barn and feel responsible for all this stuff...

I can't quite bring myself to auction it all off but I know that *that* day will come and I will have come a full circle...

But as for now, "Lord, just get me thru today, if You will..."

That is my story...

Those who have been in my house can verify every bit of it...

Sniff...

Bobert