The Butt Ugly Weblog

Recycling parties

I've heard lately people complaining how much stuff they have. It might be a common problem in my age group - you just accumulate things over time, but you never really need to throw them away because you keep moving to a bigger apartment, where the stuff can always be hidden. Looking at the amount of things we have (fairly regular amount of stuff for any six-person family - except, of course, there are only three of us) it really makes me wonder whether I need all of that.

Now, clothes are fairly easy to keep from multiplicating - at least for me - but I've got a ton of stuff which just simply isn't really necessary, yet too useful to throw away. But it seems that there never is time nor the will to start triaging things.

So here's an idea - and I'd like to hear if anyone has experiences with something like this before: a recycling party. You gather a lot of friends (preferably with some inkling of good taste) and let them do the sorting. All things go to four big boxes: "Keep & display", "Keep & hide", "Recycle" and "Throw away". Keep&Display are things which look nice and are worth keeping, Keep&Hide are things which have particular value but aren't used often (or are hideous but precious), the Recycle bin is for those things which are good but not necessary, and the last one is obviously for things which just deserve death.

The party host offers food & drinks, while everyone has fun rummaging through the host's closets and arguing about the things. Finally, the Recycle-bin is taken to a recycling center whereas the garbage is ceremoniously thrown away; and kept items are placed in their proper places.

Might work well as a part of move. Don't know. Let me know if anyone has tried something like this.