Journals journals journals

In addition to going through my CDs, and going through my books -- I'd already culled a bunch of DVDs a year or two ago -- I'm also getting rid of nearly all of my academic journals.

When I thought I'd be a professor, I was emulating what professors did:  subscribing to scholarly journals, and letting them accumulate on the shelves.  But now that I've accepted that I'm not going to be a professor, I don't need them -- and they're taking up valuable space.

I haven't kept track of how many I've gone through -- and I'm not sure how many I have total (stashes of them keep popping up!) -- but I estimate I had around 100 issues of various journals.  So far I've gone through about 30 -- and kept one... plus another where I tore out a specific article, then recycled the rest.

I can't bear to just recycle the whole lot without looking -- while waiting for webpages to load (and etc.), I've glanced through each one before recycling it:  using the "Pete Guest" approach (one of my professors in graduate school), I read the titles (usually 8-12 articles per issue).  Among the ones that sound interesting -- and often, none of them sound interesting!!! -- I'll read the abstract (the summary at the start of the article), which usually includes the "punchline" (the main finding).  For the very, very few that are particularly interesting, I'll actually glance through the article itself.

I usually go through 1-3 journals a night.


Between the book purging and the journal-clearing, there's now a few sections of carpet in front of the "main bookcase" that haven't been exposed in years:  a good feeling.

My aim is that I'll clear enough room that I can actually set up my recording gear properly -- such that I can record when the mood strikes me -- rather than having to spend 10-15 minutes setting everything up. 

Chipping away...


--GG