Monday, April 23, 2012

Simplifying Our Lives/Home: Magazine Clutter

 "Let me put it this way. Have you ever heard of Plato, Aristotle, Socrates? Morons."

This post is a continuation of my simplification series. Call it "part deux" or even "deuce".

*snicker* I said deuce...


Eliminating magazine clutter

Part of my stockpile
I admit that I'm a bit of a magazine junkie. Currently, I have six subscriptions. Now this is not a post about saving money, as I only actually paid for one of those subscriptions. One is a yearly gift from my dad and stepmom and the other four I got for free.

So the problem isn't the spending—it's the clutter. I used to be pretty good about rotating my magazines in and out of the bathroom and into the recycling, but now that I have so many, I have piles of unread issues in cabinets, on counters, and in drawers. It's a little out of control.

All of my subscriptions should expire sometime this year, at which point I am not going to renew any of them. It makes me a little sad, but not so sad that I'm changing my mind. In the meantime, I've made two piles—one stacked high with magazines I've already read or probably just won't, and one with magazines that I want to read before they go. That includes my beloved Writer's Digest. And if I decide I can't live without something, I can always subscribe via Kindle. No clutter, no storage, no paper waste.

My new goal is to read one magazine per day from the second pile until I'm all caught up and then take the whole stack to Half Price Books. I won't get much for them, but a little cash is better than no cash, so I'll take it. Then I can walk next door to Michael's and buy the candle wicks I've needed for weeks so I can make my homemade soy candles.

How do you control magazine clutter?

2 comments:

  1. I, too, have had tons of free subscriptions for years, 98% of the magazines rarely even being opened. This past weekend, I was on a spring cleaning mission, and dumped all of them into a nearby recycle bin. I figure that if I haven't read a Sports Illustrated from 2007 by this time, I probably won't.

    I wish we had a HPB near here. I'm sure there are similar stores that would accept the magazines I just threw out, I just have no idea who they might be.

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  2. I hide them under my bathroom cabinet until Kurt finally flips out and moves them to the recycling bin when I'm not at home. ;) I get a LOT of magazines and I do keep a few for reference - Family Fun is amazing for kid activities and crafts that I can actually do, for instance, so I keep it for homeschooling stuff, and I keep Cincinnati Magazine because I use it to give me ideas for freelance pitches and online writing stuffs. I used to keep Cooking Light and Cook's Illustrated, but I finally conceded that I have too many cookbooks as it is.

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