(no subject)
Aug. 20th, 2019 04:27 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
psipsyRecently, I went to Otakon. This is the second year in a row I commuted there, although for an event like that, commuting is surprisingly cumbersome. I think the size of the convention center has a lot to do with it; as events such as AUSA or Katsucon are entirely in hotels, and it also tends to be more loot-heavy than AUSA or Katsucon. But then there's the whole "driving into DC" thing that's more trouble than it's worth, so I just take the metro and deal with it because Otakon is right on top of one of the stations.
I picked up more laserdiscs, because I could. A few full sets, each one for about the price of what 1 or 2 discs originally sold for. Then someone on FB commented that he has a collection of about 300 discs that he'll sell for $1200. A great deal when looking at the cost per disc, but Otakon put too much of a hurting on my disposable cash.
In the process of organizing, I discovered I have way more CDs than I thought. I don't directly count them; that way lies madness. I found it easier to simply measure stacks of them in inches, then calculate how many from that. That also gives me a direct and more usable figure to work with when determining how much linear shelf space I need. The total length I calculated my music collection to be came out to 36' worth of shelf. As 10 standard CD cases will fit in 4", as the vast majority of them are, then according to my calculations, I have about 1100 CDs, give or take a few. (My initial estimate was maybe 800.) Fortunately as CDs don't have much overall volume, they won't require much in the way of wall space. I have a couple smaller CD shelf units and a small open-rack unit and that combination is enough for most of them. Eventually I'll probably build up some kind of shelf thing that can hold all or almost all of them, or find an existing solution better than what I have.
The high number of CDs is mainly from buying them used lately. It's a lot easier to justify taking a chance on something unknown when it's marked down to $2-3 (or less) than when they're at their original price of $15-20. That said, while there were some that I got for cheap and was pleasantly surprised, there were others that I thought were kinda "meh", and I can probably sell those back to the store I got them from.
Another dawning source of cheap used CDs is ironically enough, straight from Japan. A long-ass time ago, when I was going to more conventions than I do now, I'd often find someone selling import CDs. The original MSRP was already around $30 for them, and then there was the markup from whoever brought them to the convention.
Well, Japanese efficiency extends to their used media markets. Most of the smaller stores in Tokyo had some kind of buy-back system and would sell used goods. This includes anime, music, manga, doujinshi, and so on. In the case of Book-Off (and the other -Off stores), that's their whole business. Because why throw things away when one can take it back to the store and at least have some coin to show for it? Anyway, while there, I used that to my advantage, buying doujinshi for about a dollar, and the same CDs that originally sold for $30 were going for a sliver of that. (Yeah, I loaded right the fuck up, needing two large suitcases.) And now, I don't really have to go to Japan for that, as a store called Surugaya started selling their used goods internationally. In a recent order totalling about $135 with shipping, that is for 20 different items of music CDs and doujinshi. Granted, shipping from Japan is automatically brutal, but even then, the price-per-item is under $7. See where I'm going with this?
Also, I got another bookcase for the manga. Another benefit to the BILLY series from Ikea is the option to buy extra shelves. By itself, each bookcase has 15 linear feet of shelf space, not including on top of the bookcase (that I plan to use). Adding a pair of shelves brings it to 20 linear feet. Initially I was worried that adding an extra shelf would result in not enough clearance. As it turns out, there is enough in that configuration, with a couple extra inches to spare. So now, some of the shelves have just enough for standard-sized manga, while the others have an extra inch for slightly-oversized volumes. That makes it damn near perfect, really. As a bonus, the shelves are deep enough for 2 rows, effectively doubling the capacity to 40 linear feet, and that one bookcase becomes enough for all of my manga. While that means pulling some books out of the way to get to others, that's always going to be better than digging through boxes for them. As it turns out, that spacing is also great for DVD/BDs.
My anime collection is unpacked and uses 48 feet of linear shelf space. Again, the figure of length is easier to get and more immediately usable than a raw unit count. I got a wall-hugging shelf thing that holds about 25 feet (28 if I use the top), and that's good for a bit more than half. I ended up dusting off an open rack anyway, because some of the box sets with a taller profile didn't really fit in the wall unit.
So! In total, I have 3 tall bookcases, a short bookcase under the window, 3 wall-hugging media units, 4 open racks, and a small desk, all in one room. After unpacking all my stuff, it's left me with quite a few empty boxes, many of which went out for recycling. Slowly but surely, the unpacking continues, in fits and starts.
I picked up more laserdiscs, because I could. A few full sets, each one for about the price of what 1 or 2 discs originally sold for. Then someone on FB commented that he has a collection of about 300 discs that he'll sell for $1200. A great deal when looking at the cost per disc, but Otakon put too much of a hurting on my disposable cash.
In the process of organizing, I discovered I have way more CDs than I thought. I don't directly count them; that way lies madness. I found it easier to simply measure stacks of them in inches, then calculate how many from that. That also gives me a direct and more usable figure to work with when determining how much linear shelf space I need. The total length I calculated my music collection to be came out to 36' worth of shelf. As 10 standard CD cases will fit in 4", as the vast majority of them are, then according to my calculations, I have about 1100 CDs, give or take a few. (My initial estimate was maybe 800.) Fortunately as CDs don't have much overall volume, they won't require much in the way of wall space. I have a couple smaller CD shelf units and a small open-rack unit and that combination is enough for most of them. Eventually I'll probably build up some kind of shelf thing that can hold all or almost all of them, or find an existing solution better than what I have.
The high number of CDs is mainly from buying them used lately. It's a lot easier to justify taking a chance on something unknown when it's marked down to $2-3 (or less) than when they're at their original price of $15-20. That said, while there were some that I got for cheap and was pleasantly surprised, there were others that I thought were kinda "meh", and I can probably sell those back to the store I got them from.
Another dawning source of cheap used CDs is ironically enough, straight from Japan. A long-ass time ago, when I was going to more conventions than I do now, I'd often find someone selling import CDs. The original MSRP was already around $30 for them, and then there was the markup from whoever brought them to the convention.
Well, Japanese efficiency extends to their used media markets. Most of the smaller stores in Tokyo had some kind of buy-back system and would sell used goods. This includes anime, music, manga, doujinshi, and so on. In the case of Book-Off (and the other -Off stores), that's their whole business. Because why throw things away when one can take it back to the store and at least have some coin to show for it? Anyway, while there, I used that to my advantage, buying doujinshi for about a dollar, and the same CDs that originally sold for $30 were going for a sliver of that. (Yeah, I loaded right the fuck up, needing two large suitcases.) And now, I don't really have to go to Japan for that, as a store called Surugaya started selling their used goods internationally. In a recent order totalling about $135 with shipping, that is for 20 different items of music CDs and doujinshi. Granted, shipping from Japan is automatically brutal, but even then, the price-per-item is under $7. See where I'm going with this?
Also, I got another bookcase for the manga. Another benefit to the BILLY series from Ikea is the option to buy extra shelves. By itself, each bookcase has 15 linear feet of shelf space, not including on top of the bookcase (that I plan to use). Adding a pair of shelves brings it to 20 linear feet. Initially I was worried that adding an extra shelf would result in not enough clearance. As it turns out, there is enough in that configuration, with a couple extra inches to spare. So now, some of the shelves have just enough for standard-sized manga, while the others have an extra inch for slightly-oversized volumes. That makes it damn near perfect, really. As a bonus, the shelves are deep enough for 2 rows, effectively doubling the capacity to 40 linear feet, and that one bookcase becomes enough for all of my manga. While that means pulling some books out of the way to get to others, that's always going to be better than digging through boxes for them. As it turns out, that spacing is also great for DVD/BDs.
My anime collection is unpacked and uses 48 feet of linear shelf space. Again, the figure of length is easier to get and more immediately usable than a raw unit count. I got a wall-hugging shelf thing that holds about 25 feet (28 if I use the top), and that's good for a bit more than half. I ended up dusting off an open rack anyway, because some of the box sets with a taller profile didn't really fit in the wall unit.
So! In total, I have 3 tall bookcases, a short bookcase under the window, 3 wall-hugging media units, 4 open racks, and a small desk, all in one room. After unpacking all my stuff, it's left me with quite a few empty boxes, many of which went out for recycling. Slowly but surely, the unpacking continues, in fits and starts.
