Ditto

I have a few collections. A collection of them!

This car used to be parked in the deck at my old job, the guy had a Ford Tempo that was in the same condition, one day the Ford was replaced by the Buick. I guess he needed a bigger car...

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1006/...e8c5ec5f83.jpg
http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1381/...75fda7211a.jpg
http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1069/...9a0fd99488.jpg

I fear that I may be turning into a Parts Hoarder.

Why do I keep 16 996/986 cigarette lighters?
Why do I keep 5 pairs of mid 1980's seats?
Why do I keep a complete 911 passenger Cab door?
Why do I keep extra bumpers?
Why do I keep spare quarter panels?
Why do I keep spare fenders?
Why do I keep THOUSANDS OF SCREWS BOLTS AND KNOBS?

The answer;
So I will have the needed parts when I begin hoarding/collecting MORE cars.

If that is sick then I don't want to be well!

Yep, that is what it was like with my mom, she doesnt drive now thank god.:confused:

My aunt was a hoarder before she killed herself. Not the "can't throw stuff away" hoarder, the "newspapers stacked in neat piles to the ceiling, 20 deep and 20 wide filling the livingroom" type hoarder. Garbage bags filled with shredded paper, crammed into the bedroom so densely that the door would not close. Tunnels (not paths, tunnels) heading between the front door and the kitchen.

She filled a 2 bedroom apartment from SCRATCH in 6 months, after we moved her out of her old townhome (which was similarly filled with stuff). She would actively collect things, it wasn't just not wanting to get rid of 20 years of accumulated stuff.

True hoarders are as hard to understand by "normal" people as true psychotics or true bipolar sufferers. Their life is alien to society, their friends, their families.

Two year ago I looked around, and I had 7 parts cars. It was the first day of real spring, and I wanted to take a ride. Of all my drivers, they were either dead or they had expired stickers or registrations.

I snapped. I vowed I would get rid of the parts cars. As I was thinking about it, a guy came to my door and asked if I wanted to have any cars hauled off. WOW, talk about the universe responding ! So I spent a week of my time stripping out cars, and then there were only the good restorable ones (All Fiats).

Now I am feeling a little better, but when me Father heard, he asked me to get all my Fiat parts out of HIS barn, four hours away in another state. Of course they were in some way my staking a claim on the family property, but my Dad wanted them out. Um, he is 86, and I haven't lived there for many many years. Sooo, off I go, a month of weekends, truck, trailer and many loads later, you can't walk around in my barn. It was all up in the rafters of my Dads barn, but now I can't walk around. It is MUCH worse than before...

Sooo, I get the bright idea to sell some stuff. All Fiat. Bump into some people, and call a guy from Toronto. Sell him a 50 foot truck trailer worth of goods, including three nice restorable cars. But he only takes the best of the parts, and leaves me with a lot of junk I now no longer need, although I still have two of the F cars, a couple of P cars and a Miata.

Still having space issues, I go through the winter. I can't walk around in the garage, and I am discovering that having Fiats is not as sweet as it was before 911s. ;) So in the spring, I call the guy, and sell the good Fiats, one an Abarth rep.

Now I can walk around, but there is still chaos. I decide to redo the inside of the garage/shop, and as I am in the middle of this additional upheaval, I get a call from the excavator who I have been waiting to get to hook up my septic to the shop for three years. Way, WAY more upheaval. I have to empty the equiptment shed to make way for the pipes, and that means tearing up the floor. AKK !

But now I am determined, oh yes, and a little crazed. I get the floor torn out, and move ALL the stuff in the loft down to the carport. ( I have a building problem. I can't stop building...) I get the pipes to the equiptment shed, but now it is time to hand excavate the packed clay inder my slab, and run the pipes into the building, coreing through my newly finished shop floor.

Big mess. Wind up getting a super deal on blown in foam insulation for the second floor loft. Now I am rushing to finish the wiring up there, including upgrading the subpanel to 100 amps. Need to frame for the final window installation, and mask off the exposed barn framing. So I do...

BUT, I still have a hole in the shed. Finish that and get the floor back in, regrade the slope. Next I still have to finish the Garage, and sheet rock the loft, after installing the windows. And then ?????

THEN I get to deal with all the remaining junk !!! :eek: :eek: :eek:

DO they have a Hoarders Anonymous ? I do not know, but I am determined to get to the other side of this. It seems that the solution to every problem has cause a new problem requiring a new solution, creating a new problem.

I kinda wish I had kept the Abarth Rep though... A darned good looking car, and my boyhood dream. Like I said, something Snapped !

They say it is aform of depression.
My sister has boxes she hasn't unpacked she moved into her present house 9 yrs ago!
Also has 5 cats. The two things go together imo.
Other wise she is a wonderful and fun person to be around.
She has found some great treasures over the years but
We all have one word of advice for her: Dumpster!
I have also have a lot of old car magazines, 2000 vinyl records 200 books etc. so I understand the need to collect.