Tara and I had our regular Monday date night and we did something a little different - we organized my bookshelves. Not the most romantic thing to do on a date, but she loves arranging books and I'm too lazy to take on a task that big without help.
Long-time readers will remember what my apartment looks like from my home theater post ("My new theater" - Nov. 25, 2007). I have a three-level built-in bookshelf above my 42-inch flatscreen TV, and I also have another three-shelf standalone bookshelf in the bedroom that has my slightly damaged 37-inch flatscreen on it.
We started with the top shelf in the living room, stacking books from right to left, tallest to shortest. Then we put all the comic trade paperbacks on the left side of the middle shelf, and all the other paperbacks (grouped by author) on the right side. The bottom shelf holds the Harry Potter box I got for my birthday and all the leftovers.
In the bedroom, we put all the books having to do with magick/paganism, and Sherlock Holmes, along with my Lord of the Rings hardcovers on the bottom shelf. The top and middle shelves hold some of my large DVD box sets (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Matrix, Star Trek, Angel, Alien Quadrilogy, etc.) and my *ahem* adult videos. Putting all these DVDs on the bookshelf in the bedroom frees up enough room to finally stop stacking DVD on top of my DVD cabinet in the living room.
Tara also alphabatized all my comics and put them in the small box I bought at the comic store last weekend. The only problem is, I haven't really figured out an unobtrusive place to put that box, so it's sitting next to my file cabinet next to my computer desk. I also cleared out my old catalogs and magazines, putting the ones I wanted to keep in the box I keep in the bathroom.
After it was all done, we sat on the couch and just admired our work for a while, and talked about books and comics. I wish I'd thought to take a before picture so all you bibliophiles could get a kick out of it. It was a lot messier than the picture I took way back in November. We finished the night with some quiet cuddling in bed, said goodnight and she went home.
It was actually a pretty cool date after all.
