Friday, February 21, 2003

friday five

1. what is your most prized material possession?
my most beloved personal possession is my library: i have an extensive, much beloved book collection, that i will most definitely send down to australia in its entirety. my computer, or rather, it's harddisk, comes a close second. realised during last year's motherboard death and the resulting data death scare, how much of my life is on this thing.

2. what item, that you currently own, have you had the longest?
my stuffed toy cat schnuffi. i've had him for more than 20 years - i got him as a pressie from my grandma after i lost my first stuffed toy cat, called klaas.
back when i first got schnuff, i must have been in the middle of my oral phase: i still used a pacifier with holes, and throughoutly enjoyed using schnuffi's very soft ears to tickle my upper lip through the holes of the pacifier.
i remember thinking that his ears were the softest thing in the entire world - a view i have changed since, but i still admire their softness, and tickling my face with them is still consoling.
i and have slept just two nights without schnuffi since i got him. - he goes were i go, and has travelled extensively as a result. my beloved schnuffi isn't terribly pretty anymore - he's quite flat, from lying under me for about 8 hours a night for 20 years, and his fur has started to get quite fragile in places. my mom has stitched him up a few times already, but i fear he will need professional restoration, soon.
people who have shared my bed have referred to schnuffi as "the dead cat" or "the ugly cat". these people do not share my bed anymore. if you love me, you have to love schnuffi. we're inseparable. so inseparable he travels in my hand luggage on planes, because i worry about him getting lost with my luggage. i'd be inconsolable if he were gone.

3. are you a packrat?
yes and no. i used to be a real, full blown messy and keep each and everything. i've tried to significantly tone done the unnecessary stuff that i own and simply get less stuff. it makes me feel a lot better, owing less stuff, and have started to realise that it doesn't make sense to accumulate fluff if i am leaving the country soon. it's been going ok, the toning down. - there are still a few boxes in my cellar that i can simply throw away, but i'll get around to doing that, sooner or later. i'm still learning and improving, after all.

4. do you prefer a spic-and-span clean house? or is some clutter necessary to avoid the appearance of a museum?
spic-and-span clean. it's a must. i've got an obsessive-compulsive personality, after all. which reminds me that my place is currently way too filthy for my comfort. - i have wanted to clean all week, and haven't gotten around to do it: will be a good way to spend tomorrow morning.

5. do the rooms in your house have a theme? or is it a mixture of knick-knacks here and there?
i live in a tiny one-bedroom apartment. if it had a thought out theme it would be "books, ikea and colour", as quite typical for a student's place. there's some stuff on "display" (real paintings, photos, souvenirs, what have you), but there's a serious underlying colour-scheme, and it shows: it's yellow-orange-red-pink, with an emphasis on the latter colours. even my dish towels, phone and my toilet paper fit into the colour scheme.