Posted on 03/23/2006 11:53:14 AM PST by Physicist
Law librarian Rick Ramponi's collection of 3,000 regional cookbooks --including "Talk About Good" from the Lafayette, La., Junior League and "Shalom on the Range," which celebrates southwestern Jewish cuisine -- was manageable while he lived in a large house in Kalorama.
But when he moved to a one-bedroom Dupont Circle apartment with a partner who collects large art and architecture books, Ramponi had to exile those cherished culinary texts to a pair of rented storage units several blocks away.
Since 2002, he has spent more than $5,000 to keep them there, which "may be more than they are all worth," he concedes. "But there is a sentimental attachment and I associate them with places I've been, people I know."
Accountant Jennifer Kimball, who is studying for a master's degree in English, and policy analyst Matt Cail, who has a pair of master's degrees, call themselves "huge bibliophiles." Thus their chief requirement when condo shopping two years ago was enough wall space for shelves to hold their books. Already they have run out of space in their Alexandria flat. "Next year we will start looking for a house to buy that has room for children," she says. And books.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
I love old ones too, as well as funky little items like "What'll You Have?" a book of drink recipes, written in 1933 after the "Nightmare" of Prohibition was over. The author wanted to teach youngsters the nearly-lost art of mixology.
That's good to hear - I thought I was the only one loony enough to actually use LC classification at home. Occupational hazard!
Another funky little item worth shelf space is a cookbook from ~1953 called "Hummingbirds and Radishes", very gourmet for its day. I use it frequently.
My last kitchen had a complete wall of shelves from floor to ceiling that were *supposed* to be open shelving to show off all one's pretty dishes and crystal, dontcha know? Ha! I still had to have extra shelves put around the breakfast table and a unit just inside the dining room, for the cookbooks.
I did have one of those "10-15 books" shelves in the kitchen of the house before that -- what a joke -- but a large morning room with lots of wall space under the windows for half-size shelf units saved me. (Collection was smaller then, too.)
Finally had to decide that Christmas cookbooks could go on the highest-up shelves near the ceiling (I'm very short), so it would be a once-a-year (ha!) chore to retrieve them.
Is there a Website where I can enter titles and get LC numbers?
get rid of the MASSIVE Stephen King book and all will be well. Other than that trash the Mickey Mouse stuffed animals and they can double stack the relegated books (like I do). There's also two couches in that picture, but only two people. What's their problem? I see lots of room for more books!!!
more books, must have more books......
Actually, I have it easy now. Since my vision has deteriorated I've switched almost entirely to eBooks. I read them on my Dell Axim pocket PC handheld (with the text cranked up REAL BIG). Now my problem is running out of disk space, not shelf space. Who could need more than 1.6 terabytes?
ME!!!!!!!!!
Oh, my. Now I won't rest till I find it. Thank you! LOL, I was on a cooking forum once - I now try to avoid those - that would quote a "Joy of Cooking" recipe and page number, then everyone would have to scramble to figure out "which edition". I had back to the first one, but always ended up being the "looker-upper" - not fun!
Then we're probably related because my MIL has the same collection. We can make hundreds of dishes out of red jello, a banana, and whipped cream - the standard in Lutheran Cuisine!
Count me in. I've already mentally designed my caverous dream library, down to this smallest detail. Now all I have to do is win the lottery so I can build it.
Nicely written. Beautiful thoughts.
You've got TAHT right, and the key factor in getting it made right iis getting the fish FRESH, and you can't get fish any more fresh than getting it straight off the boat.
I gotta stop this; I'm getting REALLY hungry and it's a long hike, yet, 'til dinnertime.
I think his best line, though, is this one:
You can't have everything; where would you put it?
I think his best line, though, is this one:
You can't have everything; where would you put it?
Yes! When I was a little girl my father told me since I was an only child I should learn to read a variety of books as they would make great friends. I did- and they have.
I've inherited many lovely older books from various family members..all my bookcases are full and I have many in storage. I buy books, I borrow books from the library, and no day is complete without reading. I usually keep a "junk food for the brain" book going- i.e. mysteries, and a "good for my mind" book- this week it's The Autobiography of Mark Twain.
Some books from childhood I re-read every couple of years: The Little Engine That Could, Stuart Little, The Secret Garden etc. Some of these do me a world of good!
My father was right.
You got me beat. I think I only have 2-3,000. Part of it is from being a homeschooler
Here it is! Mine looks just about like that one, except much more dog-eared. Now I'm thinking "Preserved Children" had to be in that one, because I was just a little child when I first saw the recipe--and that would not have been 1967, lol.
You can do that through the Library of Congress website Basic Search page. Simply search on the title then, when the results come up, click on the number in the left colum next to the desired title and that will pull up a page specific to that book. The LCCN is displayed near the top of the book information, just below the "tabs" shown on that page.
Yes, I just moved and it's true. I spent 6 months taking books to old folks homes, the Salvation Army, anybody who would take them. At one point we had the living room, the den, the bedrooms and the garage walls covered with books. They're nice to have in middle age and when you have children, but after that, it is liberating to let them go.
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