Be Excellent To Each Other

T-shirts.
I've got more than 100, and I tend to buy around five more a month. Some of them don't fit any more or have become all tatty, but I won't throw them out (they tend to become 'work' shirts for doing my car with).
99% of them have writing or pictures on, generally something "funny" (today I am wearing one with a picture of a barbecue on top of a barbecue, and it says "hot grill on grill action"). They live on hangers in two wardrobes, and have spilt out into the corridor now, too.

Knowledge of Belgian beer. And liver disease.

Aliens memorabilia. Obligatory picture of my pride and joy(s):

I collect fluff in my belly button. Weird.

I used to collect some pretty geeky things. But never in a serious or committed way. I have a load of old Transformers, but mainly all in played with condition. I have a 90% complete collection of the Star Trek Fact Files (they should've let me know it was nearly finished so I didn't stop buying the fucking things). I have a large collection of old PC hardware, most of it still working. I have a huge stack of Star Wars Pogs. I have some Jurassic Park Coins. I have a thick stack of Batman Bubble Gum Cards.

The list goes on!

Oh yeah, I guess I collect Aliens stuff too. I am most jealous of your gun.

That's what all the guys say.

Just videogames for me really. Nothing too irrational either, except maybe some of the quantities - I've a shoebox full of game boys for example, but then, I've got another shoebox full of loose game boy carts too, so you can imagine that's quite a few. That's just the english, unboxed stuff though; boxed games go somewhere else and there's a separate place for japanese carts.

Plus I've got stuff that I'll probably never use like a Sega Pico.

I collect nothing whatsoever. I have completely the opposite mentality. I don't like having 'things' unless they do something.

Aches and pains and shattered hopes and dreams

Enemies. Gotta catch 'em all.

I also collect radio controlled aircraft I guess, although I'm a bit unsure as to what separates having a number of something from having a collection of them.

Short People.

I'm planning on aquiring one this weekend.

Good point. I suppose a collection is when you get things and never 'use' them.

Or you get them just to pad out the collection.

Which may be the same thing

Other than books, not much.
I have a few ACW relics (bullets mostly, but I have a couple of buttons too - I suppose I should not get the Brasso on them), but I'm not a big collector.

I have an awful lot of stuff, but pretty much all of it does something.

Gundam Kits, Airfix / Revell Kits, Games Workshop placky and mecul, Illustration books, Apple mice (have a drawer full for some reason, Records...

Thinking about books, occasionally I'll buy them to look good on my shelf and/or impress people.
With some book tokens I recently bought a very beautifully produced complete Shakespeare: sometime I plan to read it.

Pretentious, moi?

Oh yeah, Zombie books too.

Nothing specific, I just tend to buy crap and I rarely sell it or throw it away, but I'm trying to be a bit better at that (both in terms of buying less crap and clearing out the stuff I already have but don't use).
I do have an awful lot of old computer magazines though, mostly Amiga ones, but also loads of PC Zone, YS, C+VG and probably some others. I used to have loads of Crash and Sinclair User as well, but I think they've been thrown away years ago.

Ooh, I used to collect magazines, but I had a moment a while back and chucked everything except Amiga Power.

Magazines are heavy man!

I had every Total Film from issue 1 up until mid-2006, every SFX from issue 8 up to mid-2006 and a butt load of old Amiga Format and PC Formats.

It was a relief to be rid of them tbh.

I've dabbled with collecting but whenever I get a significant amount of something I end up selling it.

The only stuff I've kept is my Aliens comics from the early 90s. Lots of first print editions in there. Completely crap investment tho!

I recently sold nearly all my Transformers stuff as well. All G1 played with stuff. Kept Soundwave (obviously), Grimlock, Beachcomber (my first), Cosmos (my second).

I've got er... 7 guitars. But that's not really a collection as I just like cheap guitars with lots of character.

Oh, I have like 70 Xbox 360 games. I trade-in a lot but this collection keeps going.

Oh, and I collect any comics with Judge Death in them.

Pencils

When I was a kid, I'd want to buy a pencil from the gift shop whenever we wnet for a day out somewhere. It stuck with me, I still do it. I have two shoeboxes full of pencils that never get used, EVER.

(also pens, rubbers and stuff, but mostly pencils)

I'm more of a hoarder than a collector. I have loads of cds, comics, dvds, magazines and games (and band t-shirts for that matter, some over 15 years old) but that's more because I can't bear to throw anything away rather than maintaining any sort of 'collection'.

CDs, Books, Games, Chaos Space Marine models and achievements.

Do you think you'd collect them if you weren't into gamerscore whorage?

PC parts and firework labels. Not real firework labels as they smell (I used to have masses of them as a kid) but I have been collecting pics from around the interwebs.

We've got stacks of books, but we also pick up any of those old classic penguin covered ones whenever we see them in charity shops, just as they look awesome. That's kind of a collection, as I haven't got round to reading half of them yet.

Mrs Squirt's aunt always gets a tea towel from anywhere she goes to visit, and we get her one if we've gone anywhere interesting. She's got bloody dozens of the things now.

There's an outdoor book store/stand/market thing on the South Bank (might only be Fridays). It has a fair few of them.

That's a better description for me too.

I reject.. MEMORRABILLIAAAAAaaaa



I tend to collect t-shirts too. But only from going to gigs.

I recently started collecting glass.

30s/50s/60s70s and I have 30 nice pieces already after only 3 months! I need to be more picky or move into a warehouse.

Glass, like what? Bowls and stuff?

I love wandering around that stall and hope I get chance next week.

I have loads of books and various other stuff. These past twelve months though I've been having a damn good clear out and sort out. I think they are sick of seeing me with ebay parcels at the PO, I'm convinced I've been keeping our local charity shop going by myself and I have people coming this morning to pick up books I've advertised on Freegle. I actually hate clutter, but was brought up not to throw anything away as it might come in useful or be worth something one day - bloody northern family. I'm very much getting away from that mentality now though and as DavPaz says, it really can be a relief to get rid.

Nothing. The concept of buying something for no real reason (like Taxalot's pencils) is so alien to me, I may be collected by GazChap.
That said, I do like having a large collection of herbs, spices and food stuffs as I like cooking, not sure if that counts.

I guess it's hard to define what a collection is. Stuff you have that has no use, that you buy simply because it is what it is?

That means my T-shirts are out, then.

Vases, bowls, figures, ashtrays. So far, only coloured (blues,greens or combination of the two)

Amazing what I have managed to pick up in charity shops and also did very well in my local junk shop.

Edit : For example these are some of the items produced by my favourite Czech factory. http://www.sypka.cz/aukce-sa22%20sklo/a46/p1/sa4/sd1/

I have some of those but I want them all (in my colours).

I dunno. I'd still count your Tee-shirts, as you don't particularly need new ones, though that might be entering the realms of hoarding. But then in my mind hoarders buy things they'll never use.

In short: erm.

I guess it's more "Something you buy out of a reason that goes beyond the purely functional". There's no way you'd say you're getting decent functional use out of those 200 t-shirts, for example. Enough for variety and to last you between washes would be the functional approach, not enough to spill out into multiple wardrobes.

I, for example, have 14 identical black t-shirts.

Well I have lots of books because I bought them to read, but I certainly don't collect them, just the majority of them I won't read again. It's easy to end up with a load of stuff in that way. I suppose it can also happen when you are given 'stuff' due to an event, eg. having a baby, getting married (possible bad example) or buying a car, people can buy you well meaning gifts, but they are just of no use to you, then you feel guilty giving them away and you end up with clutter. Ok, that's not a collection, but people can do it in that sense too. I used to have a LOAD of Eeyore stuff, It was my ex that liked Eeyore, but because I was the female everyone assumed it was me. It was about 2 years after we split (there was a lot of monies worth of stuff there) I did a car boot and sold 99% of it. I can't tell you how good that felt!

Plain black t-shirts.

Emo!

It's a good point, maybe stuff, or a 'type of stuff', that you don't really need but still collect. You don't need hundreds of T shirts, and can probably only wear a few at a time, but like having that many.

Or maybe it's more of a kind of association rather than a purpose, for example I will only buy pencils that have either the name of a place, or are some sort of novelty (usually a bit of tat stuck on, or a funny but completely useless shape), preferably both. I guess as a memento of a place I have enjoyed visiting or a happy time. I think habit also plays a large part in it, along with a slight abandonment of reason.

edit: Gah, lots of replies already, but I'll post this anyway.

I used to collect Marvel Legend figures. I had loads on a shelves in my bedroom... and they looked ace! I'd still have them now if I hadn't moved out.

They're currently back in their boxes in my parents loft. I'll get them out when I get my loft converted.

The only thing I've ever really collected as such is Megadrive stuff. For whatever reason, especially considering I was a SNES owner in the day, I've developed quite the affection for Sega's 16-bit machine. I've got a Japanese Megadrive 1 (the best looking one IMO) that's been modded with 50Hz/60Hz and region switches, a PAL Mega CD, loads of pads and accessories and quite a lot of cartridges. I particularly went through a phase of grabbing as many Japanese games as I could simply because I think the cases and cartridges look much nicer than the dull PAL and duller US releases.

I did at one point have a Multi-Mega, but money became tight and I couldn't justify holding on to another Megadrive and Mega-CD, especially an unmodded one, even if it was a very cool looking mini-combo thingy. It is a shame though - the Multi-Mega is still a lovely bit of kit even today.

Agreed. I still have mine, but for some reason it now outputs no video signal.

And one beige SupaMod t-shirt.

I have a Wunderkammer (german for cabinant of wonders).

The precursor to musuems, wunderkammers were owned by renaissance men to show off their love of science and nature and all that when they were entertaining and what not.

They were full of Fossils, and mummies arms, and stuffed animals, and insects, and interesting rocks, cutting edge scientific gadgets (of the day) and weird chemicals and and the like.

When such people died they often donated them to the public, and blammo, a lot of musuems were born.

Saying that my Wunderkammer is tiny, and is currently a little chest - proper good one though.

It contains:
Bits of a meteorite.
Fossils.
Lava.
A Neocube.

And thats about it at the moment.

But by the time I'm a grandad it's going to be awesome...

Are they the things that appear in the Doctor Who story, Ghostlight? You know, where Ace opens a set of drawers only to find all the dead insects on display inside have come to life?

I went to Waterford a year or two back and got a private tour around their glass factory thingie. Not my sort of thing at all but they have got ridiculous skills.



Possibly not. You see I buy the games rather than pirate them because I want to keep my score legit and don't want to get banned for yaarrrring. I was a shameless PS2, PS1, Dreamcast, Amiga, Speccy yaaarrrer but I've come to realise that when you buy a game, it's a lot less disposable and so I'm enjoying my gaming a lot more in this generation rather than having 300 discs but only playing PES!