CAN I GIVE UP THE SMOKING??? MR CARR SAYS I CAN!!!

ILX is basically a collaborative blog anyway

this is true

if allen carr can stop smoking 100 cigs a day after 25 years, maybe i can stop smoking 10-15 cigs a day after 13 years.

ilx is a karassblog

estela, I have no clue what that is, and thus I will happily agree to it.

sara has been kept ignorant of Bokononism

http://www.cs.uni.edu/~wallingf/personal/bokonon.html#words

lol

corny or no, that kind of is how i view ilx.

i'm up to page 91/110

since you're not allowed to quit until after you finish reading it, maybe you should slow down a bit.

having read that page (how have I not read cat's cradle btw? out of all the vonnegut) I now understand estela's approach to this much better and suspect it is the only proper way to appreciate anything on the internet at all. perhaps it should have been called the fomanet.

i think you might like cat's cradle, tombot.

yes, I would.
I think perhaps in the next couple of weeks I will make a project to revise the contents of my bookshelves, and perhaps put a good chunk of my tax return towards putting some things there that are supposed to be there, like that, and getting rid of some of the things that are not, like old shit I had to buy for a class once and never opened.

PLAN:

RR, you quit smoking.

I will rearrange my literature.

We'll take them by surprise.

then you'll take berlin

It's a good plan, Tombot -- though personally I'm leaning more towards the 'why do I have most of this stuff around ANYWAY?' attitude. I've been shedding discs at about a hundred a week recently, and the books will be next.

where do they go? i have 1000000 discs to get rid of and no sod wants em

I've been shedding discs at about a hundred a week recently

The way you write this makes it sound like a distressing symptom of some kind of illness.

given where he's shedding them from, it probably is.

ok tombot, deal. carr makes a good point about the attitude towards quitting.

when i finish this book, i've got ernest becker's 'the denial of death' to read. anyone else read this or any of becker's other stuff?

electric sound - if you can't sell them, can you donate them to some kind of charity? We get rid of our excess stuff when the Epilepsy Foundation comes around - every two months or so. Books, and c.d.s we usually save to donate to the huge annual used book sale that happens every year in our town; all money raised there goes to the local hospital.

Look around and see if you have some kind of local organization that would take them.

i've been doing some culling too, i hate having too much stuff, it makes me feel trapped. i always moved quite a lot and that kept it down but now we've been in this house for 5 years and it's getting dire, there are books and magazines and cds and dvds stacked everywhere. and i refuse to get a bigger house just so we can own more crap.

i'm looking forward to getting rid of everything i own bar two suitcases

i just wish i didn't need money so bad that i have to fuck around trying to sell it all, i'd rather just bin it or give it away.

I don't actually want to get rid of everything. I just want to get rid of all the crap, and replace it with nice things, like the photograph of ronald reagan that hangs in my bathroom.

I note you don't say where it hangs, exactly.

and i refuse to get a bigger house just so we can own more crap.

^ this. Not that I'm immediately planning on moving, but it's just...well, *easier* to move with less, if/when one has to. And I like the idea that the inevitable next move will be a lot simpler than the one into this place.

When my grandma died a decade back -- and she was a pack rat -- my folks and my aunt and uncle spent months upon months clearing through it all. Some things were kept, particular heirlooms and practical items, but most of it was given away or in many cases simply trashed. At the end of it all the four of them looked at each other and agreed -- they weren't ever going to do something like that to their kids. So comparatively speaking there's much less at the family house, and certainly compared to my sister I have more random stuff around and that's starting to go more thoroughly now. The technology allows for it, those discs that I do want to keep I will keep. Combine that with working in a university library with ILL links around the world and the need for me to actually own most of what I have around is minimal. Seeing it all here is more of a mental comfort zone than anything, and that's not a reason to keep it.

(To answer Jim's question meantime -- Amoeba in Hollywood, my eternal friend. They take 'em all. Any of the really randomly rare stuff I'll eventually flog on eBay for the feebs who want them.)

I sold a ton, a ton, a ton of stuff through amazon, and ditched the rest at college rip-off shops that'd take anything. the last part was in some ways a mistake. all my optical media (cds/dvds/games) now goes in big leather case logic cases which renders the question of portability/storage practically moot

Yup, did the big switchover with all my burned discs to those cases a couple of months back. I like having permanent backups that are easy to slug around.

The Amazon/eBay route for these massive ditchings I've considered, but a lot of what I am getting rid of now is pruning -- stuff that was so mass-produced that it's common, random promos nobody cares about and so forth -- and ultimately I just don't think it's worth the effort to try and ditch out one by one. Keep in mind I'm still sitting on top of thousands of discs!

Ned's grandma = my in-laws. I am completely terrified of what will happen when we have to take care of their stuff. On the other hand, every time I come back from their house I'm inspired all over again to get rid of *my* stuff.

i don't like clutter, but i do tend to collect stuff. so every once in awhile i do a huge clean out. when i 'moved' to sydney, i gave everything away, except for 6 boxes of books, and a box of personal things (letters etc.) and took two suitcases. it was the most liberating feeling in the world. this time i'll be getting rid of even more stuff.

guys, i think maybe i can give up for realz. the book itself, the way it's written, is really kinda not that good, but the guy actually makes two basic points that are sort of spinning the wheels in my head right now.

hmm. we'll see, i guess.

ruby, years ago i read that book, only because it was lying around my flat and i was bored, and i gave up smoking even though i'd had no intention of it, so i believe it actually does work.

thanks estela <3

<3

i still <3 you both

UPDATE:

i am still smoking

...because i still have 20 pages of the book to go...

try to read a word a week but don't beat yourself up if you miss from time to time.

update:
so i haven't given up BUT since i've been in the US (6 months) my average has been about 2 p/day. is this progress or just denial?

there has only one day where i smoked a bunch and that was mostly the fault of ilx poster 'the table is the table'.

here in the US progress and denial are just two sides of the same shiny coin.

Wait, you went from 10-15 to 40 and you're asking if this is progress????

I mean, it is, but not necessarily in the direction this thread indicates you want to go.

I think she means two cigarettes per day, not two packs per day. In which case, I'd call that progress for sure.

My goal is to get through this last year of nursing school without starting to smoke. Because it seems like a cigarette would be just the thing after a horrible test...

will you allow me my endearing bafflement just this once or must you shatter my crystal palace of naivete

You may have your endearing bafflement. Just know that I think every person in my class is a nonsmoker, and I think that around half of us have considered actually going out and buying cigarettes after various tests or other experiences. (And you wondered how it was that so many health care providers smoke...)

Damn, have I shattered your crystal naivete palace?

(I feel so dirty now!)

^^^ guilt seeping in now for realz

hahaha really???

Everyone has the power to use the Lapsed Catholic Guilt.

dan you goofus, i meant TWO INDIVIDUAL CIGARETTES PER DAY

I probably inadvertently inhaled more smoke than that at a friend's house tonight! So yeah, you're doing good!!!

over the holidays I was smoking only 1-2 cigarettes per day and have skipped a couple days recently - when I related this to a colleague he suggested that I just hand over my smokes to him, as I was making everybody else look bad, and was just pretending

luckily once I get a few cold ones in I am able to resume my suicidal fixation with the best of them, inasmuch as the local laws allow

This isn't actually illegal anywhere, Tom:

http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/6811/imageuploadimagetb8.jpg

That is an impressively awkward looking cigarette contraption. It looks heavy!

just1n3 it sounds like you're def making progress! seriously way to go.