Odd conundrum
 

I hate throwing things away. Whatever it is, it could be useful sometime!

When I got my school library job 5 years ago I found this in my desk: The Boardwalk and Park Place title deeds from Monopoly. In really good condition. I have no clue how they got here.

I hate it when you have a game and you lose some vital piece and you have to replace it with some random replacement from around the house. I'm sure that there's some Monopoly box that currently has two title deeds made out of index cards. In my mind's eye I can almost see the faded blue marker and handwritten mortgage values.

I left them in my desk. I rediscovered them today.

First question - does anyone need these?

Second question - what would you do with them if you were me? I was thinking of throwing a post on Craigslist (which I've never done before) because it's such a random thing.

If you think I'm crazy for keeping them I still want to hear what you think :)

Could I interest you in the plastic Knights of the Round Table action figure I found in the grass outside my house about 2.5 years ago? It's cleaned up and sitting in my kitchen window if you're interested.

Are you kidding? No deal, unless you throw in at least 2 railroads ;)

Hmmm I'll throw in my sixth grade report card... how's that?

Listen to the shiny...

[/

The Shiny says:



Ye shall know the trashcan and the trashcan shall set you free!

My wife is a pack rat. I am not.

THROW THEM AWAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Do you really think that someone would get onto Craigslist looking to find two deeds from a monopoly game?

Found stuff always seems to have powerful mojo: keep 'em. I'll bet you get an amazing vibe everytime you pick them up, eh? I once found a fantastic poem in my back alley written one line at a time on old daytimer pages. They had been torn out and strewn about, but the dates helped me reassemble most of the poem. I'll never know who wrote it, but man, it was good. I've been meaning to go through my stuff for ages to retrieve it and post it on that "found" website...if I can find that link again, anyway...

Moonliner, how dare you abuse the power of the Shiny!



You will ask everyone you know if they need Boardwalk and Park Place...

You never know. And it's free. Aren't there far more random things on Craigslist?

If I were missing two deeds from a monopoly game, I would take a piece of cardstock, cut them to the appropriate size, and write the names of the properties on them.

But.....whatever makes you happy.

CP , do you have an art journal? Or a scrapbook? Not the totally photo kind.. the other kind... that would be a fabulous piece to journal about and add the ephemra (the cards) into the book.

Thats my two cents. If you have no idea what I mean, I'll find you some links.

Ralphie can't throw things away, either. He saves everything.

I understand it, though. The feeling that you don't want to waste something. Or the feeling that something you save could be useful later. But unless I have a detailed inventory system, I forget what I kept and why I kept it...

:)

OMG! What are the odds?

Look at what I found on Craigslist!

This reminds me of the "Stuff" thread I think back on the Pad. I believe CP started it.

Ya, I got nothin on what to do with the cards. I'd probably keep them since they don't take up much room and dispose of them during a de-cluttering frenzy.

So, you posted a fake item on craigslist. Lame. :rolleyes: Wading through ads is annoying enough without fakery.

On a better note, I went ahead and posted my actual ad.

Yes, what are the odds? ;)
So, if I replied to the posting on craigslist, will I get a legitimate response or is this a fradulant post that needs to be reported to the proper authorities? $100! Yikes! Monopoly retails for $12 at Toys R Us, and special-edition versions range from $20-$30.

CP, I say throw out the two game pieces ... but since you work in a library, could they be recycled and used as bookmarks?

While on the topic of Monopoly, these three versions might interest people here:
Disney Monopoly Box Game
or
Mickey Mouse 75th Anniversary Monopoly
or
Monopoly: Disney - Pixar Collector's Edition

I like the scrapbook and/or bookmarks idea. You could always bring them down to Kinko's and have 'em laminated.

LOL! Priceless.

For $100 bucks I'd say you'd stand a fairly good chance of getting exactly what the ad offered... However it seems that the ad has been pulled.

Throwing away a third of my possessions and keptcrap was one of the most freeing things I've ever done. It felt soooo good, and had such positive results.


Now I follow a simple rule for everything I find around the house: If I haven't had a use for it in the last 5 years, out it goes. I exempt from this certain sentimental papers and momentos I am purposefully saving to review in my old age. But otherwise ... if I haven't used it in half a decade, I'm not likely to ever need it.


Your mileage may, of course, vary. (And then there is the nagging question of will the partial Monopoly set appear only soon after you throw the title cards away??)

This is a great rule!

I love throwing away trash. However, we seem to accumulate so much of it it is hard to keep up. I've gotten MUCL less sentimental over the years which has helped me get rid of things. Do I really need my Father's favorite blue sport coat? No. His Purple Heart, yes but the Sport Coat, no.

Now, if I could just stop accummulating.......

I've started over with near zero possessions several times in my live so I'm not particularly attached to any of them.

I used to be unable to get rid of books but when I finally broke through that barrier (moving to Hawaii and my parent saying they weren't willing to to store them for me) I've never had a problem again.

One method I recommend for people is to put all the junk they think they're willing to give up, but just can't pull the triger is to put it all in moving boxes. On each box write a date six months or a year into the future and then store them somewhere.

Whatever is still in that box in six month or a year is something you obviously don't actually use, and then just take the boxes to Goodwill without even opening them (you probably won't be able to remember what is in them without checking).

If it has been taken out of the box over that time, then you can keep it.

The only reason to keep something you don't use is for decorative, sentimental, or investment reasons. If it is in your closet, it isn't decorative. If it hasn't come out of your closet in five years the sentimentalism isn't as strong as you'd like to think, and most people incredibly overestimate the investment value of minor collectibles.

Of course, that hasn't much to do with two Monopoly cards in an office drawer. In a school library environment I thikn the bookmark idea is a good one. Otherwise just toss them.

I feel a moral obligation to save various artifacts for the future Smithsonian exhibit honoring my remarkable life.

I must have read the OP differently than some others did.
I look at these tiny little cards as less of a pack-ratty thing (they'll take up less space than... I don't know... some other crappy thing.)

More importantly, there's a mystery as to the origin of these little blue cards. I see the potential for comedy and taking the deeds into new memories. A place we can all go, a story we can create behind them. The craigslist, IMO, wouldn't be to actually have someone to find them and take them, but to have someone else in the world laugh, and to let us have a laugh, too.

If I'm talking about being a pack rat, I'm the crossroads type. I do it in phases. I get sentimental, but when the moment's gone, I toss and never look back. So I do things in phases.... I always feel like I'm in phase 3, but that's because I get new stuff to replace some of the crap I got rid of in phase 1.

Except for books. Don't get rid of books. Unless you'll be embarassed to be known as having read them. Then you can remove them from the premises.

They don't take up much space at all in the drawer, and they're such odd items to have, that I may as well keep them there. I figure I'll leave them in the drawer when I switch jobs and forever wonder what the next library tech did.

Perhaps someone had Monopoly, had those two cards missing and trashed the game. Then they found the two cards but didn't have the game anymore and donated them thinking the library may have a monopoly game missing those two cards. ;)

Or maybe someone who used to work at the library got tired of the competition over BW and PP that they decided to take the cards out of the game.

Or maybe the cards were prized in some way...

Like one day, that library tech would move up into the world... Perhaps own a "Park Place" or a "Boardwalk"...

Bigger dreams, baby! Bigger dreams!

I'm loving Erica's take. :snap:

I think it's up to me to find these cards a better destiny than the back of the drawer. I've started surfing around for game sites that swap around pieces. I have a coworker that is into geeky gaming stuff so I'll see if he has any sites to recommend. If I can get these cards into an actual Monopoly set I'll feel good for a month.

It is my destiny.

Whatever you do, don't push the button. The button is bad!

In my desire to discover and interpret metaphore in real life, I think we need to contemplate the deper symbolic meaning of your discovery of these two cards.

First off in the context of Monopoly you accidentally aqquired the two most prized properties in that game. Thus in some ways it might be an indication of a change in luck especially in regard to property. But the rest of the game is missing, indicating perhaps some self sacrifice or loss also associated with this change in luck. A darker interpretation might see this as a warning that you maight indeed "give up the game" in your pursuit of the perfect property match.

In another sense, your desire to reunite the game cards to the game might indicate your own sense ofincompleteness as GD is off on a business trip. Returning these to the game, vicariously returns GD to you.

In a novel there are no accidents

CP, my density has popped me to you.

I think we should start a LoT found art sculpture. CP, attach the cards to a ball or something, then whenever any of us finds an odd object we'll send it to you and you can attach those to the ball too. We'll eventually get into a museum of Swank.

Found Swank Ephemera - I like it!

Swank Katamari!!

Sometime last year, I found a fortune from Esmerelda at Disneyland. I do not remember when I got it. When I found it, the fortune seemed right on. I rediscovered it within the last month, and the fortune seems right on. I'm currently using it as a bookmark. But my point is that sometimes saving stuff can be fun.

I am also a pack rat and would not be able to throw those two Monopoly deeds away. My first thought was freecycle, but I suppose craigslist is the same thing?

However, they'd make for a good journal piece or the basis for a found art collage of some sort.

You know, you could tack them to the wall at your local TGI Friday's. They'd probably still be there years from now.

€ always has a great interpretation. :snap:
I'd never seen freecycle.org, and now I'm going to post on it.

If these do not get claimed then I will definitely add them to the Swank Ephemera collection. :tiki:

Hmm, there's more to this freecyle site than meets the eye. :confused:

I'm on the hunt for similar sites...