The Ongoing Struggle

Two nights ago, I was stocking the most recent VHS tapes I'd bought. They had been sitting around a little while, because it's a very tedious and tiresome task. I have some six boxes of alphabetized tapes, and keeping the order straight is just the beginning. I have given up on alphabetizing them in my head. Instead, I bring out my laptop and order the tapes to reflect their placement in my spreadsheet. I'm very glad I started doing that.  I'm apt to throw the order off every time I put a tape back that I've been watching.

The alphabetizing is only the beginning of the inconvenience. When I stock a new tape, it begins a cascade from that box all the way to the last one. If it goes into the first box, which contains A and B, that means that one of those must move to the second box, thus displacing a tape into the third box, and that goes on until the final box. Over time, I watch with growing concern as the final box fills, mindful that I will need to locate (and place somewhere in the living room) yet another box. For now, my roommates are tolerant.

It would obviously be hard enough if that was all there was to it, but it regrettably is not. Most tapes are what you call a slipcase. It's just thin paper with an open end for the tape to fit into. Those cases are not very durable, but they're compact. If every tape came in one of those, that would make it very easy. Unfortunately, there are several types of case, most of which are at least a little bulkier. It's possible to make them fit, (though making them look good is too much to hope for), but if two of them wind up by chance aligned next to each other in adjacent rows, they just will not fit well together. I recently had to remove a tape from its giant box in order to make it fit.

What I'd really like is to have shelves. If I could have the exact sort that video stores used to (as I must remind myself is the case) have, that would be ideal. It would take up much more space, so it's not realistic, but that would be the dream. On and on I go looking for the best way to maintain this habit I have. Someday I'll be rich and famous, and the fact that I have an extensive, museum quality collection of VHS tapes that fills a large room will be a fun little detail to fill out a bio of me.