A bright idea just came to me. How about we set up a book exchange/
swap/trade? 
   
    I must have at least 300 odd paperbacks floating around, that I am
willing to loan out if someone wants to read them. 

 what do you think?

37 responses total.

It's worth a shot.

I am moving in four weeks, but would be willing to give books to people
who promised good homes.  Most of my stuff is fantasy and bodice rippers...
er, historical (hysterical) romances. Anyone?  You would have to come
to Lansing...

I'm not sure I'm in the mood to read odd books.

(toking plays the funeral dirge for this apparently long long dead item)

It was a good idea -- but it might be best turned into an *event*.
Pick a saturday, pick a place, everyone brings 5-10 of their "books to 
trade", and everyone swaps.  Any unclaimed books can be taken home for 
next time or donated to charity, as the owner wishes.  

(This is how we do clothing swaps in my circle.)

I'll offer my house once my move is complete.  Anyone interested?  Shall 
we say 11am on October 11?

In the current agora conference [summer, 2007], there's a
[sub]discussion [in the 'clutter'  item, I believe] about the desire of
so many of us to have books of our own, instead of  having to rely on
libraries and such.  Are there people that would be willing to do some 
kind of book exchange??? Perhaps knowing that our beloved books are
going to a good  home might be easier to take then having to give them
up completely [if/when we're in  the position to have to get rid of some
of our collections].

I'm ready.

Here's a thought:  Hold the Grex book exchange.  Any books that don't go
to Grex homes can be taken to the AAUW book drop off across from Meijer
on Carpenter Rd.

The AAUW booksale helps move books to their next home, and the money
gained goes to support science and math programs for K-12 girls, to help
counter the "girls shouldn't show how smart they are" culture.  

Does the AAUW also collect and distribute old magazines? I get too many as 
a result of supporting numerous organizations (mostly environmental or 
scientific), and it seems such a waste to discard them in the paper 
recycle.

No, they only collect books for resale.  

Why don't you switch to the electronic versions of those magazines?  

It is vastly more difficult, inconvenient, for me to read the online 
versions on desktops. It is also a lot slower to scan - to "flip pages", 
either forward or back. Besides I already spend too much time online - 
some experiential variety is desirable. (And, I can also write in the 
margins or otherwise annotate printed text.)

(I suppose part of it is what I grew up with.....I usually print out 
material from the web that I really want to study.)

I'm a lot the same way.  I like to touch the paper.  If I could get 
the Washington Post in print, I'd be a happy happy girl.

Other reasons for preferring paper: the images and text are sharper; the 
colors are more subtle (a full spectrum from true white light and a 
continuum of colors, and not just RGB); the illumination is by reflected 
light, not by phosphorescence; one can take it with you to the bathroom 
(or wherever); one can doodle on it.

Print is dead.

Au contraire, my friend.  If it were, they wouldn't be building Barnes 
and Nobles at the speed of sound down here.

Anyone want to set a date for the book exchange?

I'm thinking after Labor Day.

Ghostbusters movie quotes are always lost on Brooke :P

Au contraire my friend!  (heh!)

I just recently was looking at their quotes, as we frequently use 
the "crossing the streams" quote.

re #12
Take it to item 108 in general, Dr.Mead!

After Labor Day would probably work well for a variety of reasons--
-it'd give us more time to promote this venture
-maybe, if asked politely, people would be willing to give up/exchange
some of the  summer readings they're finished with and may wish to part
with [to get even more  stuff to bring home and read] -as some of the
school-aged kids start back with their school texts, they'd be willing
[or  perhaps the parents would be more than willing] to part with some
of the stuff their  students are done with and could donate -and since
we've been talking about decluttering in agora, maybe we could take 
advantage of the effects of such decluttering.

Maybe on a Sunday? Not only would this be a better day for me than
Saturday due to  prior committments, it may be easier for those 'few'
people in this town that get pretty  wrapped up in the events held at
'The Big House' and other stadiums and sports bars  and such on
Saturdays afternoons.

We'd have to be careful with text books.  The AAUW will not take those. 


I doubt anyone would hold off on buying needed textbooks just to see
what they might find at a small book exchange.  

I am game for a book exchange!

Anyone want to suggest date[s] and location? Once we determine that,
then perhaps we  can post it in agora [about the when/where as well as
in looking for donations/ exchanges].

[Holding it here at my place would be kinda out of the way for most
people, therefor,  probably wouldn't get that much in the line of
donations or traffic/attendance.]

If the weather is nice, we could do this in a parking lot somewhere.
That way we can all put our books in the trunks of our cars and just pop
them open for the swapping part. 

That could work...  And we could come up with some kind of backup plan
for the  possibility of rain.  [or, in case of rain, we could postpone
it a week or something like  that...]

Perhaps make one of the Happy Hour or Saturday Lunch events the book
exchange event.  

Now that's a good idea as well...  How about at one of the near future
HHs? This week's  HH may be a bit soon for some people but maybe the
last Fri in Aug or first in Sept can  work.

And perhaps we can do one every quarter or on some kind of semi-regular
basis. So if  anyone wants to not take their extras back home with them,
one of us can take them to  the library [after the AAUW sale] for the
'Friends of the Library' store.  [At least with the  Ypsi's Friends of
the Library store, they have sales 3x/year IIRC AND their bookstore
itself  is open 6 days/week.]

That all sounds like a good idea to me. 

Ok, how about 9/7 [the first Friday in Sept at the HH?
That'd give us all a bit of time to do a quick run-through in sorting thru
our bookshelves without putting it off tooo long so we forget and/or
'forget'/never get around to doing it in the first place...

I cant promise I'll be there because I have houseguests until the 
middle of september and we might end up having plans on that day. But 
otherwise, I'll plan on being there. 

Bring the houseguests to the HH; y'all might have fun!  And you then
wouldn'[t have to  worry about cooking dinner--if you wanted to eat at
the HH, and y'all might bring home a  book or two to read

Bringing them along is certainly an option

I won't be able to make the 7th but I have a few books to donate to the 
cause.  Mostly they are cookbooks.  I'll try to get them to one of the 
attendees.  Bundling this with Happy Hour sounds like a winner.

Ok, maybe the 7th isn't a good idea [was just a suggestion to get the
ball rolling]. How  about the 14th?

The 14th would work for me.  It's almost impossible to find a day when 
everyone is available.  That way lies madness. ;-)

I don't have that many books to contribute so just set a date and if I'm 
in town, I'm there!

September 14th sounds good to me too.

I don't have lots of books to donate/exchange right now since I got rid
of so many just a  few months ago--but I do have a few that I'm done
with [that I had gotten at the 'friends'  store.  But still, if everyone
that has some to bring, even if its just a few, that'd be cool. 

I'll try and post something in agora sometime in the next day or two.

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