Stuff: Age: Ratios: Probabilities: Individually meaningless, but combined they create an interesting set of questions. I’m not yet in the bracket of old, but there is a lighter significant birthday in the near-ish future and this does push this combo into a sharper focus. This alongside watching our Mr. Hill’s frustration in clearing the effects of a deceased relative with a lot of things that may have come in useful one day, but now certainly won’t. This is not an entertaining watch and the heated moments relayed to me solidify my thoughts on this matter. Particularly when there are items such as lathes and pillar drills which I thought would be snapped up but appear to be useless.
The forth of my keywords; probabilities, is the hardest to define. The third, is the end result. How much of this stuff will we ever use? You know, the one day things that we can’t bear to throw out. My worst should but can’t is the set of American stock that was bought at low cost in the 90s and which would be astronomical to replace at current prices. Is there a plan for it? No. I can’t settle on one that makes me actually push the go button. The ratio is the time expected/stuff in stock/desire. Even if I continued at the current build rate and enjoyed the physical ability to do so, I’ve probably got 15 more layouts to build. That’s the maths. The probability is a lot lower, as is the storage capability for these. So I’m building to sell. Is that what it comes down to? Building things just to dispose of them to build more purely to use the ‘stuff’ up. There must be a better way as that doesn’t sound very enjoyable.
Much of this is down to the fact that there is no grand opus – I’m not that sort of modeller. One wonders how much ‘one day’ stuff Peter Denny had in stock when he popped. Is this just the butterflies like me or do the one man/one project bods also suffer from this problem?
The title of this post is intriguing (look it up) essentially the idea is more about clothing/drawer contents and the like that lifestyle TV is so fond of. We are in a similar, but wildly different game as there is much more emotion tied up in modelling than a pair of M &S trousers. How do we keep doing what we do for as long as possible, without any excess at the end for others to clear and dump in a skip? Think that won’t happen? Think again. Your prized work is going to landfill and there will be nothing you can do about it. There’s a way to square all this, but I’ve yet to work out what it is.
