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I lost a book

TragicMonkey

Poisoned Waffles
TragicMonkey
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It's silly, but I'm actually rather upset about it. I was wondering what to read next, and I suddenly thought it was time to read "The Hobbit" again. So I went to look for it...and it wasn't there. I searched all the bookcases three times. I took every book down off the shelf to make sure it wasn't hiding. I ran my finger down every spine and read every title, in the absurd hope that I'd merely forgotten what color the book was and was overlooking it.

It's not here.

It was the first copy of "The Hobbit" I'd ever had. Come to that, it was the only copy I've ever read. I must have read it dozens of times. I got it when I was eight years old. I've had that book for more than twenty years. I know I could just get another copy, but it won't be the same. It wasn't anything great, just a battered paperback. But I want that one. I hadn't realized I had a sentimental attachment to a particular copy of a book, but damn, I've had that book for most of my life. The pages went yellow and soft, and the cover was decidedly rumpled from being leaned against pillows when I read it in bed as a kid. I used to contemplate the cover illustration, of Gandalf and the dwarves and an eagle in the eagle's nest. I even remember the smell of that cheap Del Rey ink. That book was part of my childhood, and now it's gone.

I lost a book.
 
Oooh! A psychical search request.

Ohm... I see a mother's face and a feather duster. A piece of yellow tape with a number. A sign that says 'sale'. If these images remain unchanged... I sense an empty shelf next to a small staff.

Oh, whew! Did I write something? I don't remember...

Anyway, I'd check with your family first. Old books are something I don't think many people throw away. They might donate them or sell them at a yard sale, but the act of throwing a book away is too much like burning one.

Look in that old box of stuff that was never opened from when you moved.
 
I have a magic charm that works very nearly every time. This may be the one time it won't work, but it never hurts to learn it for next time:

Under other stuff.

My husband swears by it. Whenever he can't find anything, no matter what, I simply call out "Look under other stuff," and it appears every time.

:boxedin:
 
I have a similar tactic to slingblade, only it's more along the lines of "where have you looked?" then going and looking there myself. Never fails.

When I can't find something, it's often exactly where I was looking except I simply failed to see it. When I go back in another light or the next day there it is and I kick myself for being mental.

I'm sorry about your book :( I too am sentimental about my childhood books, to the point where I recently went on a mission to get copies of several of my favourites that were long gone. They needed to be the exact same editions, too. It took me a long time but ebay and several vintage bookseller websites prevailed. Perhaps you could replace it with an identical copy if it doesn't turn up?
 
I'm pretty sure it's lost forever. I moved in January, and I had many boxes of books...and some grocery bags of books I didn't want anymore and donated to the library. It probably wound up in the wrong pile. Although I can't remember seeing it in the year I lived in that apartment, either, and I had never bothered to organize the shelves so I wouldn't have noticed it was gone unless I went looking for it.

If I had it, it would be on the shelves. Most of my mass-market paperback sized books are on the shelves in stacks two deep and three wide, so I have to do a lot of moving sometimes to get a particular book, but I'd see it if it were there. But I can still fit all the books on the bookcases, and don't put them anywhere else. Well, there's a spillover stack, but I searched that, too.

Oh, and I was wrong. It wasn't Del Rey. It was Ballentine Books, part of a "silver jubilee" boxed set with LOTR. I still have the other three books. They seem to miss their friend.
 
This is the cover image I seem to remember from my Hobbit paperback...

543444d236f5693c.jpg


Rings a bell?
 
You've lost your precious?

Perhaps filthy hobbitses stole it?




Sorry - someone had to do it. I do sympathize really :(
 
TragicMonkey said:
Yay! Thanks!
Click to expand...
You realize, of course, that the moment your replacement copy is delivered you will find the original. It is an imutable law of the universe that never changes and always reamins the same, varying in no way ever.
 
What I was saying... here in Brazil, whenever we lose things, we say "Saint Longuinho, Saint Longuinho, if you find my *.* I'll give you three little jumps". Then you go looking again... and you find it! Or so they say. Later you must pay your promise and jump three times.

It is so thoughtful of the Catholic Church to have a saint solely dedicated to finding stuff.
 
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Metullus said:
You realize, of course, that the moment your replacement copy is delivered you will find the original. It is an imutable law of the universe that never changes and always reamins the same, varying in no way ever.
Click to expand...
That's what ebay is for.

When we moved last year I lost my precious, precious copy of my MGee's science and food Encyclopedia. I'm still pretending it's around somewhere to avoid forking out for a new one but I know in my heart that it's gone. I hope that your law is true for that book too, cause my sister wants a copy.
 
that sucks that you lost a book but look on the bright side...you don't have to read The Hobbit again.
 
Ha! First David Swidler's Beethoven's Triple Concerto and Brahms's Double CD and dryer lint. Now your Hobbit book and used coffee grinds. Our NWO can't be stopped!!

Seriously though, I'm deeply sorry for your loss.
 
tkingdoll said:
That's what ebay is for.

When we moved last year I lost my precious, precious copy of my MGee's science and food Encyclopedia. I'm still pretending it's around somewhere to avoid forking out for a new one but I know in my heart that it's gone. I hope that your law is true for that book too, cause my sister wants a copy.
Click to expand...

No, the law won't work if there's already a plan in place for the original book. Your sister will have to buy her own copy before your original reappears.

Sorry, it's the law. :D
 
Luciana Nery said:
What I was saying... here in Brazil, whenever we lose things, we say "Saint Longuinho, Saint Longuinho, if you find my *.* I'll give you three little jumps". Then you go looking again... and you find it! Or so they say. Later you must pay your promise and jump three times.

It is so thoughtful of the Catholic Church to have a saint solely dedicated to finding stuff.
Click to expand...

I thought Saint Anthony was the patron saint of lost objects?
 
In Spain there's this little spell they do to San Cucufato, which is the patron saint of lost objects here, if just for the rhyme. It goes like this:

Make a knot in a handkerchief and say:

San Cucufato
Los c*j*nes te ato
Si no me lo encuentras
No te los desato

Make the knot tighter and tighter as you repeat the incantat... er, prayer. Which, roughly translated, is:

San Cucufato
I tie up your [family jewels]
If you don't find it [lost object]
I don't free them

Many people swear by it. If only for the mental catharsis if provides, I guess...

ETA: Spain is rather... freely behaved with its saints.
 
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