WSJ:

Some collecting groups have created unstated policies. The 650-member National Milk Glass Collectors Society — a group devoted to opaque glass — holds an annual auction. When the rare young person shows up to bid on an item, older collectors lower their hands. "We back off and let the young person buy it. We want them to add to their collections," says Bart Gardner, the group's past president.

And, from the same article, the unwritten story behind this anecdote somehow entertains me:

Philadelphia Daily News columnist Stu Bykofsky, 64, has collected the last editions of 79 daily newspapers that closed down since 1963. His adult children don't want the old newspapers, which fill a closet. "The only kind of paper my family wants is greenbacks and stock certificates," he says.

He hasn't been able to find a university to take his collection, either. And now he's under the gun to get rid of it. He is about to marry his third wife, who is 27 years old, and in the prenuptial agreement, there's a clause that he must dispose of the collection by Dec. 31. She wants to store her shoes in that closet.

"At least I can wear my shoes," says his fiancée, Jennifer Graham. "He never reads those papers, and besides, he likes how I look in my shoes."

On a mildly related topic to the subtext of this anecdote, see Alex Tabarrok and the comments section.

Five Guys is opening a branch on 2300 Wilson, thus mildly improving the quality of my life.

The Areas of My Expertise, a present from my friend Trout (thank you, Trout!), is the funniest book I've read in the last ten years. I'm usually too jaded to react to humor, but this one had me laughing out loud on a crowded Southwest Airlines flight. The Daily Show interview with John Hodgman was what sold me on the book. An MP3 of the 700 hobo names from the book. Gothamist interview and Mediabistro interview. Hodgman's thirteen-part series for McSweeney's. And, hey, there's a book blog, though I appear to be several months late to the party. New Yorkers, I gather, were already aware of Hodgman from the Little Gray Book Lectures.

LAN3 asks for the reveal. We'd been playing a lot of Carcassonne and Settlers of Catan, so I purchased Slim a big box of German boardgames to supplement those (including the delightfully named Funkenschlag). I thought it was a good solution to the gift-giving problem, as it showed "Hey, I like your mind, too," but was more together-oriented than books.

But I did end up getting her roses. And dinner at a good Clerksville restaurant. And a stuffed gorilla, though that was ironic, and was well-hidden by the time I came to visit. (Though not before she told me "You know, with all the helper-monkey jokes, I was really worried you were going to get me a stuffed monkey.") And canned food in case the electricity went out during the weekend ice storm, though perhaps that was more a Presidents' Day gift.

I was feeling a tad guilty that I was going to receive splashback utility from my boardgame gift until I opened a late-arriving UPS box to see I got a universal remote for Valentines Day. Which is both appreciated and thoughtful, but will probably be of more utility to the member of the couple who had trouble keeping track of my five separate remote controls, which the third-party vendor was probably thinking of when it was addressed to Slim. (I kid.)

Slim and I were perusing a Clerksville gourmet market this weekend when we came across a bag of Australian rock salt, the label of which suggested we buy it to help "the serious inland salinity problem."