This Monday I found myself in Laughlin trekking down casino row during one of the worst wind storms in a while. The chilly windy made my bum knee ache and I ate some dust during a bad gust. What would bring me out on such a day? What earth shattering emergency could drive me to out on such an unpleasant day . . .a deck of cards.

Yep a lowly pack of cards, I collect cards from various casinos I visit and I needed just one more to get all the casinos in Laughlin. So I set forth in my trivia quest.

I was lost to the collecting fever long before I was born. My grandmother collected (sometimes simultaneously) stamps, board games, sewing projects, made and collected doll's clothes, carnival and other colored antique glass pieces and house plants. There was definitely a packrat in the wood pile somewhere.

Me personally I don't have as many collections as she did but I am trying. I started my casino decks collection in October and it is now nearing forty decks. I also have a collection of nearly 10,000 comic books.

Many aspects of being a packrat strikes me as being interesting. The fact that packrats can never seem to leave their collections sit. Me and other comic book collecting friends love nothing better than rearranging their collections into some semblance of logical order.

Another aspect is the bragging. Just ask me (or any other packrat) about their collections and you are sure to be deluded with trivial facts. Me, I own every Action and Detective Comic since 1979. I own every X-files comic (including rare freebie issues) and even have a letter printed in issue 2 of the regular series. I also own a deck of cards from the now closed Maxim Casino. See, there I go.

A fun aspect of being a packrat in these modern times is the computer. One of the main things I use my computer for is keeping track of my collections. I also use the net a lot to find out facts about my obsessions. I have even used the net to find software to keep track of my stuff (Realms of Wonder for my comics and Star Office for every thing else).

Another computer based collection I suffer from is fonts I love the things and at one time had 1500+ on my hard drive. I had to erase them because of space problems, a dark day indeed.

So I am probably crazy but I think I have a lot of good company. To paraphrase the bible "The collectors shall inherit the earth for we will own all the stuff".