book cataloging

Having a few relatives over for dinner tomorrow night so Amy's put her foot down on all the stacks of books next to the easy chairs (and behind them and lining every wall). For this reason I spent much of yesterday "processing" a fair number of ones that were closest at hand (not coincidentally the most recent to come in). I enjoy the cataloging process. It is nice to look at the books more closely, find an apt (or howlably inapt) blurb to quote parenthetically. Linking to the photo, listing on biblio or half, and copying the listing for the new arrivals section, plus the time I spend checking out the book, is not the speediest of processes -- but it beats a few other ways to kill time on the Internet, and sometimes it pays off, even if only a little. I've been veering away a bit from the steady diet of SF/F/H books, listing everything I happen to pick up. There's lots of reasons I pick up the books I pick up -- collectibility being possibly the least of them. It could be a book I personally would like to (or wish I could) read, or maybe it's a nice copy of a book I think maybe someone else would like to (or wish they could) read, or maybe the price is right. Too much stuff seems like it might be of interest.
Still, for the couple stacks of books I was able to get through, another several had to go down to the cellar, where I'd like to think I will get to them -- but past history is not very encouraging on that score. Chances are the books coming in will continue to outpace my ability to get them cataloged -- and once cataloged there's the always daunting task of shelving them in such a manner that they can be retrieved when needbe -- only my second least favorite task behind the actually pulling of books. But now I sit here, without a stack of books beside me, for the moment -- so I write this little diatribe.