Collecting the Collector: When Collecting Is Funny

Anyone who gets the joy of collecting -- and who may have had a spouse or significant other refer to their fine objects as "junk" -- should get a laugh out of the new book of cartoons, Collecting the Collector, by Andy Broome (broomewithaview on Twitter). 

In addition to being a cartoonist, Broome is a Senior Vintage Card Grader at Beckett Grading Services in Dallas, TX. Broome deftly observes that "humans are split between collectors and non-collectors," or "others" as he calls the non-collectors. Broome has collected all kinds of things including coins, stamps, trading cards of all types, comic books, and even ex-wives and debt, according to his introduction.

Any of us who has hoarded...I mean...collected...lunch boxes, coins, baseball cards, action figures - you name it - should recognize him or herself in these pages. A father rushes to a son about to tear open a new action figure box on Christmas, "Don't open it!" A mailman encounters a "#1 Pez Collection" mailbox, only to flip back the whole box on its post, like a giant Pez dispenser. Perhaps my personal favorite, the mom whose kitchen shelves are taken over by cookie jars of various shapes and sizes, explains to her baffled son, the "Cookies are in the Tupperware."

Because the actions of a collector don't always make sense. To the "others," anyway. But even the "others" should get a chuckle from these 'toons. "Your tattoo collecting has turned to hoarding," states one fed-up significant other, whose boyfriend is covered in the ink designs.

Broome also intersperses some collecting jargon and definitions throughout the slim volume. And the funny story in the foreward by Antiques Roadshow appraiser Simeon Lipman is not to be missed. Apparently a guy brought in what otherwise would have been an almost mint collection of tobacco cards - except for their cut-off corners, which he'd mistakenly thought he should remove. Oh, the humanity!

As Lipman -- and Broome -- show, there's both comedy and tragedy here. And while we're here, what funny collecting stories do you have? Did you accidentally ruin a prized item? Does your spouse threaten to throw out all your "junk" onto the lawn someday? Has your spouse actually done so? Post a comment here! 

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