The OED defines a fetish as “an inanimate object worshipped for its supposed magical powers” or, alternately, “a form of sexual desire in which gratification is focused abnormally on an object, part of the body, or activity.” My particular fetish falls squarely in the realm of the first definition.
I spent a lot of time at the office, either with my mother or my aunt, when I was a kid. So much time at my aunt’s office, in fact, that I had my own little “desk” behind the counter at the unversity dean’s office where she worked. I’d do a drawing, put it in the Dean’s inbox, he’d put a star on it, and send it back out. He was a really nice man. As a result of all this time at the office, though, I learned early on to like office supplies.
Pens, pencils, highlighters, new pads, spiral notebooks, looseleaf paper…shopping for school every year was a joy because it meant going through the sale circulars to find what I wanted for the best deal. Things have changed, though, and with identity theft on the rise my office supply fetish has taken a new twist.
Like any American with even moderately decent credit I get an average of three credit card offers per week. I’ve been pre-approved! A new low rate! No interest for the first three months! It’s even worse, I think, because I originally registered my domain names under the name of my freelance web company. Naturally, I get credit card offers for the company too. And these fat little envelopes are a pain in the ass. Opening them, making sure that I only feed the right number of sheets into my tiny little shredder, cleaning out said tiny shredder when it gets jammed…all tasks that are way more onerous than they should be.
But I may have found the holy grail of office supplies: a shredder that costs less than $100 that will let me feed those envelopes into its jaws completely whole.*
* At the time this entry was posted this shredder was on sale for $99 + shipping