Spring Loaded: A Message from the Editor top of page | cover page

Happy February from Pezhead Monthly!

In this issue, I describe the agony and the ecstasy of the beginnng of my big Pez cleaning project. Look for updates in future issues! Also in this issue is the return of the Five Questions... well, one question, anyway for the Cherub Pez dispenser, with an impromptu song to boot. Finally, some Pez Poetry and a Pez Almost-Quote round out the issue.

By the way, did you blink and miss my top 10 Pez moments from July 2008-January 2009? Here they are in case you did!

Have a Happy Valentine's Day and see you next month!

Joe Durrant
Editor, Pezhead Monthly
joe@pezheadmonthly.com

Organizing My Pez Collection: One Pezhead's Journey top of page | cover page

I recently began my most ambitious Pez project yet: Cleaning and re-organizing my Pez collection. What follows is a chronicling of what I've done so far and what lies ahead. As you read through all the victories and agonies below, perhaps you will be inspired to take on a Pez organizing project of your own. Dream big!

First, Some Background

When I got the Collector's Guide to Pez, 3rd edition for Christmas, a seed was planted in my brain: what if I used the categories that Shawn Peterson uses in this guide as a basis for organizing my own Pez collection? True, I already have my collection on an Excel sheet, separated by set and alphabetized, but Shawn's categorization is so much more organized and, it seemed to me, makes it easier not only to find dispensers more quickly on the list, but to identify those missing gaps in my collection that I could fill with a quick trip to Wal-Mart or with a careful plan at a Pez convention?

Another thought I have been having recently was, with my new iPod Touch, will I finally have the chance to carry around high-quality, zoomable pictures of my collection wherever I go? Sure, my Verizon enV2 is portable, but the picture size could be bigger. And sure, my PSP can display nice high quality pictures, but it's rather bulky and not exactly the kind of gadget I could carry around in my pocket. Could the iPod Touch, with its ultra portability and nice big viewing screen, offer the best of both worlds?

And a third thought, which has admittedly been on my mind for a while is, wow, my collection needs a thorough cleaning. Whenever people come over to see my collection in person, or even when they see a picture, one of the first questions I get besides "What the hell?" and "Were you dropped on your head as a child?" is "How do you dust them all?" Up until now I have had to sheepishly reply that I do not, because I simply don't have time (we're taking 750+ pieces here, not counting all the non-dispenser stuff!). This is especially evident when you take a good luck at my trucks, since their horizontal designs tend to really show the dust.

About a week ago, all three of these thoughts collided in a spectacular way. And the end result was an inevitable realization: I need to completely clean and reorganize my Pez collection, both electronically and physically. Top to bottom, front to back. As someone who has put a lot of time, money, and effort into growing my Pez collection, I owe it to myself to also do a better job of maintaining it as best I can.

Here are the six broad steps that I envisioned for this project:

1. Take every Pez dispenser off of the display. All of them. Come on now, don't be shy.
2. Move my electronic list of dispensers from their current categories into those from Shawn's guide.
3. Clean every Pez dispenser. Every single Pez deserves to be clean. Even Egg Baby Pez
4. Take close-up pictures of my dispensers, by Peterson category, and verify them against the electronic list.
5. Put all of my dispensers back on display, by Peterson category, as best as possible given the space limitations of my display area.
6. Copy each of the categories onto their own tab in my Excel file for quicker access to the dispensers (making sure that any changes to the complete list also carry over onto the tab of the applicable category).

So with Peterson book in hand and, of course, Pez in heart, I began this project last weekend. I know that this will be a long, exhaustive project, but hopefully it will pay off in not only a more organized collection, able to be accessed with the touch of a finger, but also a more efficient way to stay on top of my collection as it continues to grow. And oh yes, it will continue to grow.

Step 1. The Takedown

This project definitely began in a hard way. I have become so accustomed to adding dispensers to my display, that when it came time to take them down, it was like the door to an alternate universe had opened up. Was I going backwards? Was I closing down my collection and moving on? Settle down, Beavis, it's all part of the master plan.

Another issue, of course, was space. If the Pez were to be taken off display, where would they go?

In the case of the Pez room, they would have to go on the floor, with the door shut behind them. While my cat Raven has never bothered my Pez collection (though I am sure she has rolled her eyes at it more than once), I did not want to take the chance of her messing with them when they were lying helpless on the floor.

Here are some before and after pictures of the Pez room display (click for larger pics).

Before

After

And here are some pictures of the Pez on the floor, including one of Raven investigating the matter.

In the case of the Pez curio out in the front room, I decided to put the Pez on the dining room table. As luck had it, after putting all the curio Pez on the table, I still had enough room for this laptop, to be switched out occasionally for dinner (although that most marvelous of inventions, the TV tray, could also help in this regard).

Here are some before and after pictures of the Pez curio.

Before

After

And here is the dining room table where most of those Pez ended up.

The story continues...

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