The collection was well-ordered, if you knew what to look for. It had a large selection of 80s and 90s CDs, a great many VHS tapes (which only wobbled slightly), and an occasional DVD. It documented, with some gaps and unreturned borrowed exceptions, the musical and cinematic taste of its owner and curator. The accumulated media consumption of decades, preserved for posterity, and only occasionally reshuffled when moods struck. Or when circumstances forced a moving of house.

However, despite the well-ordered nature of this collection, one thing stands out. The addition of new items seems to have stopped after a certain point in the mid-00s. Should you ask its owner, he’d most likely tell you at length about his active interest in contemporary music. But at some point, owner and collection fell out of contact with each other. It remains, as it were.