I was reading a sad little tale the other day of a lady whose husband sold her favourite cookery book at a car boot sale. The article contained the dreaded words 'he decided to surprise her by clearing out junk'.

Oh, haven't we all suffered that ladies? And, I have to say, gentlemen.

The cookery book in question wasn't all that valuable, not a first edition , but it had been given to her by her grandmother so it had great sentimental value.

I know how she feels, because I have one too. A very old battered edition of Mrs Beeton, with added handwritten recipes from my grandmother. There's one for ginger biscuits which seems to contain an awful lot of ginger. They did too, I suffered them as a child and believe me you always had to eat them with a jug of water by your side. The cookery book wouldn't even deserve a second look at a car boot sale, but it's valuable to me.

I have an ongoing battle about books which usually begins with the comment 'why do you want to keep that, you've read it?'. Yes, but I want to read it again, I say. In fact all the books I keep are books I can read over and over again, so I'm keeping them. But not without difficulty.

Some people keep books because they might one day be valuable, which to my mind is sad, especially if they are in the words of antique dealers everywhere 'in pristine condition', ie not even opened.

Book lovers leave fingerprints, turned down pages and tattered covers and are an anathema to antique dealers. They will view your well thumbed stack of Brer Rabbit classics or your much read Rupert books with distaste. Far better the child who doesn't read and is unlikely to even turn the cover. I wonder if they refuse to allow their own children to so much as breathe on the frontpiece of Harry Potter books.

I'm not much of a collector, apart, as regular readers of this column know, for kitchen gadgets. I would be extremely miffed if anyone attempted to throw away my five garlic presses, part of an ongoing search for the perfect press, ever since someone used my favourite one to crack a Brazil nut and broke it.

I do have a small unwilling huddle of unusually shaped teapots. Unusual in that many of them are animal shaped and unwilling in that they are not really my doing. The first one, in the shape of a rabbit, was bought by my son who is not awfully good at buying gifts, or cards for that matter.

He once sent me a mother's day card which read 'you've been like a mother to me'. Still it's the thought that counts, and I love the rabbit. The next year I got a pregnant pig, plus a small cottage. This was followed by a rat in a dress; or it might be a misshapen cat, it's difficult to say.

Then there's another cottage, I'll soon have a terrace of them, and an apple, and a kitten with it's paw out for the spout. I called a halt then, there's no room for them and not one pours a straight cup of tea anyway.

Not that partners tend to throw away this kind of thing, although I know someone who barbecued her former husband's Smurf collection. No, it's all those things you keep for sentimental reasons or because you really like them or because they work better than fancy new things.

I mean take teapots. It can take years to find the right tea pot; the right size, the right weight, the right handle and the right spout that doesn't dribble.

Then an idiot husband notices a small chip on it, chucks it out and buys you a fancy stainless steel one which pours boiling tea down the side and onto your hand every time you pour.

I once had a friend who almost went over the edge when she came home to find her husband had, with every kindly intention, thrown away her omelette pan, which she had inherited from her mother and which was perfectly seasoned.

He had replaced it with a lightweight non-stick job from Woolworths and was very pleased with himself. Before he got out the words 'I couldn't help noticing . . . ' she had nearly brained him with the new pan before explaining that seasoning omelette pans is a delicate and long-term job and takes years.

Women do it as well. They chuck out favourite gardening implements because they are held together with binder twine without realising they have been worn into perfection over the years and are much loved.

They can't understand why their man wears a cardigan which is not so much a cardigan with holes as holes held together by a cardigan.

Perhaps it should be one of the the ten commandments - thou shalt not chuck thy husband's favourite fishing hat - battered Wellingtons or comfortable if threadbare tweed jacket. Or maybe into the marriage ceremony - 'do you promise to love, honour and leave your wife's egg beater strictly alone?' ' Do you take this man and his collection of very old and apparently totally useless clock parts?'

One of my favourite objects is my little Mellita individual coffee maker - you pop in a filter paper, balance it on a cup, pour on boiling water and behold, one cup of perfect coffee.

It annoys everyone else because it constantly falls out of the cupboard, it drips all over the sink and on occasions someone knocks it off the cup and it falls on the floor and spreads boiling hot coffee grounds onto someone's foot. But I love it.

They've bought me a fancy coffee maker, several coffee jugs with built in filters and two cafetiers. Plus there's an expresso jug if I fancy frothy coffee (which I don't), but I still hang on, like grim death, to my little plastic filter. Or rather filters, because on occasions it has developed mysterious cracks; one was broken in two; one disappeared altogether and another was rescued from the bin liner where its shape gave it away and it was said to have accidentally fallen in. Oh yeah.

I never have any difficulty replacing these filters, because you see them in charity shops and car boot sales all the time, probably put there by people of like minded pettiness.

It's a battle I'm determined not to lose and so far it's Filters 6 - Rest of family 0.