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I got a panicked email last night from a listener/reader named Emily.  I tried to answer her questions best I could.  If you can offer any additional advice, leave a comment, okay? 

Here’s the email. 

Hello Mr. Cross,

Sorry to bother, but I need some advice on a small emergency surrounding a pile of my records and a storm that blew through my town earlier today. I tried to do a Google search for a website that would go into detail on how to deal with my problem; but alas Obi Wan Kenobi, you’re my only hope.

OK, so here’s the deal: I just moved to a new apartment on Sunday, and this afternoon I found out the hard way that I cannot leave my new bedroom window wide open when it rains, nor should I leave it open when I’m not nearby to close it upon arrival of a surprise torrential downpour. 

When I got home after a few hours of shopping, I found a mini-lake had formed on the floor and some water had found its way to one of the President’s Choice reusable shopping bags (the black cloth ones) I used to transport my records.  Now, upon the discovery, I immediately went through the process of removing each record from the bag one by one.  All were wet to some degree, some more than others.  I removed all of the discs and they are all currently in a pile on my stereo in my room.  The jackets I laid out on the floor in hopes that they will dry as quickly as possible.

My questions are:

1) Would this be the proper course of emergency action?  (I know the pile of discs is, more than likely, the absolute worst thing I could do, but instinct told me to get them out of the wet jackets and I just don’t have any room to lay them out anywhere on their own.)

AC:  Getting the vinyl out of jackets was the right thing to do.  You don’t want the labels to discolour for peel.  Stacking the records themselves was a bad idea.  That can lead to scratching.  If space is an issue, separate them somehow, even if it’s just with a piece of paper towel.

2) Will the jackets be OK for storage once they’re completely dried out?  They shouldn’t moldy or anything, right?

AC:  They should be–if they’re completely dry.  If any curl up, you might want to try gently ironing them with the iron on low heat and through a towel.  That’s how butlers used to prepare the daily newspapers for their employers.

3) Will the discs themselves be OK?  Some had a few smudges, but the majority of them looked OK.  Can small amounts of water do a lot of damage to the discs? 

AC:  The vinyl itself will be fine; after all it’s nothing but plastic.  The labels may suffer—and  there’s not much you can do.  After all, you can’t iron them back on.

4) Any advice for the next time I move?  The reusable bag method as discribed to me by an employee of one of my favourite stores was fine until I got them to the room and realized it would be a few days before I was able to put them away, thus leaving them somewhat vulnerable. 

AC:  U-Haul has boxes that fit LPs perfectly.  I’ve moved a million times and they’ve never failed me.

5) Any general advice for the noob collector?  I’m 25 years old.  The majority of friends that I have that are also record collectors are record collectors because they saw me do it first; so pretty much everything I’ve done so far has basically been on the fly.  The only advice I ever really got was from my dad who told me if I tape a penny to the cartridge, it will weigh it down and avoid unnecessary skipping.  Anything additional would be super awesome.

AC:  Buy Record Collector magazine every month.  It’s expensive–about $13–but worth every single cent.

Any additional advice for Emily?