Empty pots make me anxious

If you're anything like me, you have lots of these:

Mind you, what you see above is just a small quantity of the empty nursery cans in the backyard. I do reuse the square pots and the green pots regularly but the 1-gallon pots really can go. I have every intention of taking them to a local nursery that accepts used nursery containers, but I haven't quite yet made it to the "get of your ass and do it" stage.

But what I want to talk about in this post are the kinds of pots you see in the next set photos: the "good" pots. They may be dusty and a bit dirty but they're perfectly serviceable and look decent when cleaned up.

Last week a neighbor asked me if she could bring me some of her pots. She'd given up on keeping plants in pots because they need to be watered so often, which required more time than she has in her busy life. I said yes, expecting a few small pots. Much to my surprise she brought at least a dozen clay pots. Below are just some of them:

It's not like I didn't have enough empty pots already, staring at me like a hungry shark with its mouth wide open:

More in the backyard, together with lots of little aloes and agaves waiting to go... well, waiting to go somewhere.

Ah, I forgot about these:

I do feel a sense of satisfaction because I have started to replant the large pots under the bay trees in the backyard. Very little will grow in the ground because the hungry roots of the trees suck up all the water. That's why pots are the way to go to bring pops of green into what is fairly dense shade, especially right under the trees. We're keeping the lower branches trimmed to allow some light in.

But there's still several large pots waiting to be put into service

For many, empty pots represent opportunities to plant new things. I agree, at least in theory. However, everytime I walk by a gaggle of pots that sit there unusued, I feel like I'm being scolded for not putting them to use. Talk about a Protestant work-ethic guilt complex!

It's not like I don't have enough plants, although admittedly most would be too small to put in large pots. 

The real problem is that I wouldn't know what to do with all those planted pots since they take up quite a bit more space than plants in the ground. Pots with plants require attention; they can't simply be stacked and shoved into a neglected corner. 

So what's the best solution? Sort through the "good" pots and rehome the ones I most likely won't use? Or just stack them all somewhere and throw a tarp over them so I don't see them? Or plant them up, at least some of them? A combination of all three options?

How many empty pots do you have? Do they also cause you to fret like I do? Or do I need therapy?

Maybe retail therapy to buy more pots and/or plants!

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