Needs Improvement

Put together a new bookcase tonight, hammered the last nails in, and then placed it against the wall.  Then I noticed something wasn't right.  Can you guess what it is?

I'm going to pull out the nails and flip the back tomorrow.  At least I didn't have to use glue to attach it.  And I have plenty of extra nails if I mess up the ones from the package.

That's a scene from Modern Family on my laptop there, I was watching while I worked.  It strangely always reminds me of my own family even though none of the characters are much like any particular person I'm related to.

I'm doing way better than I have in over two years now.  My therapist thought I was doing so well that we agreed I could come for "as needed" sessions from now on.  That was almost a month ago.

I'll be doing Twilight Rummage Sale again this month, provided I can get a table.  I put the contact information here for anyone who wants to look into this for themselves.  Fun fun!

Return to Green Gables

April was a busy month and left little time to make some lasting impact on my housework.  When guests come to stay I use the office to throw all the random papers and supplies, so now I have to undo that mess.

This past week alone I was involved in several major events, including Stumptown Comics Fest and Gridlords.  There have been a lot of big things happening, including the announcement that I've passed ownership of the business I owned up until two months ago to my employee/business partner.  Also my birthday was yesterday along with everything else going on.  Now I feel like I can start catching up on some things I have put aside for a little while.

I admit that for the past month I've been blocked in terms of writing in here.  I was really on a roll for a while before that, with all the posts I completed.  It's hard to write about what really is just self-actualization silliness when there is so much going on in the world.

Today I'm handling the office, getting the stacks of papers and files off the floor.  Here's where I'm at right now:

I'm watching season 2 of Game of Thrones.  It was my birthday present to myself, along with a giant buttermilk donut from Blue Star Donuts.  Heaven on earth.

Everybody says it's just like Robin Hood

I got fed up with things last night and threw a sheet over the TV set so I won't revert to watching DVDs while trying to do other things.  Not that I'm not watching other things (hello YouTube) or overusing the computer in general, but I did manage to avoid the brain fog that overtook me since Sunday.  It seems that everyone I know is feeling it so I don't think it's all me, we are blaming on the weekend time change now.  I did get almost everything on my to-do list completed today.

I am using the ruse of gifting to move some things out of this house.  My brother in law is a musician with a big CD collection, so I am sending him and my sister a nice big box of CDs that I think they will like.  I am sending a friend a package of books as a late birthday present.  Hooray media mail rates!

I am also starting to sell on eBay again, so I put a few things up this evening.  I want to raise some money and make some room.

Yesterday was Donation Tuesday, that is, I gave away a lot of stuff without even planning to do it in a day.  I gave that weird wire rack to my friend Virginia for some extra storage of her own, and made a pit stop dropoff at SCRAP, where I also found cheap and plentiful contact paper.  I had nearly bought some new at Fred Meyer a couple days ago, but it the cheapest was $5.99 a roll!  No!!  I need it to cover some shelves in my linen closet, because I think they got a little oily with some of the medicines and things sitting on them for years.  I don't want clean sheets touching that!  I rounded off yesterday with a stop at Goodwill to get rid of the stuff I had left over.  The day began auspiciously with a call from Volunteers of America, asking if I had any household goods to have picked up.  They don't take furniture, alas.

I had a call from a guy yesterday about a job interview, who told me he was going to call me today to set up the appointment.  He never called, but I wasn't surprised.  If someone calls you to tell you they're going to call you, they have a problem.

    

Arrrgh...Aaahhh!!

What is this shit?  It's what I've been trying to figure out today.  I think I got done with it but I may never be sure.  These are all the cables and crap that I've been gathering to sort.  I made another big box to take to Free Geek.  I guess whenever you get a new electronic device it comes with all kinds of stuff.  I've never needed most of it for the last year so chances are I could just ditch it all and be fine.  I think I just echoed something I said in an earlier post, but I just don't care anymore.  Yes, that is Donald Glover of Community on my laptop screen there on the left.  I had to have something to take away the pain as I forked through this mess.

Now, take a look at one of my little triumphs...

I know it doesn't look like much, but it's my home filing system for all of my personal paperwork.  Well, this is one drawer, but it's pretty much the same for the other one.  And the one pictured is the drawer I use all the time.

I used to use multicolored files to make it look interesting and try to group certain categories, but after a while it only looked more jumbled.  I switched to all one color with matching tabs.  I used to work in office supplies so I already had them for years, I didn't have to make a purchase.  Here are my helpful tips for a streamlined file experience:

1. Keep a folder for "Unpaid Bills" in the front of the drawer, as you can see I have above.  I used to have a "Mail" folder for all incoming stuff to sort, but bills just got lost in there. 
2. I like to have paper utility bills, but I don't have individual folders for them anymore.  I put them all in one.  I almost never have to look them up so it doesn't make sense to be too pedantic about sorting them.
3. I've been shredding bills and most other things that are more than a year old.  You can find most statements online now so why bother holding onto them?
4. I love shredding!!  I now have the big shredder that used to be in Sparkplug's old office.  It gets rid of tension.  It's like a game of bowling but you can do it while watching TV!  Just put on subtitles if you can.

December 16 will mark THREE MONTHS that I have been piloting this blog!  I will make sure to celebrate with some primo photos.  

Thanky-doodle

It's Thanksgiving day and I'm waiting for my sister and her partner to come and get me so we can converge on other family members in a third location.  I wanted to check into my blog while I have a minute.

I only remembered a few days ago that I haven't really consulted any books about cleaning or organizing since I began this struggle.  I've looked at a few websites and recalled some common wisdom but haven't taken an academic approach to this thing yet.  I went to my library's website and put a couple books on hold to get started:

1. Leeds, Regina.  The Complete Idiot's Guide to Decluttering. 
2. Davidson, Jeff.  Simpler living : a back to basics guide to cleaning, furnishing, storing, decluttering, streamlining, organizing, and more. 

I already had 13 books on hold so I couldn't add any more after these two.

I don't think I'm going to learn a lot of surprises.  I really just want some inspiration.

Speaking of which, here's a show I really liked that I don't think is on anymore: How Clean Is Your House?  It originated in England, and then it became a program on American cable with the same two sassy ladies.  I know mine isn't even close to what they've seen, but right now it's in a state. 

 

Another Beer Please

I finally caved and rented Game of Thrones from Movie Madness last night.  I have it on hold at the library but I'm about #350 of 500 holds, and that's for season one.  Everything people have been telling me about it has turned out to be absolutely true: massive amounts of female toplessness, sex and violence, plenty of gore.  And that's just in the first 15 minutes of episode one!  Peter Dinklage is great as ever.  I'm not sure why there isn't more male nudity.  If HBO has a nudity quota, there should be yin and yang.  Behinds almost don't count anymore, after everything we've had to view on NYPD Blue on network TV years ago.

I was away for a while over the weekend but I made up for it last night by assembling the wooden shelves I had repaired.  I put them in the laundry room.  I've already got a call in to Salvation Army to get some furniture I don't want.  I can't understand why you need to schedule pickups a couple weeks ahead, but it gives me time to add to the giveaway quantity.  I also can't understand why a simple do-it-yourself pine shelving set is so hard to get to fit together correctly.  I KNOW it's not because I hit it with my car, because I've had this problem before with another, identical shelf.

Things are looking pretty good in the basement, it's almost time for another update photo.  I've extended  my efforts to include the laundry room.  I had a bittersweet moment last night when moving a shelf and sweeping; I found some of Dylan's underwear and socks that had fallen behind the dryer long ago.  I washed them today, and put them in a collection of special things of his I'm keeping.

Upstairs Downstairs

While perusing the DVD shelves of my local library yesterday I came across an unexpected gem.  It's a British reality show called Manor House; much like the 1900 House series of a few years ago.  Here's a description I read on IMDB:

"21 people from the 21st century are being brought together in an Edwardian Country House. 6 of them are the Upstairs family and the 15 others are the servants. For three months, these people have only the rulebook and each other..."

I put it down at first because as a rule I hate reality television, but then I realized this show fits right into my particular tastes.  The point of the show is to have the family and other people involved live with the social protocols and everything else contemporary to  the Edwardian manor house style. If you've ever seen Gosford Park (one of my favorite movies ever)  or Downton Abbey, these illustrate perfectly the kind of life this show is trying to have the participants recreate.  Thankfully, it's not a contest, but it is a challenge to the people involved to cleave to the social roles (as well as the lack of technology) from back then.  I love movies that take place in this kind of household.  I don't long for those times, let's make that clear, but I do think a (fictional) manor house is a perfect place to have dozens of intrigues going on at once.  Scandalous!

Here's a clip of Manor House!

As far the upstairs vs. downstairs in my own house goes, I'm finding that I have to be sure I'm not just hiding things from myself, that they really are being put away or given away.  The room I'm sitting in right now has become the defacto extra storage room, especially when guests arrive.  They think my house is so clean because the walls in here are straining with junk!  And that's what I'm trying to do away with in general.

You don't LOOK like a chili dog

More selling of books today, and donating to Title Wave.  You may think that my whole life right now is sorting out my crap, and you would be partly right.  I don't have a full time job at the moment, and this is an urgent matter, so I'm trying to stick with it as much as I can.  Also, I worked very hard closing down the store I ran, The Bad Apple, so I'm trying to take it kind of easy.  I messed up my back a little and I have a recurrence of plantar fascitis in my right foot.  I'm only lifting little things for now, and using a cart whenever possible.

Here's an old photo of The Bad Apple, around the time my husband Dylan opened it with his friend Tim three and a half years ago:

That's Patrick McGoohan's face on the wall there, though if you've ever watched The Prisoner you don't need to wonder where that still is from!

This is only a very small portion of the stuff it eventually had.  Books, books, books, and lots of dvds and vhs tapes.  Not to mention the furniture and fixtures.  And, wait, there was a back room where Dylan ran a comic book publishing company, Sparkplug Comic Books.  Here's a photo of that, from way back:

When I think it will be too hard to get my personal space in order, I tell myself that I coordinated moving everything in this space (which was much more stuff than you see here).  This was an 1800sf space!  I should be able to manage the 200sf or so that I am overseeing now.

I'd like to say a word here about Craigslist, and what a help it was to me over the last few weeks!  I sold a few pieces of furniture, and that was great for raising the money needed for the move and the new Sparkplug location.  However, the "free stuff" classifieds are just as good when you need to get a load out quickly.  It's like getting a moving company for free!  I got rid of some huge, slightly damaged metal shelves that I was dreading having to take out on my own. The same for a big old sofa bed with tears and stains.  People will take the weirdest things as long as they're free!  I got about 75 email inquiries in just a few hours on one ad.

Portland Store Fixtures was pretty great for this kind of thing too.  They bought a couple fixtures and completely lowballed me (I mean LOWballed).  But, they offered to take anything else that I didn't want.  Apparently they have ways of recycling that thrift stores can't do.  I gave them all the damaged or flat out broken stuff that I had left after the Craigslist sweep.  The only thing the pickup dude wouldn't take was a pane of chipped glass that I was having trouble throwing out.  Whatever, I just thought I'd ask if he wanted it.  This experience has kept my enthusiasm for the Portland Store Fixtures high.  I got compensated in junk removal.  If I ever wanted to start a new store, I know they'd have whatever I needed and cheap-ish, so I still think they're rad.

I was watching NCIS Los Angeles this evening while making yet another pile of things to take to SCRAP* and a guy in it says "Now I feel like a chili dog" after looking at some photos of a criminal rendezvous at the Santa Monica pier, or someplace like that.  The girl he's talking to looks at him dumbfounded.  Just LOOKS at him.

*SCRAP, 2915 NE MLK Blvd, Portland OR 97212 (503-294-0769), scrappdx.org.  Best place ever to find cheap and plentiful donated art supplies!  Best place to donate them to also!