Uncluttering

So I decided to unclutter my workspace today. I am hoping that if I unclutter my workspace it might unclutter my thinking by default.




Okay, now that the laughing has died down I will continue.


Seriously, my desk is in the bedroom and because of the space crunch there is only a minimal distance between the edge of the desk and the edge of the bed on my side. When I get up in the middle of the night, as I have been known to do because of insomnia, I take my life into my hands just trying to navigate around the bed to the door of the bedroom or the bathroom.

So I started with all the accumulation of pillows and blankets (and assorted other things I have managed to shove into my corner of the bedroom, and then worked toward the desk. Now I am working on the desktop. I am really pleased with how merciless I am being with myself in terms of what I "need to keep" on my desktop and what I can either put away somewhere else or what I can just toss out all together.

Next I am going to work on clearing out the boxes I have stuffed into our closet in the thought that I would get around to them "soon". I have a box of pictures that need to be scanned into the computer that aren't going to get scanned in the next four or five months, so they can go somewhere else. I have a box of stuff from my office which I had stashed away below my clothes but moved when I set up my yarn stash last fall. Then there are three suitcases (we have traveled a bit recently, so maybe we should find a way to store those in the closet. . . nah the laundry room is close enough, just been too lazy to drag them downstairs. After that I will just have to organize my shoes and pick up a little garbage off the floor and the closet will be clean.

If after all that organizing my thoughts aren't less cluttered I will at least have a nice clean bedroom, and fewer bruises on my shins. Better get back to work before I lose my nerve.

Pax

We've Got Way Too Much Stuff (With A Big Hat Tip to the Late Great George Carlin)

Since we really love our house and at 3900 square feet it should be more than sufficient room for a family of seven people, mrangelmeg and I made the judicious decision last night that it is time to get rid of some of our stuff. Because if we don't the only alternative according to George Carlin anyway is to buy a bigger house to put our stuff in, and we don't want to move.

So, my project for this week is to get rid of some of our stuff.

I did get a head start by going through my closet and deciding to let go of all of those cherished pieces of clothing that I have been hanging onto "just in case" I _________ (fill in the blank with responses like:

a) go back to work and need that polyester pantsuit,

b) lose fifteen pounds and can fit into those pants again,

c) gauzy peasant dresses ever come back in style or

d) forget and try to wear that third pair of black pumps that really pinch my toe but look so cute when I first put them on.

All of those things are bagged up and ready for Son-and-Heir to take to work with him this morning. (I think I mentioned before that he works at Goodwill, but I will add it here just in case you were wondering why he would take a bag of women's clothing to his job. I wouldn't want you to think he was a tranny in training or something.)

Today I will be going through piles of crap from Gradual School (you should see the bookshelves in the office, we have twice as many books as we have shelves in there and the bedroom bookshelves aren't much better) Surely I can let go of some of those books. I can say with perfect certainty that unless I have an aneurysm I will never intentionally open another Philosophy book as long as I live, and if I pick one up it will only be to smash a spider. (That is of course with the exception of the occasional Kierkegaard, so Rufus, you can stop holding your breath.)

And that doesn't even begin to describe the condition of the desks in that room. I haven't bothered trying to get things into the file cabinet for at least a year, so I have been stacking everything on one of the desks. This week I will go through the files and determine what we need to keep and what we can archive and what we can throw away. Then maybe, just maybe someone will actually be able to use that desk in there to do school work instead of being in fear that if they bumped up against it they would cause a clutter-lanche of epic proportions.

The goal is to cut the clutter by 40% with the pitch, donate, organize method, or suffer complete exaustion in the attempt. Wish me luck.

Pax

Getting Organized Around Here

For those of you not in the know, January happens to be National Get Organized Month.

In the spirit of getting organized I have decided to do some organizing around here.

This year I am instituting special blogging days to try to write more intentionally.
My New GO (Get Organized) schedule will be:

New Media Monday: I will explore new podcasts and innovations in new media that I have come across

Training Tuesdays: These will be stories and tips from my training experience now that I have a personal trainer.

What I am writing Wednesday: I will share a little snippet of the fiction I am working on, or a link to my latest Helium essay that I have up.

Theology Thursday: I will be reinstituting my angelmeg's theology lesson of the week from way back in the early days.

Fun Fridays: This will be the day for games, meme's quizzes and jokes.

The weekends will be free for whatever, and If I have a burning need to blog about something I may break the pattern to for newsblogs at anytime. And I haven't given up on my Mental Pause Moments.


This will be a great year, I can tell.



Pax

My Lenten Sacrifice for 2007

I have prayed and meditated and examined my life over the last few weeks. I have discussed with mrangelmeg what would be good for me to offer up to God this lent. I have determined that there is something very big that I have been clinging to for a long time that I should give up.

It will take all of the will power and prayer support I can muster to give this thing up, but I honestly believe that if I can banish this from my life these 40 days of Lent, I will be a better person for it, and my husband and children will benefit as well.

What, you might ask is this thing that will create such an enormous change in my life?

I am going to give up being a SLOB!

I really mean it, I am going to get organized and stay organized. In fact I have already begun in little ways to accomplish this task. I started by organizing the kitchen junk drawer, and it wasn't even all that painful, unless you count the pin I got stuck in my finger. now when I open the drawer to get the tape I can actually find tape! What a concept!

Next I organized the silverware drawer by getting a larger holder for the silverware (one that actually fits the drawer and the set of silverware). I am telling you. If I stick with this and do one simple organizational job every day of Lent I will be in great shape by Holy Week.

And I will be able to find things, like the set of keys to the van I lost last week after using them only once.

So, goodbye to disorganized, slobby angelmeg you are gone with Fat Tuesday. Each day of Lent I will be working on those get organized strategies that I have been trying to put in place for years.

I can do this.

Help.

Pax