Whoop! Whoop! Parent invasion imminent. Take cover!
Remember back in July when we gave my Mom tickets to see Cirque du Soleil? The show is this Sunday, here in my town. Sooooo. Yeah. I've been trying to make the apartment look a little less like Oscar the Grouch lives there, with limited (very limited) success. I keep getting distracted by things I find as I clean up -- "Oh! That's what happened to that Laurie King mystery I bought last month. I never finished reading that....Hey! There's that knitting project I started and put down. Why'd I put it down? Oh, look, here are those pictures I got printed. I should organize them..." and suddenly it's 11 pm, and the place doesn't look much better than when I started at 6.
I'm taking tomorrow off to clean (and for some blood work my doctor wants. I get to fast for 12 hours prior to being poked with something sharp. Doesn't that sound like fun?), and I swear on Delilah's fluffy little head that by Sunday morning this place will look like a responsible if slightly untidy thirty-(mumble) woman lives here, not some messy teenager with ADHD.
I hope.
5 comments:
That's twice in 24 hours Cirque du Soleil has come up. They were advertising in the national paper yesterday (which doesn't come cheap) for rigging crew of all types to go and live in Macau.
No, not me.
Have a happy time with your mom, V.
Hmmm... This self-proclaimed Queen of Kinetic Cleaning* thinks you might need a "deal with it later" box. It should be roomy and sturdy. Using it isn't too fancy, really. If you find something that doesn't have an immediate home (i.e. book shelf or craft drawer), it goes in the box. "Immediate home" are key words here. Those photos belong in an album or scrapbook, but you can't afford to waste time organizing them right now. The photos go in the box. Near the top if you want to show Mom.
Yes, the box will end up with an "ishmish" (That's George's word) of items, but its function is to quickly move things out of your way so you can continue what you're doing without sidetracking yourself to find them a home.
When all is said and done, you'll likely have a nice-looking apartment except for the big box of ishmish.
DO NOT stuff this box into a closet where it will be forgotten It may be unsightly, but if you hide it from yourself, you won't bring it out again until you move or something.
Depending on how much time you have before Mom arrives, you can start going through the box now, or you can wait until she goes home.
Whenever you go start to through it, allow yourself no more than 15 to 30 minutes of sorting its contents. There's nothing wrong with pulling out the easy stuff out first, like the photos. Shuffle through the box, pull out all the packets of photos, and devote the remainder of your time to picking through the ones you want to keep and putting them away in albums or envelopes to friends or wherever.
The next day, allow another 15-20 minutes of treasure hunting in the box. You will either empty the box in a few days, or you'll throw it and its remaining contents out when you finally decide there's nothing you or someone else would REALLY want/need in there.
*Kinetic cleaning is the act of moving your clutter from one place to another without actually DOING anything with it. Our friends had a slick little move where their glass coffee table was usually covered with a sheet. If company came, the coffee table clutter was scooped up with the sheet and put into a closet, and all that was left was a neat, dust-free coffee table.
Please tell your Mom that your flaky friend says hello.
Amy B.
Wow - I'm impressed by that trick with the sheet.
Yeah, I thought the sheet trick was pretty cool, too. Best of all, when the guests went home, the hobo-bag sheet was placed upon the table, the four corners opened, and all of those cluttery little necessities were right back where they needed them.
I have a similar trick with the clean laundry that never seems to leave the loveseat. Ugh.
First of all, my entire apartment is one great big "ishmish" box.
That being said, I should maybe sew together a bunch of sheets and cover the whole floor with 'em. Clean-up sure would be simpler. Swoop! Done.
:)
New post coming soon.
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