3307 Emerging Pattern

Sunday, July 17, 2011

It isn’t how you start that matters, it’s how you finish.

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From Shoebox.com: "In the latest gambit in the debt limit talks, the GOP has figured out a way to make Obama take all of the blame for keeping interest rates down, paying Social Security recipients on time, and continuing to pay soldiers. No, wait. That wouldn’t be blame, that would be credit. We’re so confused."

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Today's Sunday Morning is described as a "special edition". IT'S A RERUN! Oh come on! Special? (Yeah, I know, it's "special" because it's all about animals, and the tag is left over from the original airing, but still, I didn't know that when they piqued my interest....)

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I have established a pattern for upriver.

I arrive early evening. Last Thursday the drive took me 3.5 hours because there was an accident on the Garden State Parkway.

The next day I spend the whole day sorting and throwing things out, into the Hunk's trailer for him to take to the dump for me. This past trip I tossed six large black garbage bags, plus a dozen or so tape and floppy disk storage containers, and outdated programming books in there. I spent the entire day on the den. It's not a large room, it's the third bedroom, but that's the room in which, after Jay died, I found seven computers and a huge laser printer that I didn't even know existed. The room also contains every important piece of paper that ever entered the house. And no longer important paper. And never was important.

That's how cluttered that room was. Jay never ever threw anything out. Someday he might be able to use it. Unlike most hoarders, though, Jay had a mental inventory of everything, and knew exactly where it was. The only problem was that he never needed to use it.

The following day I pack whatever needs packing for this load and fill Fred. This past trip Fred's load is almost entirely paper to go to the recycle center down here. (Yeah, I could just toss the paper in the trailer, but I'll pay by the pound to dump it, and I don't want to pay for a ton of wet paper.) And a few things to go to Good Will.

There's a recycle center upriver, but they are open only one afternoon during the week and on Saturday morning, and you have to buy a sticker to get through the gate, and everything has to be strictly sorted. I didn't get the $25 sticker for this year. The recycle center down here is open every day except Sunday, it's free, and paper is paper, no sorting necessary. Free! Easy! And they take electronic thingys too, so there's also a few external drives and old monitors in Fred.

Then after loading the van I return downriver. Yesterday's trip took over three hours because I left too early and hit the Saturday shore traffic on the Garden State. Note to self - leave mid or late afternoon. Once home, I immediately unload anything that can't take heat, and then the next day, I rest. Tomorrow I get to fully unload. Usually that involves finding new homes for everything I brought down. With no chests, tables, bookcases, or anything else, that's not easy. Mostly stuff is just getting stored in boxes in a bedroom until I can get furniture down.

On the previous trip I worked on the kitchen, clearing out drawers and cabinets (that house has a huge kitchen, nine or ten large deep drawers, seventeen or more cabinet doors (all the shelves glide out), four rotating corner cabinets, a butcher block island, a huge double pantry - I loved that kitchen! This trip I had taken a container of stew. I wanted to heat half of it for dinner Thursday evening, and discovered I had nothing to spoon it out with.

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I probably threw out a lot of valuable stuff. Jay was all science. He loved Edmund Scientific catalogs. I found all kinds of kits, some that had never been opened. One was labeled "photographic special effects" and the box was full of camera lenses (without the plastic screw-on parts). I threw them out. There were three microscopes. I kept the one that looked least jury-rigged and still had the instruction book and threw the other two out.

Yeah, maybe someone would appreciate that stuff, and at one time I considered listing stuff on Freecycle or eBay (most of it is too esoteric for Good Will), but when I consider the amount of research and coordination that would involve, I realize I just plain don't have the time or energy, and all that crap would just end up stored here, just like it was there. It has to go, now. And once the decision is made, it must be executed immediately. No second thoughts.

I can hear Jay screaming.
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