The saga continues.

Taking a break from the basement. I am soooooo close! Honestly, I cannot believe that I have actually done this in less than 2 months. I am not quitting tonight until Dh approves the basement for storage rack relocation! But I am taking a water break.

I forgot to tell you - yesterday 8 picked up a Mickey Mouse work bench from the curb. It had been there all week. The trash truck was due in a few hours and most of my neighbors had already driven to work.

It is plastic, and missing the tools, but it has plastic nails and plastic screws and dials and gauges and a scale that talks and a drill press that makes drill press noises and also talks if you switch Mickey on. All it really needs is a plastic hammer and a plastic screwdriver. It is basically clean except for dirt splatter from sitting by the road on the rain.

I am going to give it a light rinse with the hose and drop it off at the thrift store when I take my next load. I feel really good about this. It is definitely much better use of my time from a resource conservation standpoint than sorting out little handfuls of craft bits. I even put a few things in the trash tonight that I would normally try to save somehow. I need the time and energy for scavenging - lol!

Hi Lila and CM!

Bean left and I fell asleep face down on the couch. I only stretched out for a minute because my back hurt..

I did my zoom call this morning, and chores, and played with Bean and started dishes and laundry before i fell asleep. But all I've done since i woke up is eat two more donuts (I froze them) and repack ds stuff in bins that I am happy to give him instead of my matching/easy stacking ones (bins I had, some that I took dd2's stuff out of)

Oh! And I just had a message exchange with dd1 who requested some items from the basement!

Lila, have you and teen looked into options for future living arrangements for teen, or is the plan just for them to live with you and then..?

I hope you have fun with your grands!

CM, I'm glad things are less dire for roommate than you feared. I wish you success with the bunny club and the exercising!

I think I'm going back to the basement. I really want this table cleared off and put away!

I'm going to make a longer post, but let me just start with "yes! Donate lids!" For most people it is the lids that get destroyed. I have about 7 containers (Pyrex, Tupperware) that if I found a lid at the thrift store I would be super excited and buy it. Replacement lids are too pricey.

Ok, didn't want to forget that while I was organizing my thoughts.

post 2 today -

CM! Hi! I'm glad you came to update. I too strongly dislike heavy traffic. The city is repairing the road that goes across town near my house and it is blocked off in one direction. So now the traffic on "main street" is backed up all the way through town at certain times. It is bad enough I have to leave 20 min early to get to work which is like 5 minutes from my house! I am just not going anywhere I don't have to.

I got all the folded towels put away.

Remember how I have like 75% of my kitchen stuff locked in my bedroom so Teen doesn't break it? Like they broke ALL of my glasses and most coffee mugs, many bowls and plates... (autism)... so we have been eating off plastic ones, and I even have most of the silverware, storage containers, pans in my room. This is because Teen also would do things like take mixing bowls, use them for yucky things and leave them outside (vomiting for example, or cleaning the cat box) or would eat from things like glass bread pans and leave them in their room to get moldy or fall on the floor and break. Or would use every piece of silverware and leave them in their room all dirty for a month.

Well I am working on this. I am so tired of having to go get a fork out of my room when I need one. I told them, you are an adult now. I am going to treat you as an adult. You may not eat from baking dishes or storage containers or cooking pots. You may not leave food in your room as you will have bugs and I am not cleaning it or spraying for you anymore. To live here you must not destroy property.

I don't know how it will be but I am so over it. I am NOT putting the glass stuff all back out. I threw out the old plastic plates and brought the newer ones out of my room into the cabinet. I brought all the silverware back out and the pots and pans. I put two old coffee mugs that survived out there. A few glass items, only a very few, just in case.

Now as I am pulling this stuff out of my bedroom I see I have at LEAST 35 plastic lids. Maybe 50. Tupperware type, rubbermaid, pyrex, all the plastic lids. SO MANY. But I have only found like 6 plastic containers that match the lids. So I put those in the kitchen. Now I have about 3 containers with no matching lids and 2 thousand (lol) lids with no container in my bedroom.

My goal is to look everywhere for the containers and lids and then anything that has no matching counterpart will be donated. (Can people use there maybe? I hate to throw them out but seems silly to just donate lids).

That is my newest project.

Hi 🙂

Just unwinding after these last few weeks. I have hope that things are not as dire as they initially seemed. Meaning with roommate's health. Yes, there is some more serious stuff that she will have to contend with over the long haul. But I misunderstood a thing or two - like one issue is not new, it's just being monitored to make sure it is still holding steady. And the pain will be able to be helped with therapy and she started that.

My brain has a bad habit of flipping into apocalypse mode. And once there it takes awhile to resettle and be able to take in more nuanced information about a situation. That's probably due to stress response. If I can tackle the stress with healthy habits and prayer, it can lessen.

Anyway, I'm thankful, and ready to downshift into everyday standard operating procedure. This upcoming week will include preparation for the bunny group fundraiser a week from Sunday, but I don't think there will be a ton to do. And we are getting volunteers. I am the one who makes bright attention grabbing graphics to put on social media calling for helpers and donations because I am the one who worries most about being overwhelmed, haha. Squeaky wheel and all that, but hey, it is effective.

The public schools start here Monday. Back to zillions of buses of various sizes making traffic congested especially in the afternoons, which I hate. But I'm going to try my best to work around it. Try to be more Poco a Poco.

Roommate and I may be doing some exercising at the gym on the buddy system if it works out. It would be a chance for me to resume my own physical therapy exercises which I have gotten away from. Having the ready made motivation, and company on the driving part, would get me past some of my reluctances until the endorphins have a chance to increase and then they will carry me along again.

Just chilling on the decluttering front at the moment unless I happen to spot something to toss, but maybe it will flow better there too now that we're settling into a new groove. For awhile there it was just getting through each day. In some ways it reminded me of when we had Covid. Now it's more like when we were recovering from Covid. Getting back into the swing of things.

Well hello! Yeah, I was working. I didn't even get all of yesterday off, but worked. And I have to work a bit this afternoon, too, to prep for a training I am doing tomorrow. I have not been managing my time wisely and have been procrastinating and there is a lot to do. Will do better next week.

ohhh SubC, cradles and rocking chairs and such are SO hard. I hated giving those away. At one point I considered taking a cradle apart, carefully, and using one side of it as some kind of wall hanging/decoration. I am not crafty though so I didn't. I saved some stuff like that for granddaughters to use for dolls but I dunno. It is hard when our kids don't feel the attachment we do to things that are family-special.

What a sweet story with Bean in the basement!!

You are doing an amazing job with the basement. Your basement is my garage. A two car garage filled wall to wall with boxes and bins and 25+ year old stuff. I will have to deal with it at some point. About half of it is ex's and he is supposed to come get it.

Tatoulia, it is hard when we are out of shape. It does get easier as we use our muscles. There used to be a group called FlyLady that I was a part of. Her motto was "you can do anything for 15 minutes." So I followed her directions and bought a timer and when I needed to attack some big things, I would tell myself that, set the timer for 15 minutes, and force myself to work on it until the timer went off. It did help.

I am watching Tot and Acorn this afternoon, so hopefully I can get a few things done in the meantime. I posted some old towels and plates in the Daily Tally. I gave old towels to a rescue and the plastic plates went in the trash because they were shedding plastic bits. This meant the nicer, newer plastic plates have come out of my bedroom and are in the cabinet, freeing up space in my room.

So far this morning I:
- swept the driveway
- pulled weeds in the driveway and front
- made coffee and read on the deck for an hour
- put stuff in the laundry basket to be washed

I have been putting the clean, folded towels away also and there are still some on the table. I washed them all last week to sort but they never got put away. Will finish that today.

I'll come post again before the grandkids show up.

Good job Tatoulia!

You had a lot of hard things to do this week! I bet it takes you less time to get things together than you expect.

I'm with you on today. I'm actually going to drop in on a zoom call with some international online "friends" (hosted in Australia this time) in a few minutes. Then chores, mucking out my house - the living areas and laundry have been ignored during the basement work, weeding in the garden, and Bean time (his mama is here, but will be gone from 10-1 for a funeral and then takes him home.)

It's supposed to rain this afternoon so I plan to dry some beans and start working on class planning. Two weeks to open house. I dreamed about classes again last night.

Well I lived through the day. And the week. I thought maybe visiting kitty was heading home but I was mistaken. Tmr for sure.

I saw mom and I went to cvs. Got all of the garbage out last night. Finalizing stuff for bf tomorrow.

Hard week. Much was very, very good and productive.

Tmr I need to get rid of stuff, do some grocery shopping, and start getting my act together. Who's with me?

Wow that was a big day you had yesterday, SubC. The realization of the moths, noting that you kept a bag of stuff and for what, and then tackling the burn box. That was a lot of anxiety and self-reflection. Very tough work. I too would've eaten the donuts but I'm not a good example to follow.

My car is loaded with stuff for two reasons: we cleared out the basement of BF's work and I cleared out his place. What's in the car? Christmas stuff, cleaning supplies, etc, etc. stuff. The boxes here are more of the same. It's a matter of dealing with it LOL so obvious. I will sort and take stock. Tmr is electronic recycling and I'm looking forward to it. Get his stuff recycled and out of his car. There's one piece in my car. I think I can then start to deal with the stuff in my house.

Okay off to another big work day.

Good morning!

Another full weekend coming up.

I have Bean today because dsil has to go out of town. He and Dd are spending the night and then she is leaving to go to a funeral tomorrow and coming back for him midafternoon.

Sunday afternoon Dh has made plans with friends we haven't seen for a while.

And I need to do some online training and set my classes up by tomorrow night - oops! I hope Bean takes a good nap today!

I dropped three paper bags of mixed recycling and three plastic grocery bags of trash yesterday. I think the clearing out may be stalled for a bit though.

Tatoulia, I appreciate that you have been coming by to talk to me! How is everyone else?

Tatoulia, I'm glad you were able to cheer up your mom and to get your laundry done.

It was really good that you were able to resist taking things, but I can't explain the car. Maybe your friends snuck things in?

I am having a tough day, but I am pushing through it. I found moths in the basement again. They had destroyed things again. Things I really liked, but fortunately things that *I* made this time. Also, I had a talk with myself. I said "girl, let's think about when this bag of stuff came down here." And I thinked. And the answer was: "after the fair in 2019." And I said to myself "so you are telling me that this bag of stuff was really important to you. So important that it has been down here for FOUR YEARS and never once have you wondered where a single item in this bag was. Never once have you gone looking for one of these things, or wanted to use it, or look at it, for FOUR YEARS! These are not baby things. They are your things, that you could be using regularly. What are you doing?! Fix your life!"

And then I decided to burn the burn box, which I have not done since I started the grass fire. But we were out of matches (or Dh hid them from me) so I had to go to the store. And I took the trash and the plastic bag recycling. And I was so stressed out, I bought a dozen sugar coated donuts on clearance and I ate three of them for lunch on the way home while contemplating wether or not binge eating is a problem if you are fully aware you are doing it and making a conscious decision to self soothe.

I have successfully burned the burn box. It took much longer than usual because every time the flames got more than about 8" tall I sprinkled them with water. The ground was soaked, the grass was green. It was still and drizzling and I weeded around the fire circle before I started and I took four buckets of water and the rake and my cell phone. It was ridiculous. And my heart was pounding the entire time until I felt dizzy and out of breath and by the time I was done I was shaking.

Now I am drinking water and feeling a little sick from adrenaline (and maybe donuts) and my belly muscles feel tight, but I did it.

And then I went online and ordered moth traps. Because there were none at the grocery store.

I need a shower. I smell like stress.

Despite my difficult day, I came home and did two loads of laundry. One was the sheets for the foldout from my guest being here and a load of delicates.

I may go try to do some laundry now. Maybe I'll do the quilt the guest was using so I can put it away.

Sounds like your husband is giving you great support, SubC. That's terrific that you can get the recycling out sooner!

Last weekend at BF's house, the helper kept wanting to save stuff and I kept telling her, you can save it if you want it but I'm not getting more stuff in my house. And I didn't hesitate on any of it. So why is my car full right now? No idea.

Having dinner with a friend from work tonight. Had a challenging day at work yesterday. Had good support from my superiors.

I'm up super early for me so I might as well make my coffee and get my day started.

Mom was pretty good last night. I got her into a clean nightie. She had the usual stories of people breaking into her place and stealing the remote for her tv.so I picked it up from the floor and said, the stealing stops now. It cheered her up.

Good morning.

I hope somebody comes by today.

Going through my son's childhood stuff with him last night was pretty emotional. I was worn out. Today I'm feeling reenergized though.

I told Dh that I wanted to buy ds a big plastic footlocker to transport all his things in because I want to keep some of my bins (still have cardboard boxes on my storage racks) and because there were a few items that were loose because they were too long or too tall for my bins. Dh said "take the grey one in my shop. It's full of plastic sheets, just dump them out. They should probably be recycled anyway."

Also he doesn't want to wait until November for another recycling drop and is willing to drive a load down with me with the truck, possibly on a Thursday afternoon so we don't have to deal with a busy Saturday.

I got through about half of the fabric. It was enough to put away the fabric that was not in bins.

I FaceTimed my son and ddil and went through his bins. He wants about 3/4 of it. I am ok with getting rid of about half of what he doesn't want. A few things I will put out for Bean to play with. He said to get rid of his very favorite stuffed animal from when he was little because it is completely worn out. I can't do that, but that is about me, not him. I still have dd1's shredded blankie too.

That is my day. I am tired. I need to get that table cleared off so I can stop for a while.

Things are slowing down today!

I got DD's things in the new bins and managed to add three bridesmaids dresses she left in her closet.

Then I decided to start with fabric since there seemed to be a lot of fabric on the table.

One bin spread all over the rug by fiber content and I have managed to throw away a small handful of scraps and donate two pairs of silk pajama pants that I thought I might use for fabric.

I am not going to confess to how many bins are left, but since I started with not all the fabric in bins, I am going to call this a success if I don't ADD any bins but I get all the fabric put away.

Know what I need? I need to clear off my work table and get my sewing machine fixed. That baby quilt in my son's bin? I MADE that 29 years ago with a toddler underfoot and a part time job. And I made him a matching bunting doll.

Aaaaarg!

SubC, you aren't wasting a minute of your time! You are getting so much done!

My challenge this weekend will be to deal with the stuff I've brought into my house. Then I will have to deal with my car.

Trying to configure Saturday's hazardous waste day since everything needs to be in the trunk and my trunk is full. I'm trying to see if I can borrow BFs car from the woman who has it. The electronics are in his trunk and it would be easiest for me to take the car. We shall see.

Good morning!

This morning I found a bin with my ds name on it (I am now working in the othe4 side of the basement as well because I need more space to empty the first side)

I cringed.

Then I opened it - it is his baby quilt and his favorite stuffed animals! His baby is due in January! So now, all I have to do is schedule a FaceTime call with him to empty the bin! Stuff he wants I will take to him in November. Stuff he does not want I will donate or keep in the "Grammie's house" toys (the Grammie's house toys also need decluttering, but that is a different round. I did find 4 games to get rid of last night.)

Thanks Tatoulia.

I think that child is going to save me.

Today was literally the first time in his life that he has seen the basement rug. It was also the first time in his life that he has seen the beautiful (to me at least, and really, it's pretty good) castle mural that his mom and uncle and aunt painted on the back of the bookshelf I'm using as a room divider.

I dropped the donations. They mostly filled the back of my suv behind the back seat.

I went in the store. I am still looking for specific items. I did not find them, but I did find a garlic press. It is the one I have, but in better condition than mine. I bought it for 50 cents to put aside. Because I love my garlic press and now I feel like I am set for life. They can discontinue or redesign it, I have a spare. A garlic press is small. Maybe someday I will decide that was a mistake, but I think I will get 50 cents worth of happiness out of having it until then.

Then I went into Biglots. My first reaction was to almost stop breathing from the plastic off-gassing smell. Then I started panicking. I made a beeline for the bins. I had to sort through them carefully to find four in good condition. NEW items! I felt so discouraged I wanted to cry. In used to shop at Biglots all the time! I loved it. The little containers, the holiday decor, trinkets, and treasures, and craft supplies...

I actually ran into furniture trying to escape to the checkout with my bins.

But yes, I still bought the bins. I am going to take the four unmatched bins that are full of stuff that belong to Dd2, and I am going to pack up that stuff in the four lavender bins that I bought to match the one I replaced her cardboard box with. Then when I move the holiday rack, I am going to slide them under it and leave them there until she can deal with them. I think she is also a hoarder, and she has enough stress in her life right now. She is doing much better maintaining her environment. She can get her present in order before she deals with her past.

Then I am going to use the four unmatched bins to help me sort out some other categories I need to add things from the table to. - wait, I didn't tell you about the table!

I haven't finished dealing with all of the stuff in bins, or over half of the stuff in cabinets and drawers, but the only visible mess on that side of the basement is a 6'x2.5' folding table with about two feet of stuff piled on it. That's it. Really. When that is gone, I get to move the storage rack and start setting up for me and Bean. I'm going to paint the wall behind the storage rack.

Anyway, eventually, when I have sorted out all the bins, I expect to be able to at least discard a broken bin and two big cardboard boxes. - net storage addition = one bin or less.

Wow!!!! Beautiful.

This is really emotional.

My basement stairs go down the center of the house and end at a landing against the wall. You have to turn left or right to see any of the basement. My pantry overflow is in a cupboard right at the bottom of the stairs on the left - the side I am cleaning.

Bean has gone down with me before to get something out of that cupboard, but I keep him on my hip.

Today he asked for cranberry sauce. (Yes, I have cranberry sauce, it's a treat, but I just keep a can downstairs) I told him I had to get it out of the basement and he asked if he could come.

I said "yes, but this time you have to walk, because guess what?"
"What?"
"Grammie has been cleaning up the basement to make a space for you and Grammie."
"To do what?"
"To play and do art and build big castles and trains."

The look on his face was somewhat doubtful.

Then we went down. And when we turned the corner - it was astonished joy - seriously, like a kid finding a puppy under the Christmas tree. I almost cried.

I am doing really well in the basement guys.

My big black bag is full. Well, it's not totally totally full, but I'm afraid to put any more weight in it. Today's best work - pillows

Little needlepoint pillow my aunt made - saved.

Throw pillow from my childhood bed in 70's pink checks and floral ribbon trim - donated. Somebody will either be retro excited or reuse the pillow form.

Needlepoint pillow that my step grandmother "M" made that was falling apart - disassembled. Needlepoint (in beautiful shape) washed and blocked. The rest - in the trash.

Quality feather throw pillow form that is just about the right size for M's work, saved. I don't make pillows, but somebody does.

Lumpy body pillow handed to Dh friend who stopped by to see Dh on his way to volunteering at the dog rescue just as I was trying to decide if anyone could possibly want it!

That body pillow was so big I have an empty shelf! I forgot it was there!

Aaaaaand my friend cancelled because she is sick.

Back to the basement.

I like the idea of you having a bed that makes you happy. 🙂

My friend is coming in less than two hours.

Here is a snapshot of my brain:
Me to Dh: The ".and there's actually enough surface area for us to work out there."
Dh "how many chairs do you have?"
Me: :0

Need to take some chairs out!

I spent a few more minutes in the basement this morning. Added to the recycling and the donate bag. Just a few things. Found a container and a home for some loose items I want to keep.

It's funny, Dh said "you must be getting to the hard part now" but what he doesn't understand is that it is all the hard part, and it is unpredictably hard. Also that I have basically been moving through the space, not the difficulty level. Like this morning - I ran across one nice, perfectly useful item and my brain was just "oh, how did that get here? Donate." But the Tupperware with no lid in the size and shape I don't even like - "SCREEEeeech" (Tupperware is expensive, what if I decide I need this after all? I could put something in it that sticks up past the top and it would be contained. How much is a replacement lid? One might turn up at a garage sale or thrift...) 20 minutes and some online searches later, I am proud to say it is in the donate bag.

SubC thanks. I can afford the sheets and they will bring me a lot of comfort. I bought three different top sheets and three pillowcases. They will make me exceedingly happy. I bought one too sheet first, and when it arrived, I washed it up and I am so glad to have it that I went to Etsy and found a few more. I did resist a fair number and I made sure to stick with white with embroidery around the top of the sheet. So I'll make sure the cleaners put them on wrong side up so they can be folded down and show the pretty embroidery. I miss having sheets like this.the sheets of my childhood.

You did really hard work today, SubC. I know it was really hard.

I'm home. It was a very long afternoon but it's finished. And I put the keys at BF's old business for the cleaners to pick up. I'm exhausted. My helper came closer to 6 but she did all of the garbage runs. Two of BF's friends came by and I cried a lot. The husband was coming to pick up a few things to take to Montreal and the wife came along to check on me. I cried the entire time but they were good about it.

My body is sore. I've showered. I'm tired. My feet hurt. But we did it. It's done. My car is terrible. Oh well I cannot do everything at once.

I saw mom today and took her down to a concert and she was enjoying herself.

Oh my gosh, I totally forgot - Tatoulia, I think that shopping is ok. It is just replacement shopping to get something that makes you happier. As long as you can afford the upgrade - go for it.

Hi guys! It is good to see everybody here!

(Lila, I know you are working and will be back soon, but we've been hanging out 😉 )

Today was really really hard. I didn't do beans or pottery studio. I stuck with the basement. It is like a splinter i can't stop picking at.

I had to call my mom. I hit the boxes of doll stuff. Clothes, patterns, doll making materials, dolls that need work, dolls I haven't figured out where to display.. Plus I had to talk about some other things. She was super supportive. She told me to get rid of anything I wanted and not worry about it. Even the rocking chairs. She said she didn't care about them and that if I regretted it I could have the child's rocker that was mine that she still keeps by her fireplace with a bear in it for visiting children. She says she understands because her house is just as bad (it isn't, but only because it is huge) and it keeps her up at night.

So far I am keeping the rocking chairs. I have managed to fit them and the cradle into the space that I am allowed to clutter up (which is supposed to be my work/school project space) but the situation is not long term sustainable.

I added five of the fifteen "not displayed" dolls to the donate pile and got rid of at least 3/4 of the ones that need work (hair fixed, clothes mended or added, restringing.) probably more because so many of them were small and a couple of the ones I kept were larger. I kept most of the doll clothes just because I lost energy to go through them and they are in a bin, so the bin would just be less full - I don't have an empty smaller bin. And all the doll making materials (except hats - I put all the straw hats in the craft store box) and patterns because that was too hard, and again - bin.

I put all the doll related donations in a black plastic bag so I can't see them and change my mind, and will try to do a donate drop on Tuesday.

I cut all the yarn drawstrings off the "very useful" plastic bags with drawstrings and put the bags in the recycling (and the strings in a craft drawer - best I can do today) I did not keep the one with the cute snowman printed on it. they filled a plastic grocery bag until it would barely tie. I filled a paper grocery bag with glass (saved jars) and paper/card stock/cardboard recycling, and a small box (large shoebox sized) with metal recycling. I flattened three large cardboard boxes that are now empty.

I am tired, but also kind of just want everything I have sorted out gone and I want to buy some more bins to finish this off (I want to sort the top shelf of stuff into bins and get rid of the cardboard. I think I deserve the reward.)

Hey the gang's all here!

The cradle is definitely a tough decision, it made me remember my cradle and how sweet it was. For some reason I kept it in my bedroom as a child and I just loved it.

BF became overwhelmed before leaving. He was overwhelmed and now it is my problem. The goal is to finish today. I can't do this any other way. My cleaners will clean on Monday and hopefully his place will be rented soon. I have to finish today. I cannot do this during the week and my next weekend is fully including taking the electronics and shredding to the hazardous waste event.

My body is so sore. I live a sedentary lifestyle. Yes I walk everywhere but the bending and reaching and lifting is new to me! I cannot have the mentality that I will get this stuff done some other time. It's now or never. I need to be done with it. When the friend showed up yesterday, she was amazed at how much garbage I'd put on the patio for us to take to the dumpster. She thought that I'd got alone done. Today is finishing.

The only thing I'm keeping of his is a towel. One white towel. I have no room for his stuff and my place is quickly getting trashed due to the chaos. My car is a crime scene.

What did I buy? Vintage embroidered sheets from Etsy. Stuff that looks like my childhood. All are white so I won't do the, why did I buy non-white sheets lament that I feel whenever I buy non-white sheets. Old fieldcrest percale sheets. Only to sheets and pillow cases. I will go through my top sheets and pare down. I have four sets of sheets normally. I will get rid of top sheets so I still only have four sets (plus the set for my foldout, which is a twin). So not great, SubC, but comfort purchases. And I will swap out.

Okay I need to do a few hours of work work before the next steps for this day.

Envious of your Mrs Meyers Iowa pine scent! Hey cm you are doing great! Do what you can for bunny club and remember, you do a lot for the bunnies.

Well, we have had our storms come through last night and the night before, so now we're out of that exhausting heat wave. It's 69 here. It'll still be August, and there'll be times of humidity, but a change is good.

There are some scheduled events that have been on the calendar, to which will be added roommate's medical appointments that she will find out the times of, hopefully soon. The rabbit club annual fundraiser is on the 20th and we will do what we can but have also made them aware that things are in a state of flux so we could end up not being able to do everything that we did in previous years. They need to be sure and recruit others or be prepared for the consequences if they don't.

I've been doing graphic and writing pieces for them, getting the word out, but am behind schedule on those due to the timing of our health crisis stuff. I'll do the best I can and that's all I can do. It's literally crazy just trying to remember which things I still need to write or design, along with keeping up with my own personal paper work and calendar. All when my "office" consists of one end of the sofa and a table not much bigger than a TV tray for my laptop. I make little lists and big long lists and I have to spread it out to remember anything because out of sight out of mind. Hence clutter increases rapidly. I had been intending to start decluttering the sofa, not have things get worse. After this push, though, I can try to regroup.

As the season changes in a month or two, I will see about a renewed effort to reckon with my storage unit once it's not a fiery furnace in there. We each had big plans for dealing with our respective clutter right before this most recent turn of events. She had been frustrated because of having been retired all these months and not being further along with hers because we've mainly been putting out fires, and I have been in the same mode for years. We'd each gotten some little things done and occasionally a bigger thing such as having the big boards in the garage picked up by Habitat for Humanity. And she's got to be in a lot less pain to be able to do much at all. And I need to be less distractible etc.