decluttering

This is our big challenge. Because a lot of the clutter is Not Mine, and so I can't just attack it and throw it out or even create an organizational system for it. But that means getting Tim to sit down and help, and he's willing, but just getting him to figure out where to put the stuff that gets decluttered...well, *that* alone takes more than the 15 allotted decluttering minutes. So...it's disheartening. But we'll get there. It's really nice to wake up to a clean kitchen sink, and see a clean(ish) bathroom whenever I go in there, and come home to a made bed. Hopefully that will motivate me to do more. And it *is* surprising how little time it really takes to do some of that stuff. It's a comparatively large ROI in terms of time expended vs. satisfaction.

And I'm not ruling Tim out on the decluttering, because the man got rid of the damn drill press. If that isn't decluttering at its finest, I don't know what is.

(Also, I really don't care about getting dressed to shoes and will happily wear pjs all day until I have to go outside. That doesn't impede my ability to clean/work/do stuff. But, again, I find it easy to roll my eyes at the FlyLady stuff I don't need and move on to the stuff that helps me.)

I am in love with the fact that there's a resource out there that has the whole how to keep a house thing all figured out for me, because I would never, ever, ever, never, ever, never take the time to figure it out, make a chart or whatever myself, and I have very little learned or instinctual behavior about it (I know how to clean individual things, but the whole house at equilibrium, not so much).

So, since I don't care about it except that I hate living in squalor, I'm psyched someone else who figured it out is sharing it for free and that a bunch of you have used it, modified it, and had success.

And I totally will start one day. I mean, I signed up, but I haven't started yet. But I will.

But, again, I find it easy to roll my eyes at the FlyLady stuff I don't need and move on to the stuff that helps me.

And I know I can totally do this, so I'm good.

I mean, my mom taught me *how* to clean stuff, but not *when* to. So nothing ever triggers me to say, hey, I should clean that.

Same here.

Doing floors on a schedule is helpful, because I never, ever think about the floors. I do hate vacuuming just from wrestling the loud, clunky, noisy beast, cutting and pulling the hair off the beater bar every frelling time, swabbing out the insides after emptying the collecting cup, washing and drying the cup and replacing it. I mean, most of the time I don't mind cleaning. What gets to me is having to clean the implements and tools you use to clean. Insult to injury, sort of.

Anyway, I never think to sweep or mop. I guess I just never look down. So having the task on a schedule at least makes sure it gets tended to.

Yeah, I don't see floors much either. My quirk (one of) is that I don't mind loading the dishwasher, but I hate putting dishes away. I should get over that. Maybe seeing how little time it takes will help with that.

Like, if the dishwasher is clean, I'll spend the next day and a half washing individual meal dishes instead of emptying the dishwasher so I could just put those in the dishwasher! Silly.

Floors are the bane of my existence. Whenever I am not cleaning the floors or just finished cleaning the floors (which is surprisingly not too often, considering how I obsess about them) I am thinking, man, look at those tufts of cat hair drifting and that random spot of- what is that? - on the tile floor and, damn, I really need to clean the floors.

But my couch holds me and tells me to forget about those damn floors. My couch will love me forever! Screw you, floors!

See also: the bathrooms.

My quirk (one of) is that I don't mind loading the dishwasher, but I hate putting dishes away.

Me, too. My main solution has been to put dishes away whenever I'm microwaving something. Of course, that's during the brief periods when the dishwasher is working.

Oh, good tip. And that will keep me from stopping the coffee re-heating process with three seconds left because I'm tired of waiting.

Y'all have me terrified of the FlyLady. I am afraid she'd just make me feel guilty and awful on top of my inability to keep everything clean. Like today? I washed and folded and put away 4 loads of laundry, took out a bunch of garbage, washed dishes, graded papers, and the house still looks like a fucking hell hole and there's no way in hell I'm doing more cleaning. Le sigh.

Oh, but forgive my whine. That's so NOT what I came to post about. I came to post about WHOO HOO NAIL POLISH!! The lovely Cass sent me some purty nail colors. I am itching to try out Antique Sparkle.

You're easy because we're so often color twins, Burrell. So if I loved a color? You will probably like it too. Such as, oh, Antique Sparkle. It's all pretty and stuff.

Enjoy!

Man, it takes me ages to master the Post Office but it's so much fun once it's done.

It is all pretty.

We are also twins in the unnecessary dread of the post office. I have put off sending packages for ages, and then POOF! Finally take care of it and I realize how simple that was. I am trying to get better about doing things sooner rather than later.