The Exciting World of Organization
More "exciting" news. Librarians may find this of interest, but the rest of you won't. I finished filing/organizing the railroad magazines last night. Rearranging our shelf space to accomodate them all without moving things to other floors was a challenge. However, I made the happy re-discovery of 6 year's worth of magazines that had been organized into binders. Sadly, I did have one slight annoyance with that discovery. It occurred after I went to the trouble of putting what were the now redundant issues of the magazines on the shelf.
Originally, I stored the magazines on the cheap--salvaged 3-ring binders and some commercially available (but now hard-to-find) plastic inserts. I can only get, at most, 9 month's worth of magazines into a binder. The magazine publishers really understand their audience though, and sell a specially-designed binder for storing your magazines--they have them with nice logos embossed on them, specific for each of their publications. Unfortunately, these lovely, purpose-made bindings also cost more than 10x than my original solution. I bought some at a sale a few years ago, so about 6 year's worth of magazines are stored nicely. 4 years are in cheap binders, and the remaining 25 years are crammed on the shelves with cheesy little home-made, hand-written paper dividers.
Sure that may not be emotionally satisfying nor newsworthy to the world at large, but for this ultra-Virgo, establishing order in at least one corner of my space makes me feel better. Plus I gained about half a cubic yard of working space in the Scriptorium by emptying those boxes. The next step is to file all the A&S stuff still laying around on the third floor then reorganize the clutter that had been piled on and around the boxes I just emptied.
Woo! Will the excitement never end? I feel dizzy with it. I should go have a little lie down, now. Heh.
Trenching
I am determined to continue with my cleaning and maintenance chores. In addition to satisfying my inner Virgo by sorting magazines, I dragged out the Edge-Hog to make the exterior of our home a little more presentable. After all, we expect visitors at the end of next month. The sidewalk actually looks like a sidewalk now rather than abandoned urban blight from an early 1970's Charlton Heston movie. I got home late enough that I performed this chore in rapidly fading daylight, so I didn't manage to get started on the driveway. That will happen tonight.
Coincidence continues to swirl around me, though. When I rolled out the trashbin this morning, I met my next-door neighbor (the nice one) and his buddy planting flowers at the corner of our shared driveway. We chatted briefly and he offered to edge my driveway because the runners from the lawn can be replanted and he has some bare patches in his lawn he wants taken care of. That is mighty nice of him, but it did take a little poke at my pride--he didn't say it, and I don't think he intended it to sound like a criticism, but the fact he noticed and commented about the state of the driveway felt a little pointed. I suppose it is better than a whiny anonymous flyer from a ficticious homeowners' association stuffed in my mailbox [no, I haven't gotten over that]. In spite of my hatred of yardwork, there are some things I feel that I should try to do myself--edging happens to be one of them. So, I told him that I would be edging this evening anyway, but I would happily save the clippings for him. All in all, it works out nicely: I get a little exercise, I get to exert mastery over my own dominion (hah!), and I get to help a neighbor out.
Tilt-a-Whirl Fu
The cats have been rather rambunctious of late. AElf', Ignatius, and Josie have been chasing one another around, squabbling. AElf' has been particularly mean to Ignatius the last couple of nights. I think I have figured out why. Fall Equinox just passed. That means that the Earth is now tilting the other way, so the cats feel like they are losing their balance and they all are taking it out on each other.
Another theory is that it is because I rearranged the stuff in the living room. Cats hate change more than I do. Wisely understanding that they cannot take out their displeasure on me, they have found an alternate way to vent their little spleens. Unfortunately, Ignatius takes the brunt of it, because as the only boy cat, it must be his fault.
Of course, they could just be trying to releive their boredom.
Originally, I stored the magazines on the cheap--salvaged 3-ring binders and some commercially available (but now hard-to-find) plastic inserts. I can only get, at most, 9 month's worth of magazines into a binder. The magazine publishers really understand their audience though, and sell a specially-designed binder for storing your magazines--they have them with nice logos embossed on them, specific for each of their publications. Unfortunately, these lovely, purpose-made bindings also cost more than 10x than my original solution. I bought some at a sale a few years ago, so about 6 year's worth of magazines are stored nicely. 4 years are in cheap binders, and the remaining 25 years are crammed on the shelves with cheesy little home-made, hand-written paper dividers.
Sure that may not be emotionally satisfying nor newsworthy to the world at large, but for this ultra-Virgo, establishing order in at least one corner of my space makes me feel better. Plus I gained about half a cubic yard of working space in the Scriptorium by emptying those boxes. The next step is to file all the A&S stuff still laying around on the third floor then reorganize the clutter that had been piled on and around the boxes I just emptied.
Woo! Will the excitement never end? I feel dizzy with it. I should go have a little lie down, now. Heh.
Trenching
I am determined to continue with my cleaning and maintenance chores. In addition to satisfying my inner Virgo by sorting magazines, I dragged out the Edge-Hog to make the exterior of our home a little more presentable. After all, we expect visitors at the end of next month. The sidewalk actually looks like a sidewalk now rather than abandoned urban blight from an early 1970's Charlton Heston movie. I got home late enough that I performed this chore in rapidly fading daylight, so I didn't manage to get started on the driveway. That will happen tonight.
Coincidence continues to swirl around me, though. When I rolled out the trashbin this morning, I met my next-door neighbor (the nice one) and his buddy planting flowers at the corner of our shared driveway. We chatted briefly and he offered to edge my driveway because the runners from the lawn can be replanted and he has some bare patches in his lawn he wants taken care of. That is mighty nice of him, but it did take a little poke at my pride--he didn't say it, and I don't think he intended it to sound like a criticism, but the fact he noticed and commented about the state of the driveway felt a little pointed. I suppose it is better than a whiny anonymous flyer from a ficticious homeowners' association stuffed in my mailbox [no, I haven't gotten over that]. In spite of my hatred of yardwork, there are some things I feel that I should try to do myself--edging happens to be one of them. So, I told him that I would be edging this evening anyway, but I would happily save the clippings for him. All in all, it works out nicely: I get a little exercise, I get to exert mastery over my own dominion (hah!), and I get to help a neighbor out.
Tilt-a-Whirl Fu
The cats have been rather rambunctious of late. AElf', Ignatius, and Josie have been chasing one another around, squabbling. AElf' has been particularly mean to Ignatius the last couple of nights. I think I have figured out why. Fall Equinox just passed. That means that the Earth is now tilting the other way, so the cats feel like they are losing their balance and they all are taking it out on each other.
Another theory is that it is because I rearranged the stuff in the living room. Cats hate change more than I do. Wisely understanding that they cannot take out their displeasure on me, they have found an alternate way to vent their little spleens. Unfortunately, Ignatius takes the brunt of it, because as the only boy cat, it must be his fault.
Of course, they could just be trying to releive their boredom.