Comments | fionapatton: A Roleplay for Dealing with Household Crap.

fionapatton

A Roleplay for Dealing with Household Crap.

Jun 22, 2013 13:11

Read a kind of ghoulish article on how to clear out your elderly realtive's homes. And on that note, we have come up with a roleplay for getting rid of all the same crap that is slowly accumulating in our own home. It's called ( Read more... )

Comments 19

maiac June 22 2013, 17:52:47 UTC

I bet it really helps to think of your stuff as Other People's Stuff when it needs to be cleared out. Triggers "What were they thinking?" instead of "But remember when!"

On another subject entirely: Please tell Tanya that the Swan's Braid ebook was my fist choice for distraction when I was sitting in Urgent Care waiting to be x-rayed. Especially nice to have it on iPod because books are awkward right now. (Broken arm, oh yay.)

fionapatton June 24 2013, 02:07:19 UTC

It does help to think of the crap as someone elses, also its fun to pretend you aren't the kind of person who would EVER collect all this crap. Not us, nope, no way.

Hope the arm will be better soon. luv.

maiac June 24 2013, 09:19:19 UTC

Remember: If you have floor space, you're not a hoarder. :-)

fionapatton June 24 2013, 15:23:17 UTC

The only reason we have floor space is that the cats make editorial comments on anything left on the floor.

Thread 5

muffyjo June 22 2013, 19:36:32 UTC

Oh, the cleverness of you! That's a terrific idea! Hmm...I wonder if I could do that for my garage...I have a week off later this summer and I want to turn it into something beautiful I can work in. Not to mention "the storage room" which is, of course, a perfectly good room next to the garage that could be used for entertaining, should I be so inclined, but is, instead, the place things go to wait. And wait.

You have inspired me...it's like finding a theme song by which to do Hard Things™. Just makes it easier.

Thank you.

fionapatton June 24 2013, 02:11:48 UTC

yup, just think of the garage as Uncle Jake's garage. HE collected all that stuff, not YOU, so out it goes.

We did the bathrooms today and have a new mantra: "If you don't know what it is, you can't use it and therefore, since it isn't useful-it goes.

muffyjo July 6 2013, 20:15:28 UTC

I have just become an architect. It's been a second career choice and so I'm not terribly well off. Sadly, my favorite Aunt (Aunt Harriet) just passed away. She clearly loved me, too, and has left me her home. She was a wonderful woman and did all kinds of exciting things but the CLUTTER! My word!

I design homes with large open spaces, lots of light, long clean and uninterrupted lines. Here, there is nothing but countertops with tupperware, various unused appliances and...it's just chaotic. But it's mine now and with love for her in mind, I'm off to tackle it.

The cat ramp her beloved pet once used has been put out to the world. And now, I'm off to the kitchen to see what's next.

Wish me luck and thank you SO much for the lovely inspiration.

ethaisa June 22 2013, 20:32:17 UTC

Ah, the 'potentially useful'. I SO fall into that - but I'm getting better. I have a couple stacks of tubs to be used in painting (and we actually have paint to paint with, so these will shift from potentially useful to actually useful by the end of the summer or out they go!)

Peanut butter jars, however, I cannot bring myself to toss into the recycling. Whenever I would, I'd need one the very next day. So now they dwell in the basement (which someone else will have to clear out many (hopefully!) years from now.)

And I don't have any old plant tubs in the garage. Nope, none, honest. I'm sure, Honest. Hmmm...

fionapatton June 24 2013, 02:14:06 UTC

we have hit up 3 of the small rooms, with very pleasing results. Great Aunt Ruby and Great Uncle Jake had a lot of strange, unlabled, natural remedies for things going back years. About the only thing we kept was the Tiger Balm, which never ever ever goes bad and can clear the sinuses at a thousand yards.

ditaykan June 23 2013, 04:46:51 UTC

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Keep the cast iron frying pan! Unless it's absolutely rusted through, it IS still useful and you could be cooking in it by next week. It just needs a little love to get the rust off, and then to be seasoned (which means you oil it, bake it at very high heat for a few hours, and repeat a couple of times). You wash it with salt and oil again afterwards.

If you absolutely aren't going to keep it, either put it on Craigslist or freecycle it! Those things are valuable and wonderful!

fionapatton June 24 2013, 02:17:34 UTC

To be honest, I think it went into the evil maw that is the workshop to be dealt with later. (But if not I will retriever it.)I honestly think it is beyond saving, but you made a good plea for it's life so it has been spared the recycle bins until a suitable white knight can be found who knows how to bring it back to usefulness.

Cool approach to decluttering livejournal June 23 2013, 13:08:53 UTC

User muffyjo referenced to your post from Cool approach to decluttering saying: [...] around decluttering. I think fi is very clever here: http://fionapatton.livejournal.com/20883.html [...]

Re: Cool approach to decluttering fionapatton June 24 2013, 02:18:45 UTC

thanks, it seems to be working. Had to do something-singing "Just a spoonful of sugar" has never managed to get the damn things to tidy away on their own.