So apparently my room was never actually cleaned out and is pretty much a visual record of middle school and high school for me.
Random stuff I found while decluttering includes...
- a nanopet and a gigapet (amazingly i did not find a tomagatchi *insert sad face here*)
- a set of cds backing up my music collection from the days before affordable external hard drives
- 3 1/2" floppy discs containing who knows what (a few were actually games, but 1 - i don't even know if i own an external floppy drive, 2 - computers don't come with those standard anymore, and 3 - even if they did, who really runs DOS or remembers the commands? - if you do, you can have the Looney Toons game i just found, i guess....)
Also, today I reached my goal of getting rid of 365 Things. I still have too much stuff. So.... NEW GOAL! The new goal is to get rid of 1000 Things before the year is out. If by some miracle I manage to get that done before October is over I'll bump it up to 2010 just to be festive. But for now, 1000 Things. This means a new goal thermometer. Maybe I'll change the color, make it say a percentage, we'll see. For now, I'm off to declutter some more. Maybe get through the random stack of papers that seems to keep growing on my desk now that it appears as if I've finally learned the difference between moving papers around and getting rid of them.
August 25, 2010
August 18, 2010
So Yeah, About that Trip....
I promised to post a little about the trip to the funeral in SC.
I don't really feel like going step by step so here are a few highlights.
My family is crazy. I know. But really, who's isn't?
- my cousin can read. this was discovered when my uncle had him read every road sign he could from philly till dc. from the back seat of the 12 passenger van. on the driver's side. well, when he wasn't asleep anyways. after all that's the seat with the best view right?
- even though we didn't pack the van, we should not put members of my family in that close of a proximity for that long of a period of time. people will always bother their siblings just because they can. and when they're adults they just know what will push your buttons even better. things get thrown and people get hit when someone won't shut up. the tenth time you tell them. at 4 in the morning.
- a 5 hour energy drink will indeed keep you awake when you get tired. it will also keep you so awake that you can drive from SC to MD without being able to fall asleep. it's not that you're not tired. you just can't fall asleep.
- people do not trust one of my uncles to drive on a road trip. because he was the first on asleep. stretched out on the front seat. and it was still daylight.
- my cousins love to instigate. ask questions to keep people talking when someone wants them to shut up. add another opinion so people can't decide between two choices. turn to a radio station with songs people like but don't know the words to so they sing their own words and you can laugh.
Anyways it was a good trip. Not something we can do everyday. And not something i think i want to do in a van anytime soon. Maybe if we had a bus or RV or at least something with a bit more leg room. Anyways, the mafia had a great few days and then returned in time to rest up before the church had the sunday school picnic on sunday. All in all, a good weekend.
I don't really feel like going step by step so here are a few highlights.
My family is crazy. I know. But really, who's isn't?
- my cousin can read. this was discovered when my uncle had him read every road sign he could from philly till dc. from the back seat of the 12 passenger van. on the driver's side. well, when he wasn't asleep anyways. after all that's the seat with the best view right?
- even though we didn't pack the van, we should not put members of my family in that close of a proximity for that long of a period of time. people will always bother their siblings just because they can. and when they're adults they just know what will push your buttons even better. things get thrown and people get hit when someone won't shut up. the tenth time you tell them. at 4 in the morning.
- a 5 hour energy drink will indeed keep you awake when you get tired. it will also keep you so awake that you can drive from SC to MD without being able to fall asleep. it's not that you're not tired. you just can't fall asleep.
- people do not trust one of my uncles to drive on a road trip. because he was the first on asleep. stretched out on the front seat. and it was still daylight.
- my cousins love to instigate. ask questions to keep people talking when someone wants them to shut up. add another opinion so people can't decide between two choices. turn to a radio station with songs people like but don't know the words to so they sing their own words and you can laugh.
Anyways it was a good trip. Not something we can do everyday. And not something i think i want to do in a van anytime soon. Maybe if we had a bus or RV or at least something with a bit more leg room. Anyways, the mafia had a great few days and then returned in time to rest up before the church had the sunday school picnic on sunday. All in all, a good weekend.
August 10, 2010
15 Minute Decluttering Part II
So yeah, apparently you CAN do anything in 15 minutes. So far I've dumped 108 things.
Here's some stuff that managed to go away this week using only 15 minutes at a time.
- A bunch of old notebooks from high school and college (stuff I'm never going to read again)
- Tons of random receipts for stuff I ate and therefor can never return (who keeps these?)
- A complete series of little kid books (I can read good now so I don't need tiny word books)
- Computer programs that some of my friends need that I don't use anymore
- Costume jewelry that I never wore that came free with something someone bought
- TONS of random fliers for events that happened already
And this is making my room look sooooo much better. There isn't really a before picture so I can't really show you the difference, but let's just put it this way, if I keep up with this I could kill my goal of getting rid of 365 things in less than a month. And I thought it would take all year. So my new goal is not to list each of the 365 things. I think that was part of why I wasn't getting rid of anything. It's a lot harder to keep track of what I get rid of than it is to just get rid of it. So the new goal is to do a 15 minute declutter session everyday for at least a month. There are 4 full months left before the year is over. If I can do 15 minutes for at least half of those days there is no way I'll get rid of less than 365 things. Even if I only got rid of 5 things every time it wouldn't take me that long. Plus I still have crap from elementary school still sitting around in my room. So 365 things is not going to be an issue. I have one more thing on my good habits list, and I'll end up with a MUCH cleaner space. Now I just have to figure out where to attack next. Maybe in my closet, cause clearly that is still a hopeless space...
I'll be in South Carolina for another family funeral later this week, so it doesn't look like my count is going to jump much before the week is over. I think I may just take a break when I get back and pick up on Monday. If I feel really motivated before I leave I may go at the bookshelves again though. Those are pretty easy since I'm not going to read most of that stuff ever again.
Anyways, Monday will be super update date I guess. Funeral stories and decluttering progress should make for an interesting post or two.
Here's some stuff that managed to go away this week using only 15 minutes at a time.
- A bunch of old notebooks from high school and college (stuff I'm never going to read again)
- Tons of random receipts for stuff I ate and therefor can never return (who keeps these?)
- A complete series of little kid books (I can read good now so I don't need tiny word books)
- Computer programs that some of my friends need that I don't use anymore
- Costume jewelry that I never wore that came free with something someone bought
- TONS of random fliers for events that happened already
And this is making my room look sooooo much better. There isn't really a before picture so I can't really show you the difference, but let's just put it this way, if I keep up with this I could kill my goal of getting rid of 365 things in less than a month. And I thought it would take all year. So my new goal is not to list each of the 365 things. I think that was part of why I wasn't getting rid of anything. It's a lot harder to keep track of what I get rid of than it is to just get rid of it. So the new goal is to do a 15 minute declutter session everyday for at least a month. There are 4 full months left before the year is over. If I can do 15 minutes for at least half of those days there is no way I'll get rid of less than 365 things. Even if I only got rid of 5 things every time it wouldn't take me that long. Plus I still have crap from elementary school still sitting around in my room. So 365 things is not going to be an issue. I have one more thing on my good habits list, and I'll end up with a MUCH cleaner space. Now I just have to figure out where to attack next. Maybe in my closet, cause clearly that is still a hopeless space...
I'll be in South Carolina for another family funeral later this week, so it doesn't look like my count is going to jump much before the week is over. I think I may just take a break when I get back and pick up on Monday. If I feel really motivated before I leave I may go at the bookshelves again though. Those are pretty easy since I'm not going to read most of that stuff ever again.
Anyways, Monday will be super update date I guess. Funeral stories and decluttering progress should make for an interesting post or two.
August 09, 2010
15 Minute Decluttering
To weeks later and I'm up to 7 Habits. It looks like this is going to go a lot better than I thought it would. I found this website called FlyLady.net. Pretty much it's a site dedicated to pulling your life together by cleaning. The general idea is that if you start in any area of your home and get rid of stuff you don't need, clear clutter from the areas that seem to breed it, and create small daily routines and habits you will eventually be able to have a clean, organized house. And by having a clean and organized house, you will be calmer, less stressed, more organized, etc. And all of that will help to clear your brain to think about what super interesting, creative stuff and free your time to do stuff other than clean, worry, and trying to remember stuff you should have written down. I really suggest checking out the site. Even if you don't agree with everything she says, you'll see that the system she uses makes sense.
So i stole an idea that I saw on there and also on a few other productivity websites (funny how these guys all think alike isn't it?) and I started to separate my day into sections and group my habits by what needs to happen in those sections. Now I have a morning routine, an afternoon routine and a night routine. 3 lists of habits that need to be done by a certain point in the day.
So now that I've gotten through some of the basic habits that help me get my morning going and one of the nightly habits that makes my mornings easier I'm going to move onto another habit. One that should help me accomplish one of my other goals. That really was the point of adding new habits in the first place after all. (It's easier to accomplish a goal if you can break it down into a daily habit and just focus on that every day)
Anyways, this week's habit is something I picked up off of the FlyLady website.
I'm not doing everything just yet. I'm mainly taking one of the ideas and adding it to my daily routine. 15 minute decluttering sessions. One of the most used quotes on the FlyLady site is "You can do anything for 15 minutes" So this week me and my trusty timer will be on a quest to see just how many things I can check off of my 365 Things list for this year using only 15 minutes at a time. I'm adding new Goals page to the site so you can follow along with my progress. Even if I don't post I'll be checking off my habits in Joe's Goals and updating my 365 Things progress bar which I'm going to reset to zero for the purposes of this 15 minute experiment. I guess we'll see what happens. Anyways, keep checking the Goals page to see how I do, and look for another post later this week with an update.
So i stole an idea that I saw on there and also on a few other productivity websites (funny how these guys all think alike isn't it?) and I started to separate my day into sections and group my habits by what needs to happen in those sections. Now I have a morning routine, an afternoon routine and a night routine. 3 lists of habits that need to be done by a certain point in the day.
So now that I've gotten through some of the basic habits that help me get my morning going and one of the nightly habits that makes my mornings easier I'm going to move onto another habit. One that should help me accomplish one of my other goals. That really was the point of adding new habits in the first place after all. (It's easier to accomplish a goal if you can break it down into a daily habit and just focus on that every day)
Anyways, this week's habit is something I picked up off of the FlyLady website.
I'm not doing everything just yet. I'm mainly taking one of the ideas and adding it to my daily routine. 15 minute decluttering sessions. One of the most used quotes on the FlyLady site is "You can do anything for 15 minutes" So this week me and my trusty timer will be on a quest to see just how many things I can check off of my 365 Things list for this year using only 15 minutes at a time. I'm adding new Goals page to the site so you can follow along with my progress. Even if I don't post I'll be checking off my habits in Joe's Goals and updating my 365 Things progress bar which I'm going to reset to zero for the purposes of this 15 minute experiment. I guess we'll see what happens. Anyways, keep checking the Goals page to see how I do, and look for another post later this week with an update.
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