Hoarding...not just on TV

blossomhill_2 · 12 August 2012 at 9:49PM

Off topic - It's no wonder we are all so tired, we have jumped every high jump, run every metre, swum every metre with each athlete - in my head I have done it all!
I can't wait for the paralympics!
And Mo is my hero for saying twins is better than 2 Golds!

Byatt - I was there when the Dixies said it and there again when they sang that they could maybe forgive but not forget! Brilliant song!

Byatt · 12 August 2012 at 9:53PM

Gingernutty wrote: »

The bins! The bins!

Well,

I live on a terrace with front doors that go straight to the pavement with no gardens.

Every 12 houses, there's a passage where we are all supposed to pass the bins every week for the rubbish collection.

My side? There are a pair of drunk brothers with vicious dogs and pigeons who have become self styled guardians of the gate. They've taken over not only the passage, but the garden of the house on the other side of the passage - all in the name of security.

This means that I have to go down, knock on their front door and run the gauntlet of huffing, palaver and sighing so that one of them will open the gate and the other sorts the dogs out, so that the panel they use to keep the dogs in gets moved, the dogs put away on kennels and the gate unlocked.

As it's too much hassle for everyone along my section, the bins are kept outside the front door which is not too bad with just the one. I keep one of the small brown bins outside the front door.

Most people keep the brown and black bins outside so pedestrians now have to slalom between the bins to get down the pavement. I throw a lot in the recycling and want to keep it close, out of the way and free of rubbish thrown in by passers by.

My trouble starts as I've got two of each and naughty though it is, I'd like to keep the bins as they come in handy.

Every now and again, a council official comes along and points out that there is a £1000 fine for causing an obstruction. We point out the drunk brothers and the collection of drunk hangers on, the obstruction they've caused and the fact that only they have the keys to the gates padlock and the council official walks off never to be seen again.

As long as the drunks keep paying their rent, the local housing association really can't be bothered to lay down the law to them. They really are slack around here.....:(

Ginger, that sounds a nightmare. I'm trying to think of solutions but I suspect you have gone through them all. What about bolt cutters? Cut the lock, put your own up and then run...:cool:

Byatt · 12 August 2012 at 9:57PM

blossomhill wrote: »

Off topic - It's no wonder we are all so tired, we have jumped every high jump, run every metre, swum every metre with reach athlete - in my head I have done it all!
I can't wait for the paralympics!
And Mo is my hero for saying twins is better than 2 Golds!

Byatt - I was there when the Dixies said it and there again when they sang that they could maybe forgive but not forget! Brilliant song!

Oh wow!! And yes, brilliant song, so much of it can be applied personally for a multitude of reasons.

And yes, I can't wait for paralympics. :T Mo is a fab person, so many of them are, so inspirational at so many levels. :A

sjprmc01 · 13 August 2012 at 11:08AM

Well despite finding it that bit easier to get rid of most types of things I still feel very overwhelmed. And it seems I keep 'sorting' and discarding from the stuff that is actually tidy rather than tackling the piles that ar under/on kitchen table and bunkers and all over the trolley thing we have in the livingroom or the piles on all bedroom floors it's like I genuinely don't know where to start with that and end up moving it from one spot to another to back again.

. And even more annoying is that I sorted out all the paperwork (well the stuff that was at the computer desk) and the desk itself and once again everyone else starts piling !!!! back on it. We now have anti bac spray insect repellant sun cream 2 cameras super glue a spoon a dominoes dip various bits of toys.....and that's all I can see from where I am. None of the stuff is mine, I don't use the desk (or the comp, really). Grr! Everything has a home but it's like no one actually puts the stuff that is sorted back where it belongs!

whitewing · 13 August 2012 at 11:13AM

Don't get disheartened sj, it took a while to collect and clutter, it will take a while to get into new habits.

Discarding from a tidy pile is still a huge step forward as you are truly identifying things you don't need, and you don't always see that the first few times through. As long as stuff is leaving the house, it is all a help.

Byatt · 13 August 2012 at 11:20AM

SJ, I'm sorry you feel overwhelmed, but I think it's a common feeling amongst us. I only have myself so in theory it should be easier, but it isn't although I have no-one to blame but myself. I have done masses of clearing, even big furniture items and to outside eyes it still looks a tip.

I look at it all, and think where do I start. There's always paperwork, no matter how much I shred and recycle, and when I feel overwhelmed it becomes Mount Everest to climb the pile of stuff...I know what I want to go, but it still takes me ages to decide, and I put it in the pile of maybes, or to be considered...

I don't have the answers, but I do think you have to be kind to yourself too and have a break...or maybe just fling all the carp on the computer desk into a bin bag and say, if it isn't put away, the stuff goes in the refuse bin for next collection.

Or, and I don't know if this would make it worse, have a basket, throw the stuff in everytime an item that shouldn't be there appears, and put somewhere like a shed.

Hugs anyway...((((((SJ))))))

Jojo_the_Tightfisted · 13 August 2012 at 11:55AM

Thought we'd been zapped then, couldn't find the thread for looking.

Good morning, hope everybody is well. I just saw the postman walking up the Path. And all it was? More junk mail. It went straight from the letterbox into the waste bin kept by the door for that exact purpose.

I hate doing the bins this time of year. Flies, flies and fishing bait galore. Now, I don't mind fishing bait in its proper place - by the water - but in a food waste bin? Yuk.

This morning started with somebody phoning but hanging up. Then the cat fell into the water bowl again (he did it yesterday as well) and then I dropped the container of cat crunchies. He now has no excuse for claiming to be hungry today. But I shall do some vacuuming this afternoon when he's sleeping in the shed.

Well done to everyone who's dealing with emotions that have been surpressed before. I think it's good that removing the visual noise gives you space to hear the things that are bothering you. After all, you can't deal with a problem until you can see there is one, can you?

But I know it's hard work. So everybody should make a point of taking ten minutes out everyday just for them. Not to do something in particular, it could be ten minutes just sitting in silence. Or ten minutes in bed before getting up. Or ten minutes playing a musical instrument or listening, completely uninterrupted, to something you want to listen to. Whatever is the most restful thing you can think of.

thriftwizard · 13 August 2012 at 12:39PM

Thank you, Jojo - I need "permission" to stop every now & then! Got myself into a bit of a spin about that dratted sideboard, which DD1 insists I can't dispose of, even for cold hard cash, but I have now thought of somewhere it could go & be useful until she has a place of her own to put it in! However she can jolly well help me move the things that are currently occupying that space when she gets back from work.

I've offered more stuff on Freecycle & gone through the "spare" young male clothing & sorted out duplicates etc. to dispose of. I like to have a few bits on hand for emergencies; we've put up more than one young lad who's been made homeless out of the blue, genuinely through no fault of their own, before now. Think middle-class parent with acute mental health issues & boys old enough not to be any concern of social services, if you're doubting that can happen. He burnt all their stuff, clothes, photos of their dead mother, everything; luckily we were able to sneak in & retrieve the file with their passports, birth & academic certificates in whilst he was tending the fire.

In the meantime I've been painting & shuffling stuff in DS3's room. Once I've removed a few boxes of mine (ex-shop) & DH's, disposed of a tatty old bedside chest-of-drawers (contents DH's) & an odd freestanding cupboard, taken my stepfather's old stereo system up to DS1 (good quality tower systems with amps & turntables being much sought-after by "musos") there should be room to move in there! But I got one-and-a-half walls done this morning just by piling stuff into the middle; now to ensure it doesn't go back round the walls again.

whitewing · 13 August 2012 at 3:12PM

I felt unsettled this morning. I found an old news report of someone I used to know that has shed some light on some shadows in the past. I have plenty of things I should be doing (day out with the children for one, but wet weather has has postponed that), but I needed to do something practical and beneficial before it swallows me up.

So I have emptied three double kitchen food cupboards, had a pile of out of date manky stuff (which surprised me because I wouldn't have thought anything was out of date), a pile of baking ingredients which is in date but won't be used by us so SIL wants it, and the stuff we are keeping. The cupboards are now sparkling clean and kept stuff back inside.

Haven't counted, but think that probably 250 items are leaving the house today. 2 books went this morning and 3 containers this afternoon.

We ask for nuts and dried fruit instead of chocolates for birthdays and christmas. I now realise that if one of us opens a packet when the other isn't hungry, it somehow becomes 'their' packet, not to be touched by anyone else. How very odd. It meant that there was about half a dozen half eaten packets lurking, and as they were on a higher shelf we never saw them. So they have relocated to a lower shelf. (I think Jojo made me think twice about storing stuff in containers on shelves. I know if we put packets into containers they just sit there forever).

The last 10% of the pile takes 90% of the time to deal with. I have to keep reminding myself of this. There are 20 half used mouldy jars of jams etc that are on the side to be dealt with. I must clear them before I empty the medicine/health/baby cupboard. Apart from anything else, I think most of the contents of that cupboard will be nearly empty packets, and stuff that has been hanging around for donkey's years. I kept my son's ventolin inhaler spacer for years; just in case'. 3 months after I got rid of it, the dr prescribed one for my daughter.

Right, must be getting on.

thriftwizard · 13 August 2012 at 3:20PM

The last 10% of the pile takes 90% of the time to deal with. I have to keep reminding myself of this.

Thank you, whitewing, that's another lightbulb moment - it's not just me, then! And I hope your shadows recede rapidly in the face of your onslaught on the shelves.

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Hoarding...not just on TV

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