Hoarding...not just on TV

Byatt

Thanks Sybil, I have so many oughts, as we all do, that I had forgotten the ring fencing (the wording is a great visual for me too)...and yes, battery totally drained.

I've never heard of the saucer of water and WUL, before, I don't need it now, but sounds like a great idea. Do they hop along to drink?

I had a sack of onions I bought a couple of weeks ago, shared half with DD and now can't find mine.

Ginger, as Sybil said, :T well done on your dedication. xx I love your tales, you are a natural writer. You should do a blog. :A

Sailor, I have to admit that made me :rotfl: sometimes I think it could be a solution to my problem.

Lazy_Liz

Just catching up after being away, you've all been very busy, well done to all who have conquered yet another draw/cupboard/room it all counts.

Re fleas, we used to have a terrible problem with fleas in the carpet, then we started using Front Line on the dog and the fleas in the carpet all disapeared too. The instructions say you still need to treat the house but I found that there was no need. Latest dog is on a health plan from our vet so he gets his flea treatment as part of the plan, its always paid for and waiting in the cupboard. No fleas here.

BTW a dust mask will not be effective against aerosolised chemicals, you would need a respirator for that.

Impressed by your efforts to re-cycle Gingernutty, reading your post told me immediatly where you live because I used to go to Poly there, when it was the Polytechnic, long before it became a university. Brought back some memories.

Going back to keeping things for tax purposes, on this very website I found information that said if your are on PAYE you only need to keep tax records, wage slips ect for 22 months. But then in the very next para it said don't thow anything away if you are being investigated and anyone could be investigated at any time no evidence of wrongdoing required.
So I as if you don't know you might be investigated is it really safe to get rid after 22 months? Aagh!:eek:just the sot of dilema that horders and clutters don't need.

thriftwizard

I'm just back from a tip/bookbank/3rd world charity drop-off; a complete car full of stuff GONE. DS3's room is almost habitable now; just as well as the students arrive this time next week! The conservatory has a large sideboard still sitting in the centre; in the end I've put it on Ebay for the £5 I paid for it 5 years ago and I've got lots of watchers, so hopefully at least one of them will bid. There are two boxes of odds & ends still in there from the Ghastly Piles, which I will go through tomorrow as I need to make up some curtains for the bedroom first. But most of it will be Freecycled - if I really needed it, I'd have had to locate it before now. I've also discovered that the china my mother insisted I'd always wanted (which came as news to me) is actually quite sought-after, so will be contacting the China Matching people about that (and my great-aunt's, and a spare tea-set from a restock of our own wedding china) but probably after the students have gone - haven't got the hours spare to pack all that up beforehand.

There's still some stuff to sort in the garage, but I'm doing a big fair in mid-September that I know I'll be able to shift a LOT of stock at, and then, wonder of wonders, I will have some space to live in at last!

wannabe_sybil

Valk - forgot to say, sorry for your loss. I hope all goes well for you. I don't have an answer for the playmobile stuff but I am sending lots of hugs

Fleas - the idea is that you put a saucer of water under a light, like a plug in night light in a socket near the floor, or a candle in the middle of the saucer. You put a few drops of washing up liquid into the water. The washing up liquid breaks the surface tension, so that when the fleas hop towards the light, they jump into the water and can't get out and drown. It worked for us. However we used powder first and then mopped up the resistance with the water.

I may be not good for my neighbour, who is a hoarder. I have offered him a cupboard - he never says no to anything I pass over. Still, if it is no good for him I will be calling Emmaus or a local homeless charity who have a furniture shop.

Not doing too well today, but taking things like eating an elephant, a bite at a time.

Gingernutty - second the idea of you having a blog. It is very therapeutic to blog, and I think yours would be very entertaining.

Byatt

Thrift, well done! :T

Liz, 22 months seems an odd time scale for the HMRC, usually it's 6 years.

Sybil, I was imagining a "herd" of fleas surrounding the dish like lions around a water hole. :rotfl:

Well, I've put the Wii on fleabay, it was a Christmas present and I have fought against putting it on there, but I've never used it, intended to when I cleared a space which has not happened and even if it does, there's still no room for it. So hopefully I will get some useful cash and no hassle from buyers.

I've also found the pack of onions.

Moved a now empty metal storage box which had my mother/sisters carp/papers in towards the door ready for the tip.Car is in the garage going through it's MOT and service which is where I usually put the stuff that is ready to move on. I'm like GQ I put things on the side for a few days wilst I wrestle with my innerdemons/angels. Oh and I was looking at the empty metal box and thinking...I could use that as a planter for the garden...:eek::eek:

Lazy_Liz

Byatt: Yes I agree it seems odd but the advice goes on to say that for self employed then the time is 5 years and 10 months from the end of the tax year in question, practical six years

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/news/family/2010/02/time-to-bin-old-tax-records

here's the link

SpikyHedgehog

GreyQueen wrote: »

Hmmm, know what you mean about needing to be at home rather than work. I wonder if a factor in hoarding is that so many of us are working outside the home as well as in it? When you add in the inevitable slew of health probs (your own and those of loved ones), pets, misc crises etc etc, it's no wonder that we end up skimming over the surface and not getting into the depths.

Val, I'm so sorry to hear of your loss. Those collectables can stay forever if they need to be kept for emotional reasons.

My bijou flatlet (sort of like the slightly-bigger cousin of a bedsit) forces objects into view so it surprised me that a visit to an upper shelf in the kitchen cabinets revealed something not seen for a couple of years at least; a handmade pottery thingy from an evening class. It's OK (but I can do better now) so I am now prepared to release it into c.s. land. I left it on the side for a few days to force myself to consider it's fate and am comfortable letting it go now, whereas I wasn't ready when I stashed it in the cupboard.

Today, friend and neighbour SuperGran will be running all over the parish in her little ole car collecting stuff for the jumble sale. By pre-arrangement, I mean, she's not tipping up on people's doorsteps to loot their homes. One thing she remarked on was how a lot of stuff being collected from one address was due to that person moving.

I wonder what the most items are that any of us have turfed out ahead of a move? I'm often astonished at the amount of stuff which gets flytipped in my block when people move out. BTW, I'm not talking about moves which involve dramatic downsizing such as back to family from your own place, or into sheltered or care home type arrangements, but regular everyday planned moves from one address to another.

And what's the weirdest thing which the move brought to light?

I really think working outside the home is a big factor - I look at all the craft stuff I've got, that I want to use, but just run out of time to use. & any decorating I want to do waits for the school holidays when I'm off, but of course I have to tidy the house first...

Byatt wrote: »

Spiky, the spray is very effective so I am sure your plan will work.

I have asthma too, so used to hold my breath when spraying, not that that works too well as the stuff still goes up your nose! :eek:

I imagine the little blighters, lying on their backs, expiring! the fleas that is.

A friend of mine came home from a 2 week holiday one time and to her horror, on entering the house, her legs were covered by starving fleas :eek::eek: Every time she went away after that she sprayed the house.

Euw, how horrid! I guess we would have too, if the animals hadn't been here. I've done downstairs, & washed the cushion pads for the kitchen table, & the sofa cover is now in the washing machine. Got more hoover bags so we can bin the bag after each hoover session.

wannabe_sybil wrote: »

I bet he was in pieces over that.

Spiky - after spraying, in the tidy up bit, do try the saucer of water with a drop of washing up liquid under a plug in night light trick. It worked well for us. Though the sprays got the most of them. We don't have much problem with fleas now. Evil cat is now so skinny that there is nothing for a flea to bite.

Byatt - hugs. If you can't do anything, you can't do anything. But what you can do is consciously ring fence some time off to do nothing/something you like that relaxes you and when you can be free of the oughts and then recharge yourself. After that, if you feel like being active, that is great, but you can't run on empty for ever. And the 'I ought to be doing...' is a really battery drainer.

Having said that, I ought to be in the dining room.

But I signed in here to do a lap of honour - I threw out the huge, study box that the massive amount of soap powder came in!!!!! Definitely a woohooo moment. They are so sturdy, so potentially useful, and take up so much space. It is now taking up space in the recycling.

sjprmc01 - more is trickling out than trickling in and it is checking the mindset, getting different patterns of thought, that can make all the difference. Good luck!

Edited to add - Gingernutty, I am impressed by your dedication!

Thank you, Sybil, I hadn't heard of that either, but will put water & washing up liquid under the plug in night light. When I was telling the boys about it, DS1 said he'd read it in a Horrible History book, also that if you put a saucer of blood over a candle & light the candle, the fleas are attracted to the blood but die as its too hot... Pleasant mealtime conversations from my sons!

Trip to town resulted in
Out: big bag of soft toys & assorted stuff to CS (waiting for them to say no more please... But there's plenty more shops to donate to!); DS2's old trainers straight into the unicef bin in Clarks; library books returned.
In: 1 pair of trainers; 1 pair of school shoes; a bottle of shampoo; 1 of conditioner; body spray; more library books.

I've put out the almost empty compost bin, the full recycling bin & heavy big bag of textiles for recycling.

Starting on new bag for the CS - 1 knitting book, 1 knitting pattern, 6 small glass bowls that were meant to go earlier but must have rolled out of the bag, fruit basket.

I'd taken as much as I could off the worktops before spraying the kitchen, & cleaned them when I got home. I like the look of clear worktops! Now, to work to getting them clear all the time...

GreyQueen

Spiky, when my parents took their cats to the vet this Monday, he told then that this has been one of the worst years for fleas, ever. He suggested using the Frontline once a month for the next 3 months to really break the breeding cycle of the little barstewards. He also said that manual combing with a flea comb is helpful.

My folks took up their living room carpet a few years ago and went to hardflooring and this really cut down a lot of the fleas as they like to lay thier eggs in carpets alongside the skirting boards where they are unlikely to be disturbed.

A good tip for those of us who use bagged vacuums is to put a new cat flea collar, unwrapped, into the bag and this will finish off any fleas sucked inside and not let them bounce out again.

Well, I have acquired a pile up of newspapers again. Each week I get 12 papers from SuperGran; 6 of the regional and 6 the local rag. It's imortant to read the Rag as I have to be a fount of all knowledge in my work and it's very helpful to be able to tell a customer that no, the issue they've just raised is about BlahdeBlah District Council and not Us. I've decided that a lot of the stuff in the regional paper is simply not relevent, and plenty of stories are recycled between the 2 titles, so I shall skim read the Rag and recycle the regional one unread.

Time's a-wasting. My Grandma (Mum's foster-Mum and 50 years her senior) put this on her 21st birthday card It's Later than you Think! That's either profound or ridiculous, you choose. Mum's still scratching her head over it all these years on and Grandma went to her Maker back in 1970.

Thrift, sounds like you're going great guns. Would it be possible to have a photo update, please?

valk_scot

valk_scot wrote: »

I
I've got my eye on my airing/equipment cupboard today. It's too big to do in one day, more like a week, but I've got two targets for today. One is to get the rest of the cleaning materials out of there and see if they'll fit into the newly cleared out cupboard under the sink. It's not ideal to have things stored across two venues, you think you're running out of something, buy more then find three bottles in the other place. The other is a big box with I know is full of cutlery and utensils. I was looking at our day to day cutlery drawer last week and thinking we must have lost a few bits, we need more. Buy more? Then I told myself not to be ridiculous, go and see what I've got that's useful in that box, take the rest to the charity shop and maybe I'll only need to buy a few teaspoons.

Well, I have achieved my objectives for today.

The cleaning materials reshuffle was an eye opener...how many 3/4 empty bottles of Cif does one woman need, you may ask? Well this one apparently needs four. There were many other examples of this, also quite a lot of spray kitchen cleaner and I'm totally out of bathroom cleaner. So I poured all the identical bottles together (no, I know not to mix types), decided that kitchen cleaner probably won't hurt the bathroom anyway and finally threw out thirteen empties, plus cleaned the sink with the last dregs of stainless steel cleaner. (There is no point to specialist stainless steel cleaner btw.) Then I put it all in neat rows under the kitchen sink and found I'd gained most of one shelf in the airing cupboard.

The cutlery search was a sucess too. I found an entire rather nice 12 setting cutlery set that I'd forgotten I'd taken when we cleared out my late SIL's house. When I showed it to OH he said it had come from his father's house so it's nice that we've ended up with it. There was no point in mixing it with our well worn cutlery so I put four place settings worth of the old stuff into a bag, to go into DS's "Things for University" box and dropped the rest in the charity shop bag, together with a few other odds and sods of things like chopsticks. And the canteen box for the posh set of cutlery has gone in the bin, it was pretty scruffy and I'll never put the cutlery back in it anyway, I'm just going to use it.

So a successful day, a good solid bagful of items either in the bin or the charity shop box. And I didn't even need to buy teaspoons.

scaredy_cat

GreyQueen wrote: »

Spiky, when my parents took their cats to the vet this Monday, he told then that this has been one of the worst years for fleas, ever. He suggested using the Frontline once a month for the next 3 months to really break the breeding cycle of the little barstewards. He also said that manual combing with a flea comb is helpful.

i'd not recommend Frontline, alot of fleas have become immune to it. I use Stronghold and also on the pet board, some advise Advocet (i think).