Plotting for an early retirement - anyone want to join me?

Bravepants

I discovered a system for books. I limit myself to one shelf each for each of my interests; a shelf of engineering and maths textbooks, a shelf of music theory and practical books, and shelf of cookery books, and a shelf of sailing books. If I fill a shelf and I want a new book, one has to go!

I don't know why I have so many cook books, I only seem to keep referring to the two volumes by Saint Delia anyway!

I use a Kindle for fiction and self-improvement type books, although there are one or two physical books of the latter hanging around somewhere.

There are no DVDs or CDs in our house anymore!


But there's lots of paperwork and clothes all over the place...none of it MINE! Ggrrr! (OK, some of it's mine! )

crv1963

it is the de-cluttering that is hard. It seems to be the only area of disagreement I have with my wife. When she complains that we have no storage space and that I should get rid of "stuff" I do point out she has 123 pairs of shoes and 57 pairs of boots but interestingly wears only 3 pairs of either!

Mind I am clearing out jumpers of mine this week...............

Techno

Oh these stories do resonate although in our house I am the Justin (case) hoarder and he is the if it hasn't moved in 60seconds chuck it out side

Techno

and we are planning on downsizing in the next 12 months :eek::eek:

gallygirl

Techno wrote: »

Oh these stories do resonate although in our house I am the Justin (case) hoarder and he is the if it hasn't moved in 60seconds chuck it out side

I'm pretty ruthless at getting rid of stuff but I do have a small Tupperware container of unused phone cables that has 'Justin' written on the lid :rotfl:. In my defence, we live in Spain and visitors have occasionally forgotten chargers, then Justin has come in to his own :T.

When I moved to Spain almost four years ago I was just reading the Marie Kondo books where she talks about storing all if one category in one place. When I got all my shampoos together from the two bathrooms and various storage places that made sense . They all came to Spain with me and I bought my first shampoo since moving here a few months ago :rotfl:.

Mr GG is not exactly the handy type so no problems in that score but he is untidy and doesn't have a 'home' for things. Well, he does but doesn't use them:p. If he can't find something now I just ask if it isn't in x place and if he says no I just shrug and turn over in bed (it's normally early morning golf related). I'm not getting up to enable his untidiness . Slowly but surely I will break, I mean train him :rotfl:.

MallyGirl

One thing that is helping a bit with decluttering is a very local Buy Nothing FB group. People can either offer stuff or ask for things that they need. DH seems to find it easier to give stuff to someone specific in need rather than put it in the charity box. Mind you he did also pick up his 4th turntable off there before Christmas as a refurb project.

OldMusicGuy

Techno wrote: »

and we are planning on downsizing in the next 12 months :eek::eek:

We are downsizing right now and are going through decluttering. We've been in our current 5 bed house 20 years and are moving to a smaller place. We are effectively "starting over" with the next phase of our lives. It's amazing how much stuff we accumulated over that time, and we are being ruthless.

Mind you, I still have every payslip I have ever received since 1978. Is that weird or just good record keeping?

JoeEngland

OldMusicGuy wrote: »

We are downsizing right now and are going through decluttering. We've been in our current 5 bed house 20 years and are moving to a smaller place. We are effectively "starting over" with the next phase of our lives. It's amazing how much stuff we accumulated over that time, and we are being ruthless.

Mind you, I still have every payslip I have ever received since 1978. Is that weird or just good record keeping?

Unless you seriously think the taxman will investigate your tax payments for the last 40 years then I'd say it's weird

DairyQueen

OldMusicGuy wrote: »

Mind you, I still have every payslip I have ever received since 1978. Is that weird or just good record keeping?

Good record keeping. I have payslips for the Saturday jobs I worked in my early teens. I think the first is dated 1973.

Terron

OldMusicGuy wrote: »

Mind you, I still have every payslip I have ever received since 1978. Is that weird or just good record keeping?

Weird. Though I still have my first one, and I kept a bunch of early ones for 30 years. Well I left them in a draw in my parents house and forgot about them, until we had to clear it.