Boxes

It has been a day of tidying. A day of boxes. Moving things around, in the eternal jigsaw puzzle that is "the tidying-up project", in order to properly ascertain, in a correct and scientific way, the things which I can live without, and those things that I must continue to keep forever and ever and ever.

Progress has been good on the boxes of old videotapes. Nobody seems to want them on eBay but I have found a few people online who might take them off my hands.

I have, therefore, been studiously going through the tapes. There is method to my madness. Tapes which are not of a regulation length - anything less than E180 - get watched, dubbed (if necessary), and dumped. Progress here is so good that my upstairs bin is overflowing with video tapes. Tapes which are E180 or above get watched (in fast forward), classified appropriately (old and uninteresting, old and interesting, new and interesting, tapes in need of advanced dubbing, tapes to be held for further examination at a later date...) and so on.

The upshot of this madness is that I can, at least, persuade myself to let go of a few hundred bulky tapes which were otherwise taking up space, and what is more, that I can do so in a way which does not trigger huge massive anxiety and feelings of loss and regret. Stop looking at me like that, I am not crazy. This is science. I am dealing with my excess hoarding in a scientific manner. Speaking of which:



See this? These are R-Kive/Fellowes Bankers Box cardboard storage boxes, the very type about which I blogged with such enthusiasm some months ago. I hasten to add that the boxes in the photo above are not mine, but in fact those of noted dead film director Mr Stanley Kubrick. This is his "archive", full of old notes and letters which he wrote or received.

It is comforting to know that I am in good company. Although if I was Mr Stanley I probably wouldn't have got rid of them either - after all, future generations and historians would find them ever so interesting. That said, I disposed of most of my paper storage a long time ago, scanning everything into neat little PDF files on my computer. Mr Kubrick really should have bought a scanner.

But truly it is a triple-play day when it comes to boxes, for today I have also been thinking about "food miles", and the hippy eco-warrior idea that it's not good to buy carrots from Tesco that have been shipped thousands of miles around the world, sometimes on proper aeroplanes and everything. This is very bad for the monkeys and the toucans and the dolphins in the rainforest, who get heated up by the carbon, and such. So, "local food" is the way to go.

I am a man of means, and I like my groceries one way - delivered. Happily it turns out that I can have delivery and save the planet at the same time, thanks to a new idea of "food boxes", whereby local farms and such all club together and deliver boxes of food to people in the local area. Eating food that has been grown right on your doorstep - well, not right on your doorstep, my doorstep is a bit mucky but I don't think you could grow vegetables there - anyway, it's very good for the enviro mint because the carrots only travel a short distance in a van, rather than thousands of miles in first class.

I visited a website, typed in my postcode, and was delighted to discover that they deliver in my area. The driver's name is Dave, and he already passes my door every Thursday. If I order next week, I could have a box filled with organic bananas, potatoes, beetroots, a butternut squash, whatever that is, and more besides.

I am almost beside myself with joy. All round, it has been rather a nice day.

Happy Hippo: Stay or Go?

There comes a time in every busy declutterer's life when the truly hard decisions need to be made. This is one of those times. In nearly 18 months of throwing things away, (or rearranging the things I can't get rid of just yet) I have never faced such a dilemma.

That dilemma is this:


Observe - a blue hippo. I bought this on eBay because it looked lonely and life really is too short to allow hippos to lead an unhappy life. It's a very nice hippo. It is blue, and as the original auction described, it is "made of pottery".

But alas, the hip hippo has remained in its original packaging almost ever since I received it. And we are now at the point where Mr Hippo is, in fact, taking up room that could be better filled by some free space instead.

But is it right to throw it away? It is a happy looking hippo, after all. Surely I should be ruthless and show no mercy, though. And, what is more, it is slightly imperfect. Observe:


Yes, that little pinkish bit is the underlying pottery, of which the hippo has been made.

So... happy hippo - stay or go? You decide, because I can't. Please vote by leaving a comment, won't you?

I Must Blog All Day Long

I can't help but notice that I've not been blogging as much recently. Clearly, with millions and millions of readers hanging on my every word, this will never do. So today I shall attempt to break the writer's block (actually that sounds a bit grand, so let's just call it "block") by live blogging about my fantastically interesting day.

As I speak, men with hammers are downstairs making changes to my window ledge, which used to be very good until an enormous crack appeared and I could see the outside through it. I hear sounds of plaster and mastic being mixed and applied and smoothed all over the place.

I am not observing them in person, for that would probably be annoying and/or awkward. I am content to leave them to their industry.

More live updates as the day progresses!

UPDATE: 12.01pm. Men have left. Windowledge all better, although it needs a plastics expert to come and finish it off. This will happen at a time and date of their choosing. What mystery! Now considering what to have for lunch.

UPDATE: 4.13pm. Had lunch, wrapped up some parcels (sold some things on eBay at the weekend, so the King of Postage was in court once more), received a parcel I'd ordered from America. Starting to think that all this does not necessarily make for interesting blog reading, though.

UPDATE: 10.15pm. Finished work, bummed around for most of the evening. Listened to a motivational audiobook, but not convinced by it, really. Decided to have a bath. For no reason. I'm not even going out tomorrow or anything. Thinking about going to bed.