My New Calendar

I purchased this calendar @Target last night. 25 cents. It is large and looked terrible standing up and it covered all the "important?" stuff on my bulleting board so I put it flat on the desk top and now use it as my mouse pad/calendar. It already has three appointments. I spent about 30 very happy minutes writing things on my calendar. Notes I had stuck up on the board. Listing things on the "to do" section. I have two phone calls to make. Tru Green and a Lab company trying to collect for something my father had done.

G purchased the very blingy monogram pin (70% off) which you can see on my desktop. It's very shiny. I got my trash bags and a box of peppermint candy canes (62 cents) in case I decide to make peppermint bark when my small stash of it is gone. I also made the mistake of staying up late and watching a program on Hoarders on the Health channel.

My father was a hoarder. I've mentioned the bags and boxes of empty mustard, ketchup, tobacco cans and bottles before. And the 100 or more pairs of jeans, in the same size and style that he purchased at flea markets. He wore the same two pairs of jeans all the time. These 100 were "in case" something happened to the two pairs he actually wore. His dresser was filled with boxes of matches, lightbulbs, extension cords and envelopes (he never wrote a letter).

ANYWAY, while watching this program I started noticing my own house and the small piles of things around the edges of rooms and by the time I finally shut the television off, I was very agitated and concerned about my own mental health. Hoarding is genetic. I undressed and put my clothes on the pile of daily clothes on the chair, next to the neatly folded pile of pants on the floor. It was all very creepy. How did I not SEE this???? Do the Hoarders NOT SEE THIS? I don't even want to go in the studio today and be faced with the piled up containers and boxes of fabric and piles of batting rolls.

Today, I will open my box of garbage bags and fill them with my stuff for Goodwill and then fill the car with the bags and drive to Goodwill with my first load of donations. The box contains 24 bags. And I will move the pile of pants into the closet. And take my jammies off the chair and put them on the closet shelf. And make the bed.

When I looked outside this morning, I could see that last night's light rain has now frozen into sheets of shiny ice all over the driveway and sidewalks. Which means the snow in the yard has a thin crust of sharp ice. Not a good thing for dog legs. I do NOT want to go out walking an eager dog this morning. A dog pulling on his leash and sending me falling down on the street. A street where I am usually the only person out. So if I fall, no one will see or help. I detest ice.

I'm just going to get on with it. My clearing/organizing task for today is to empty the cabinet next to the fireplace and relocate the bottles of wine and spirits to that cabinet. Right now they are lined up on the desk across from the couch where I sit and watch disturbing television programs. I had originally thought it sort of looked like those nice "drinks tables" in the magazines. But we aren't people who have evening drinks, nor do we entertain. The cabinet contains assorted oddities. Wooden apples. Matches from European business trips in the 1980's. A Chinese tea set from Hong Kong. Oh, dear.

I'm having cold cereal. And another coffee.