All for Nothing (Two Weeks Later)

That's what the garage has looked like for the past week. All that work we did two Sundays ago to clear it out was totally undone within an afternoon. Ah, well, I enjoyed the open space in the garage for a week. And I took advantage of the access to get rid of lots of stuff through Freecycle.

All of that, plus this 7-foot by 3-foot Thule box that's been in the back yard for a while:

But what, you may ask, happened in the garage? That I can answer in a single word: Pesach. The vast majority of what got loaded into the garage is empty boxes from our Passover dishes and utensils. Additionally, all our regular dishes were moved out there, along with any food we sold to use after the holiday is over.

The shelves to the left nearest the garage door are full of dishes and other stuff from the kitchen, while those bins on the right of the narrow path that allows us access to the recycling bins are full of food. (Yes, there are some Girl Scout cookies in the top bin.)

And while the men in the family -- who moved all this stuff out to the garage -- left me a path of sorts to the dog food and second refrigerator:

Access to those shelves on the back wall -- the shelves that the original clearing out of the garage was all about -- is totally denied:

Pesach ends Tuesday night. Once we get everything packed up and back to the shed where we store it, maybe I can get back to going through stuff in the garage.

You Can Do a Lot in Two Hours

Although today was the Wizard's birthday, I asked him to please help me in the garage. It turned out we didn't need the whole day -- we got everything I wanted done completed in about two hours.

We started at 8:30, after we'd had a chance to digest a bit of breakfast. The view from the house door into the garage at that time:

As you can see, there's just STUFF all over the place -- cans of paint, that backstop I uncovered last week, an old rocking chair, some boxes, extension cords. The real problem is toward the back, though -- there are several pieces of furniture from my grandmother's house that are just too big and heavy for me to move by myself. And they are blocking access to the shelves along the back (right-hand) wall.

By 9:00 we had made significant progress.

Trash bags are being filled with trash. A vacuum cleaner was brought out to pick up some of the dust. Cans of paint have been moved to the shelves on the left-hand side of the garage. The right-hand shelves, however, are still blocked by furniture.

So we kept at it. We kept pulling things out of the garage to list on Freecycle or give to people we know can use them. And amid all the STUFF, we found a bag that held all the pieces of that backstop once it was taken apart. And directions for putting it back together again. Wonders never cease.

By 9:30, we wanted a quick bathroom and water break, and more progress was evident.

That right-hand wall is, of course, still totally inaccessible.

Oh, look at that -- two long boxes just chock full of comic books belonging to Future Vet. And now conveniently located in Future Vet's bedroom.

By 10:00 a.m., we were ready for Sports Nuts to lend a hand in moving the furniture into the space we had cleared.

Because, you know, I still couldn't reach those shelves.

With the help of Sports Nut, we finished up within the next 30 minutes. Here's the more-or-less final product, circa 10:30 a.m.

I can now reach everything on the shelves along the left-hand wall.

And the shelves on the right-hand wall are crammed full of stuff that is almost accessible.

The shelves nearest the garage door have Passover items on them, so during this coming week they will be emptied and our regular dishes will be moved out here.

Also, some time much later in the day, I moved all the empty collapsed boxes off of Future Vet's bed and onto the top of one of the chests out in the garage. I counted 108 boxes and rather more box lids. Some boxes went out of the house with things in them; others were too damaged to re-use and were recycled. Considering all of those boxes had STUFF in them not too long ago, I guess we truly are making some progress here.

Some of the Crap

That title feels like it ought to have more. Some of the crap some of the time, maybe?

I am not going to post a picture of what the garage looks like right now because it doesn't look significantly different than it did yesterday. Today was grocery-shopping day and laundry day and having people pick up Freecycle stuff day and, as a consequence, I didn't take a whole lot out of the garage. But I did find some interesting things, which I have decided to share with all my loyal readers.

There was a definite sports theme among today's finds. For example, a back stop.

Our Pesach groceries can be seen hiding discreetly behind the mesh. No doubt they are unaware that the mesh allows them to be clearly seen. No doubt.

In keeping with the baseball motif, there were no less than three (count 'em -- 3!) baseball equipment bags out there. In the event of a zombie invasion, we have enough baseball bats to equip a small army.

The next item I located deserves a little bit of explanation. One of our kittens is a thief. All is well; she is named after the thief Parker, who is played by the delightful Beth Reisgraf in the television show Leverage. Our Parker was actually named after the other Parker before we realized she was a thief. Life imitates art, as they say.

Anyway, our Parker has been going out to the garage for months and coming back in with marbles. One at a time, she has transferred an impressive number of marbles into the house, which we try to collect and put into this pitcher before anyone has a chance to slip and fall on a marble.

We sort of knew that there was a bag in the garage containing the Wizard's marbles. (No, the Wizard has not lost his marbles; they have been in the garage all this time.) We figured that Parker had found the Secret Stash of Marbles. And within the last week, we finally managed to get to the back wall of the garage and uncover Parker's marble warehouse. And some baseball gloves (the sports them was not yet done).

We brought the marble bag into the house briefly, but then we realized that we were spoiling Parker's fun. So the bag is back out on the shelf and Parker is once again bringing in marbles one at a time. We figure when the pitcher is full and the bag is empty, we can transfer the marbles back to the bag and let her start all over again.

I mentioned that Sports Nut and I had been bringing stuff in from the garage. Today I took a good look at the pile of stuff we had brought in. These items will form the next round of Freecycle offers.

Super Soakers! A lamp! A lap desk! Light bulbs! I can't stop to think about it because the variety and number of things out there is just too overwhelming.

And here's another item I found in the garage today. I set it up and immediately had an opponent.

Puck has decided to take the white pieces and is contemplating his opening gambit. Meanwhile I am wondering where and when we acquired this chess set. Not to mention why. Maybe it was a gift. Now I have to decide whether to keep this chess set or the wooden set we've had for years. Decisions, decisions.

I mentioned that it was laundry day. Among other things, I stripped everything off the bed and remade it. It's a good thing, though, that we have two complete sets of bedding. I had planned to wash the mattress pad from the bed, but every time I thought about putting into the washer, it was in use.

This was the only time all five kittens were on top of the mattress cover. Most of the day there had been at least one kitten underneath or inside. Mighty battles were fought. Now that all the kittens are shut up upstairs waiting for their dinner, I'm contemplating tossing the mattress cover into the washer. By the way, Parker is the all-gray kitten in the upper left.

Last, but not least, the remainder of the 20 or so boxes of homeschooling materials that I still had in the house left today. Most went to a couple of homeschooling coops that run resource centers. May they all use them in good health. And I'll enjoy the empty space where they used to be.

Is This Progress? - Revisited

Today people came and hauled off big items, like doors and shelves and floor lamps, and boxes of books. Okay, I'll admit that some of those items are actually being picked up tomorrow, but the idea is the same. Things are moving out of the house once again.

I continued taking things out of the garage today, but once again I'm not sure that it looks like progress is being made.

That's because a lot of what I'm doing right now is consolidating things -- like an enormous bag of slipper and sandals (why? I don't know), papers to recycle, paper grocery bags, and on and on. There are a few things out there that I dread having to deal with. But more about that when I come to them.

Today I thought about the fact that we aren't putting in a vegetable garden this year because we hope to be out of Dodge before the vegetables could be harvested. So I haven't done much outdoors. Yet, there are things that must be done. If the weather is fine tomorrow (insert hysterical laughter), I'll try to get some pictures of what's going on out there.

In the meantime, Hershey is trying to help. He has dug a hole.

Not Sure Whether This is an Improvement

Sports Nut and I dragged all kinds of things out of the garage yesterday, and then I spent the rest of the day writing up Freecycle offers. And most of the evening into the wee hours of the morning sorting requests and responding to the people who asked for things. I am somewhat befuzzled this morning.

But I did remember to take a few pictures late last night to show what progress had been made.

I took that picture and thought "but .... we dragged big enormous things out of there". So I took a few steps to the right and found the big hole in the STUFF.

Look! Bare floor! Sort of.

Shortly after that, I went to bed instead of posting at 2:00 a.m. I'm not sure I'm more coherent or more awake, but at least the sun is up.

A bottle of wine, a pile of potholders, and a kitten. Who could want more out of life?

Reality Rears Its Ugly Head

The 16-week plan that I set up in January has been lost. I've looked around for it, but can't find it anywhere.

Between adjusting to Daylight Savings Time (never a pretty picture for me, regardless of which way it's going) and the Attack of the Allergies, I never got around to finishing up with the books. There are still piles of boxes all over the house. At least they are divided into groups that make some sense -- fiction, non-fiction, children's, college texts, Manga, homeschooling materials, etc.

Most of the books still in boxes are ones that we will not be keeping. I have a plan for disposing of the homeschooling materials and possibly the children's books, but that still leaves a fair number of books.

Whatever. I no longer have time to give much thought to books. Pesach (Passover) is two weeks away and that takes precedence over all else in life.

Except baseball, of course.

The Wizard, Sports Nut, and I got away briefly to watch (if not totally enjoy) a real, live baseball game during Opening Weekend. Not at the ballpark of our dreams, but at a very nice ballpark one state away from Dodge.

The people, even the ones rooting for the home team, were quite friendly. And although the Red Sox lost the game rather spectacularly, we actually had a pretty good time. It was baseball, after all, and there are still 159 games left in the season.

Having spent Sunday returning home and vegging out, I started on the general cleanup and sorting out of food that always precedes Pesach. I'm going to have to tackle the garage today. Though the boxes of books have been moved out, there is still a lot of work to do there, no matter what angle I look at it from.

Despite the unorganized mess in the center of the garage, I have done some work out there. I cleared off, cleaned, and reorganized the dog-feeding area.

Also the shelves where we keep food and household supplies.

The stuff piled up in front of those shelves is Passover food, which will soon be moved indoors to the pantry cupboards in the kitchen. So don't judge me by that.

Sports Nut just came home early because his class was canceled today. I'm going to hijack him (as soon as Sports Center is over) to help me tackle the center of the garage today. I'll do my best to report on our progress -- or lack of it -- later today.