My temporary reprieve from day teaching is over, and I accomplished most of what I set out to do. I ripped up the carpet in the dining room and put down new pergo floors, but the project is not finished. I had to special order a piece of stair nosing, which was out of stock and then shipped to the wrong address. At some point, you wait for something like that so long that it takes on less significance. The drive I had to finish the project is long gone. Now I look at the blank stair and think, “whatever, nobody ever visits anyway.”
I recently read an article in The New York Times that said that the reason we don’t finish projects we start is because we severely underestimate the time it will take. However long we think it’s going to take should be multiplied by three, the article stated, for a more accurate timetable.
As 2018 comes to an end, there are many things I want to fix, repair or upgrade in my house, if I ever get the money or estimate the time correctly. There are even a couple things that I have finished* that I haven’t shared yet but that I want to share.
The laundry room overhaul I began back in January doesn’t feel exactly finished because I still have not carried through on my plan for a barn door. The laundry room is a very narrow room and the door swings open right to the front of the new, front-loading washing machine, making it impossible to do laundry or maneuver with the door open. (I initially bought a top-loading washer because I knew that would be a problem, but went through the hassle to exchange it because it tangled up my clothes and I hated it. If you ignore the door, I’m happier with the front-loader.) Closed halfway, the door gets in the way of the dryer. It just doesn’t make sense the way it is now, and after 11 years of dancing around, I’ve had enough. A sliding door would ease the awkwardness. The rest of the work I did on the laundry room I’m quite proud of. I took out the ugly dark cabinets and put up two floating shelves. In place of the dark cabinet over the sink, I put up a drying rack. Yes, I definitely lost some storage space, but this design adds functionality for me (I’m always drip-drying something – this keeps it out of sight and over a sink). I painted the walls and the one dark cabinet that was left, the sink cabinet. On the narrowest wall at the back of the room, I installed an ironing board hanging rack so that I finally had a space to keep my ironing board that made sense. Ironing = laundry ∴ ironing board => laundry room. Finally, I swapped the old lighting fixture with a track lighting fixture from my husband’s man-cave office that he didn’t like, and now I can actually see what I’m doing! (Also, while painting, I took off the door to the adjoining half-bath. That room has a window and lets in natural light. I liked the light so much I left the door off, since nobody uses that bathroom anyway. It seems that the solution to most of this house’s problems is to remove the doors.) I’ve been very pleased with the results of this room, but for it to truly feel finished, I need to add the door. The final wish I have for this room is to swap the position of the washer and dryer. They are backwards now and unfortunately, that is the way the plumbing is set up, so it would not be an easy job (or so I am told.) The current setup requires me to dance to get clothes from the washer to the dryer, and often results in back injuries from running into the ajar door. Continue reading “My House Update”→
I’ll be honest here – I’ve tried and failed to write this post so many times I’ve lost count. The problem is I don’t know where to start. I’ve blogged extensively about my love of Marie Kondo and decluttering, which seems as good a place to start as any, but somehow the line between those books and my obsession with zero-waste YouTube videos is blurry.
Zero waste is a lifestyle in which people try to produce as little trash as possible, and that includes recycling. Recycling is a very good thing to do, but it takes resources. Plus, plastics have a very short recycling life and eventually wind up in the landfill or our oceans and are generally a real scourge on our planet.
I do not remember how I found these zero-waste YouTube videos or even learned the term zero-waste, even though it wasn’t that long ago. That’s how entangled I’ve become. I should say right off the bat that I am not zero waste nor am I under any delusions that I can make that happen. I am, however, trying to rid my life of plastics. My motivation for making the changes I’ve made is one part environmental concern, one part user interface. I can’t save the environment on my own – no one can. Business has to take an interest and be held responsible for the of impact the materials they use. But I can do some things, and the things that I can do make my life sometimes easier, sometimes more enjoyable. If you think of the big picture, stuff does wear out (albeit quicker now than it used to, in most cases.) Stuff does become obsolete (see previous parenthetical.) Stuff does go to the dump. I think the zero-wasters who brag about fitting their waste into a mason jar are underestimating their impact. Yes, you can flit from apartment to apartment, leaving your wear and tear behind. When you’ve lived in a house for 11 years as I have, you know at some point you’re going to be throwing away a few broken pipes and worn out washing machines. Continue reading “My Waste Matters (and So Does Yours)”→
I started this post last year by saying there was a feeling that culturally, it was kind of a shitty year. HAH! Move over 2016, you got nothing on 2017. Sigh. There were still many great cultural offerings in 2017. This post always focuses on the great things I found during the previous year, whether they were produced in 2017 or not. Items on the list include but are not limited to: books, television shows, movies and trends. As I began last year’s post similarly to this year’s, so shall I begin this year’s list with:
Better Call Saul Season 3
Holy crap. A few years ago I hailed Breaking Bad‘s “Ozymandias”episode as the best hour of television that ever was. Well, there’s a new contender for that title, and it’s Saul‘s“Chicanery.” What a masterful piece of work this was. It was what’s referred to in the industry as a “bottle episode,” taking place entirely in a courtroom. Breaking Bad’s greatest strength was always what creator Vince Gilligan called “mining our own history,” searching for details from the past and letting them pay off in future episodes. “Chicanery” is the episode that this entire series has been leading up to. From there, the main character’s dissent into darkness begins. We know it’s coming, and somehow we resist and we fight and we wish we could change. We shouldn’t be surprised by the decisions these characters make – we know how this story ends – and yet we are not only surprised but we are heartbroken.
Sneaky Pete Season 1
This is an Amazon series that was developed by Bryan Cranston (Breaking Bad) and produced by Graham Yost (Justified). This was a fun series that showcased the terrific Giovanni Ribisi, who I’ve been watching since he was on My Two Dads. I thought they did such a nice job of wrapping up all of their story lines too, when at the very end we’re reminded of one we forgot, and that’s the cliffhanger for season 2.
The Edge of Seventeen
Ladybird is getting all the awards buzz, but another movie with a teenage girl protagonist also came out this year to great reviews, and that’s the one I saw. The Edge of Seventeen is probably the best movie I’ve seen in a decade. I’m not sure I even want to like Ladybird, because Seventeen was so perfect. When I was writing my NaNoWriMo novel about 4 years ago, my protagonist was a teenage girl, and I thought constantly about the drama I was creating. I thought it was too much. I wanted to convey a sense of extreme urgency, but I worried that it wouldn’t make sense to anyone but me. Along comes Seventeen, which perfectly portrayed the urgent atmosphere I was trying to convey in my novel. Goddammit. If only I hadn’t doubted myself, maybe my book could’ve been that movie. Or something like it. One final thought: Why is Woody Harrelson so good in everything he does?
Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, season 3
This show is reliably funny and despite the fact that I am still mourning the loss of Santino Fontana as Greg, season 3 might be the best one yet. There have been so many great musical numbers this season, it’s hard to choose just one to showcase here. But choose I did. The following, as well as any related Crazy Ex-Girlfriend musical numbers that show up on YouTube after you’re finished with this one, are NSFW.
Mike Birbiglia
Netflix has this new feature where, when you hover over one of the shows you are contemplating watching, it shows you a preview. And so it was that as I was scrolling and hovering through the comedians section, I laughed at the preview of Thank God for Jokes by Mike Birbiglia. I laughed and so I watched. And then I laughed a whole lot and was also amazed. At the end of the set, I realized I’d listened to an entire story. These weren’t one-off jokes. No set up was forgotten, not a single joke was random. There was an overarching theme. It felt like a stand-up novel. And since I am nothing if not interested in storytelling, I wanted to explore more. I watched My Girlfriend’s Boyfriend – same deal. Then I went and listened to an old podcast of Birbiglia talking to Marc Maron, and they talked about the particular style of comedy, which is actually called story-based comedy, and it is so difficult that few people do it. I believe it. But I LOVE it. If I were still in college, I’d find a way to write a paper about it. On the podcast, they put forth Al Madrigal as another one who does story-based comedy, but I’ve not been able to find an act of his to check out to see if it’s the same thing. I hope that it is, but I suspect Birbiglia is just extra, extra good at what he does.
Malcolm Gladwell
Speaking of people who are extra, extra good at what they do, there’s Malcolm Gladwell. He likes to look at stories from a different perspective, and what he does is so well-researched and so well communicated that it’s difficult not to take his side. Gladwell has been around for years, and I started reading his books last year, but I read more this year and listened to his podcast and I know I’ll be interested in what he has to say forever.
Minimalism and Marie Kondo
I read Marie Kondo’s The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up last year and I loved it. This year, I read the illustrated Spark Joy and that helped me fix my kitchen, which I realized I hadn’t tackled properly in my previous tidyings. I’m still far from perfect, but I’ve incorporated so many of her principles into my life that it most certainly qualifies as life-changing, and I’m all the better for it.
So with that I’ll bid adieu to 2017. I’m not exactly sad to see it go, but I definitely thank it for the things it did bring into my life this year. I can’t wait to see what 2018 brings. But I will have to.
I consider the year-in-review post a labor of love. I love it, especially for posterity, but it’s a labor to remember just what I did all year. Mostly I’m afraid that I may not be able to come up with anything. This year seems thin, but I’m sure I feel that way every year. Either I have to start taking better notes or doing more memorable stuff.
January
The first day of the year I begin a three-month Facebook cleanse, probably one of the only resolutions I kept. It was quite a productive time for me.
Sonja in PJs, photobombed by the dog, the vacuum and me.
Sonja at a birthday party.
Stock! I make chicken stock about 6-8 times a year, and beef stock once a year, after Christmas dinner.
February
February is boring.
Valentine’s Mailbox
Sid
Playing in muddy puddles
Sleeping in her toddler bed
March
Knowing that March is also largely boring, I make plans for my spring break: I paint Sonja’s room and buy her a “big girl” bed.
New room, angle 1
New room, angle 2
New room, angle 3 with closet doors
Sleeping in her big girl bed.
Hunting Easter eggs
April
Sonja and I go to the Spring fair. We are supposed to meet friends, but they back out last minute so the two of us tackle kiddie-land together.
Face paintin’
Car drivin’
Sunshine, lollipops and rainbows
I hope she doesn’t mow over someone’s foot…
Milking a fake cow
Sonja-Go-Round
Helicopter flyin’
Fairy T-Shirt wearin’
Stair nappin’
Helping Mom cook
May
I see Paul Simon in concert, and buy a tour hoodie which I ultimately find to be a little ridiculous because the hood covers the logo, and other than the logo, it’s just an off-brown hoodie. But I still wear it nearly every day because, dammit, I bought it. I also paid off my car about a year early, so hooray for one less bill…
The Back
Pepper got a haircut
Fun at the park.
Sonja has her special day at preschool
A preschool photo
June
I tackle some decluttering a la Marie Kondo, making the trash can my new best friend.
A new bike
She said it was her “summer break.”
July
Day trippers! In lieu of a longer vacation, we take the first of two summer day trips. We also let Sonja play with fireworks for the first time, and we do a little photo shoot down on the farm. (Not our farm.)
Family photo, Leavenworth, WA
Friends
More friends
A sweater was required for fourth of July fireworks this year.
Dancing with fire
Tire swing
Carrying vegetables that she would not even try.
August
In August, we take another trip to the zoo. Shaun and I celebrate our 8th wedding anniversary. I have another birthday. And, on the hottest day of the year, we take our second road trip, the genesis of which is bathed in confusion, but the execution of which is memorable.
Something tells me it’s all happening at the zoo
In the Columbia River
The girls coloring.
September
We begin a bathroom remodel that is still agonizingly unfinished. Sonja turns 5. And I somewhat ill-advisedly start playing Pokemon Go, even though I know squat about Pokemon.
The 5-year old
Birthday fun
Birthday girls in a car
Some pinata confusion
This is early, but after some work was done, such as waterproofing the subfloor and moving the wall.
October
The predicted storm of the century turned out to be, quite predictably, nothing. Sonja goes on a field trip and trick or treating.
Totally prepared for and completely underwhelmed by the storm.
Prepping for a storm that never materialized.
Porch decoratin’
Field Trippin’
Giant Pumpkins
Trick or Treatin’
November
We eat a turkey.
Outside of her school in a turkey hat.
December
We see The Nutcracker and we visit Santa Claus. We decorate the Christmas tree and bake Christmas cookies. Sonja leaves out two cookies and a glass of milk for Santa, plus a carrot for his reindeer. And of course we open presents and eat ourselves into a stupor. As always, we really overdo it on Christmas. As always, I vow not to even leave the house after about December 10th, but then proceed to go out every single day to pick up some item I forgot the day before. It’s too much trouble, but I suppose I do it so that I’m not left wondering what I did all the long, dark winter.
Seeing the Nutcracker and eating very expensive M&Ms.
All decked out
Thumbs up with Santa
Stocking stuffers
A purple brontosaurus (that thankfully she loved…Santa was worried.)
I’ve heard that keeping a done list is as motivating or more so than keeping a to-do list. It is naturally rewarding to your brain to see all the things that you have accomplished, squished together on a single piece of paper. So I thought I should take this opportunity, the weekend before I have to go back to work, to check off all that I accomplished with my two-and-a-half weeks off.
Here’s the original list, with notes:
3-week meal plan Eh, I didn’t do three weeks in advance, but I did cook a lot and tried several new recipes, so I’ll say that’s a check.
Take Sonja to the doctor for quarterly height-weight check; take myself for triptan reup. Sonja: 28.8 lbs, 38 in; Me: 6 triptans in hand.
Read, read, read. Also, binge-watch, binge-watch, binge-watch. Nope, nope, nope. Also, nope, nope, nope. I started on The Americans, which is good but very dark and I wanted a little lighter fare. I’ve just started Mr. Robot, which is still dark but has occasional moments of humor and no body count (so far). I’ll see what the rest of season 1 has to offer.
Writing other than for this blog. Sadly, no.
Declutter clothes, books and, if time, the miscellaneous category as described by Kondo. Yes! I made tons and tons of progress with this.
Clean the garage on a weekend with Shaun. (This doesn’t fit the KonMari method in that it’s cleaning by room, but it really can’t be ignored any longer.) Check. It’s still messy, but it’s not as messy.
Organize all digital photos by year and make new back-up discs. No, but it will be easy to transition to this when I finally get all the decluttering done.
Declutter computer work files. No, but I still have to start lesson planning (eek), and some of that will go hand in hand.
Trip to Goodwill. Check.
Trip to county dump. Goodbye console TV!
So there you have it. Not bad, if I do say so myself. Perhaps you notice, as I have, that the more specific things on the list (declutter clothes) were the things that actually got accomplished. It’s the vague items (read, write) that are left to languish in the summer heat. I’m still in the process of actually getting the actual stuff that I decluttered actually out of my actual house. This is going to take far longer than the tidying did. My plan is to continue with the decluttering throughout the summer quarter, and transition from that into decluttering the computer. Then I can make a whole new to-do/done list for the second, longer summer break. If that doesn’t spell summer fun, I don’t know what does!
I am reminded of a question posed in one of my grad school classes: If you had access to all of your music and DVDs online, would you actually need to physically possess them? This was back in ’08 when things were digital but not as digital as they are now. A lot of students protested. “Well, the internet can be flaky.” The response was, “Imagine that it’s not.” “Well, sometimes providers take away access.” “Imagine that they wouldn’t.” “Well, I just like having my things.” “Why?” I don’t think everyone was convinced at that point that they didn’t need their possessions, but I’ve continued to ponder that question ever since.
Marie Kondo poses similar kinds of questions in her organizational advice book, “The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up” about why we keep the things we do. She wants to know why we’re really hanging onto that thing from 5 years ago that we thought we might need but never look at or think about. And why on earth do we keep the box that the cell phone came in?
I had to admit after reading her book that I didn’t have answers for those questions, and thus began my decluttering journey. The real revelation of this book is to clean by category, not by room. Get all your shit that belongs in category A together, from all different parts of the house, then realize that you have way too much and start paring down. Thus, I awoke early last Saturday (okay, was awoken) and started on what Kondo suggests as the first category for tidying: clothes. This took me all day. Literally. About 9 hours total. I was surprised, but I got through it and filled up a medium-sized moving box plus a smaller box of clothes for donating.
The next day, I started on the next category: books. This didn’t take too long as I’d recently donated several things, but I still came up with another small box to take to the library. Then it was time for papers, which I started on Sunday evening. I was dreading this because I knew it was going to be a slog. Unlike the clothing and books, I didn’t have to decide if papers “sparked joy,” but I did have to go through them one by one and keep only what was necessary.
Oh, the treasures I found! Receipts from just about every cell phone Shaun or I ever bought – including one receipt from that brief period where AT&T went insane and called itself Cingular!
Cingular Wireless
I also found receipts from Circuit City…
Circuit City. Where dat?
And that time we got married and then bought a bunch of stuff from our registry ourselves…
Wedding Registry Receipt (Little did I know how much of this stuff would eventually be clutter. Not the lamps. Those still spark joy. And electricity.)
And from that time we adopted a cat and immediately changed his name…
…because Maxie? Yuck. Sid should really be nicer to me just for giving him a proper name.
And from the first piece of furniture we bought for our apartment…
I also still have the papasan chair, but after last year’s new couch purchase, it resides in my office.
And from the halogen lamp I requested and my grandfather bought me when I was in college…
I still have this but it was living in the garage and got mysteriously dented. I think somehow the cat knocked it over.
I also found instructions from the lava lamp that I bought and still have…
I had no idea there were so many rules and regulations concerning lava operation.
By Tuesday, I was clearing out a second filing cabinet and having the time of my life. This was exactly the project I needed at exactly the right time. I hadn’t realized how long some of this stuff went unattended. We’ve been in this house for nearly 10 years now, when we expected to be here for a maximum of five. George Carlin said when you get too much stuff, you gotta get a new house, but we bought in 2007, so you do the math on that. With nowhere for us to go, it was time to say sayonara to some of the belongings.
After reading all those instructions, I decided to see if the lamp still worked. Here it is after turning it on for the first time in who knows how many years.
And here it is after being on all day long. Sorry, lava lamp, no worky, no stay-y. (Sniff.)
Some decisions have been harder than others, but I am so very happy to unburden myself. One of the things that I have enjoyed the most about this process is the concentration I have applied to it. Rather than worry about making the house clean or presentable, I have allowed certain messes to stagnate and sometimes grow so that I can completely finish what I’m doing, knowing that that will help to keep the house cleaner in the long run. This is not a new or radical concept to me, it’s just been dormant the last five years as I’ve struggled to finish so much as a thought. I have to say that Sonja has been great this past week, allowing me to get more done than I ever thought possible. She also started making her own “keep” pile out of stuff I was trying to get rid of, but that was inevitable. Some of the things like old stickers and stamps and paper I gave her willingly. I’m sure I didn’t think when I bought that Pinky and the Brain eraser as a teenager that I’d one day give it to my daughter (I’m sure I didn’t think any future children would even know what Pinky and the Brain was) but clearly, that is why I kept it all these years.
Floppy Disks. Somewhere, somebody has the technology to read these.
Though I consider myself very organized, I was flabbergasted to find how many of the same type of thing (e.g. DVDs) were scattered in different places. I consider this the real value in Kondo’s suggestion to hold everything you own to see if it sparks joy. If you actually go through all of your things, then you know where all of your things are. The joy thing is secondary, really, and to me just means don’t keep anything for the sake of keeping it. Only keep it if you want it.
I wish I could say that the house looks ship shape. I am nearly through the third category, which is the large and nearly all-encompassing miscellaneous items (komono). However, I haven’t decided how I am going to store everything that I am keeping, and have piles scattered around the house. I am waiting to get everything done before making the final decisions. Still, even though things appear messy, everything just feels lighter. Boxes are lighter, drawers slide easier, there’s more space surrounding things and more sunlight coming in the windows – it’s wonderful.
I, however, am exhausted. I’ve barely slept all week. I’ve stayed up late tidying, then been unable to fall asleep. This weekend we’ll tackle the garage, and for the first time, I feel that I have a real handle on how to do that. Maybe then I’ll be able to get some sleep.
Facebook promoted a personal year-in-review this year that I thought was kind of lame, as it only included ten pictures. Not even 12, Facebook? But it’s enough to jog one’s memory. Like many others before it, this year went by very quickly, but we seemed to do a lot. For instance, in…
Top ten lists abound this time of year, and I have taken to recounting my favorite things, in no particular order and with no number cap. Herein I will tell you about my favorite things of 2015. In the case of entertainment/media, they may be things that debuted in 2015 or things I simply discovered in 2015. Without further ado, this year I start with the brand new…
I’m not entirely sure I want to remember the last half of 2014. It just doesn’t seem like a lot of good things happened, and when one is writing or reading a year-in-review, I think one wants to write or read good things. Somehow, even though I am a perennial pessimist, I cannot help but think that all the bad things are just paving the way to a much better 2015. So here is a look back at 2014, warts and all. Continue reading “My 2014 Year-in-Review”→
Suite Story Productions 