I just cleaned out my garage....or rearranged the clutter if I'm being totally honest. Just making more paths than were there before.
Part of it is the nesting thing of pregnancy but it really did need to be done.
As I cleaned, rearranged & moved the clutter from one side to the other, I became increasingly aggravated.
Time for a really personal question...
Does your husband KEEP things? I mean not just old trophies or a million t-shirts that no longer fit, but "THINGS"?? (That's a polite word for "CRAP!")
Every so often I get SOOOOOOO aggravated I have to clean out drawers & shelves & places where he's hidden said "things=crap".
I'm talking Mc Donalds monopoly pieces....the paper ones! He keeps those till the next year, never bothering to check the expiration date. I knock them off every time I go to put something on the key shelf! ARGH!
Right now it's Pepsi caps and the whole stupid bottle! Because the label has something on it he needs. Now, a woman would not try to keep the WHOLE bottle, would we?? NO! We'd cut off the label & take the cap off & stick them both in a snack size ziplock tucked neatly away in it's own little corner of the junk drawer. (Some wives would make a note on the calender of when the contest expired.)
Oh but no! Let's try & find a spot to balance three or four 20 oz Pepsi bottles that we're SAVING! ARGH!!!!
This weekend I could actually laugh one off. Okay, sort of but not really.
We had a baby shower & after bringing home all the gifts & emptying them from their gift bags, I thought about whether or not to keep the bags. I decided that since the garage was tight enough on space, roaches LOVE paper products & I hardly have the need arise to use 39 baby boy (1 baby girl) gift sacks, I'd THROW THEM AWAY.
I should never have opened my big mouth to have him "help" me look for one missing baby sock! He started in the trash bag. Ohhh ho ho! You'd have thought I threw the Heisman trophy out!!! Geez!
This incident resulted in him going through my trash bag & taking out EVERY gift bag & looking them over & folding them together to put in one giant bag.
Such incident also included plenty of exclamations of disgust & disbelief at me that I could throw away such beloved "THINGS". I truly expected him somehow to weave into his monologue something concerning starving children in Africa & how THEY would know to keep said "THINGS".
And of course you know what else he found with the countless gift sacks in the trash bag......you guessed it! TISSUE PAPER!!!!
As he began to smooth each piece, I slowly moved toward him ready to suffocate him with the one baby girl sack. He moved too quickly (I AM 9 months pregnant) but did stop smoothing & agree to throw the tissue paper away finally. He tried to cover it like it was all a joke, but I think that's because the hormones gleaming in my eyes scared him just a smidge.
5 comments:
By the way, folding the gift packing tissues carefully as if you are going to reuse them is a great way to make people think you're off your rocker (or to cause your spouse's eye to twitch).
Don't touch my Pepsi caps, woman. That may be how our kids pay for college.
Sawed-off stereotyping: Women buy resources because "it was on sale." Men hoard the resources they already have. 'Nuff said.
Not mentioned was my worst vice: papers. Instructions. Jokes. Fantasy Football stats and draft results from five years ago. Computer game walk-throughs. The weak points on the armor of an M1Abrams tank in Battlefield 2. How to create a water droplet effect in Photoshop. What the definition of "art" might be. How to create a likeness of the Partridge family bus using only McDonalds Monopoly game pieces.
Why the paper work (and the myriad binders they go in)? My RAM is short term, and I need a backup hard drive to keep information I might forget or need later. I tend to forget my own phone number.
"Eyes gleaming with hormones"...you may think that funny. It is only funny until you have seen it. Being the brother of said DH, I have to admit I understand his ways. Consider it another language, if you will.
I have to side with Matt on the gift bags thing--what were you thinking???
Having said that, all the other "crap" (and especially big piles of paper) would get shoveled away into trash bags and tossed if it were in my domain. CLUTTER IS THE ENEMY AND THE ENEMY DESERVES NO MERCY!!! (Okay, now MY eye is twitching a little...)
So feel lucky, Matt, that you married a wonderful woman who only blogs about your mess and doesn't annihilate it.
Matt and my mother are probably kindred spirits. All our Christmas presents come in gift bags that are recycled yearly, including the tissue paper. She has creative ways for making new tags, although sometimes you get a present that on one side says, "To Lisa, Love Mom and Dad" and on the other side says "To Grandma, Love Lisa."
Only after the bag is creased and wrinkled beyond repair does it get tossed, much to her chagrin.
And yes, that was me, Lisa, in the last post.
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