Unshelved by Bill Barnes and Gene Ambaum
comic strip overdue media

Thursday, July 16, 2015

With the exception of a few dishes to do

unloading the dishwasher, and going through the refrigerator, I did a pretty decent job of cleaning up the kitchen today. I also am making some bread in the bread machine, as I am out and have all the ingredients and no money to just buy bread. Besides, it tastes better when homemade anyway, even if I'm not doing the kneading myself. :) I don't want to work anymore in there tonight because the bread will be rising, so it's time to move to other parts of the apartment and get things that were in the walk-in closet that leaked back in (they're mostly plastic, so they should be okay if it should happen again). I also want to wash the couple of clothes baskets I have (they got wet, and stained with rusty water), so that I can use them to corral the clothes in the bedroom, which have become a problem.

I just read a book I got out of the library called Organizing Solutions for People with ADHD : Tips and Tools to help You Take Charge of Your Life and Get Organized by Sarah Pinsky. While I'm not going to take all of her suggestions (I think my apartment leasing agent would be less than thrilled if I took all the cabinet doors off their hinges in the kitchen), a lot makes sense, and I'm going to try to put some of them into action. Her theory is that the best system for someone with attention-deficit disorder is to make things convenient, fast, easy, and efficient, so no beautiful baskets for magazines to languish in or using staging areas such as the main kitchen table for craft projects. Storage should be open and so easy to use it takes less effort to throw a sock into a hamper rather than on the floor. The book is organised by room of the house. Some areas don't apply to me, like the garage, or the playroom, but a lot did. And once I have money again, I really need to get a bigger trash can (not the tiny ones you see in bathrooms) for the bedroom, and one for the living room (not for food, obviously) and maybe a small recycling bin for both, as I tend to strew packaging and papers around in both places. I think that will cut down on a lot of that.

I also want to go through the many boxes (both plastic and cardboard) of paper that I have here and there in the closets and some behind the couch. Most of that stuff can probably go. They're old bills I wanted to shred, or school material copies, or stuff to do with my accident three years ago--that sort of thing. She argues that really, very little needs to be shredded these days, as account numbers are masked, etc. Simply tearing them in half and putting them in different bags is probably enough. So that's a goal to finish by the end of the year. First I have to get things passable in the bedroom. At sometime in the next month, the fire department is supposed to come check our fire alarms, smoke detectors, and that our windows open. The bedroom is very cluttered, and while, yes, I can get to the window, it's not exactly clear and easy, either. Plus, I may need to rethink my plants and try to come up with a better solution for them. They effectively block the windows. The living room has several on some blocks and boards, and the bedroom has a end table with two rows of plants on it. The living room isn't so much a concern--the door is there, so I'd likely not go out the window there anyway. But the bedroom is definitely an issue. I am going to try to consolidate my plants and move things around, use the space better. Hmmm...maybe I'll do that now.

One last thing, did you know 'Bloom County' is back???? I loved that comic strip when I was in college. You can get the new strips by liking Berkeley Breathed on Facebook. So far, Opus has awakened 25 years later and discovered the Internet. There have been three strips so far, released as Breathed feels like, rather than a daily schedule. But I'm happy it's back!

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