Just Call Me Martha!

Well, it was a busy Thanksgiving holiday weekend and it has been a busy week, so this is the first time I’ve even thought about writing a blog. I’m sure you’ve all been anxiously awaiting my next entry in the wonderful world of blogdom…right? If not, don’t tell me about it, okay? I choose to think I spread sunshine and lightness wherever I go and with whatever I write. (Why yes, I DO live in a fantasy world. How did you know?!)

Anyway, despite our burgeoning colds, Vince and I had a productive weekend last weekend. We got the tree up and the decorations out and even managed to wrap the gifts and place them festively under the tree. We worked on our Christmas card list and wrote our annual letter and labeled and stamped at least half the envelopes. And we even managed to do a little cleanup around the place. Not bad, eh?

But what I’m even more proud of is the fact that I made some organizational progress in the bedroom. Just call me Martha Stewart, Jr.! I rearranged the room so that when Vince gets up at the ungodly hour of 4:15AM, he doesn’t have to stumble across to my side of the room in the dark to dig his work clothes out of the dresser. Not only that, but his dresser is now organized so that he can easily find what he’s looking for and doesn’t have to sort through a pile of socks to find an undershirt. (I may have even pruned a few of the old, ratty undershirts, but that’s just a rumor and I’m not willing to confirm…)

This means, of course, that my dresser is now on the other side of the room, too. And the only problem with this arrangement is that so far I’ve gotten up every morning and crossed to the wrong side of the room to reach my dresser. We are such creatures of habit, aren’t we? Ah well. Eventually, I’ll get it right. (And by then I may have figured out a new configuration for the room!)

I turned my old desk into a vanity table and set up a lighted mirror so that I can actually see when I apply my makeup in the mornings. The mirror is even magnified on one side, although I admit this is a little scary. Our eyesight tends to get worse as we age, so we need magnification to see – but nobody (and I mean nobody!) needs to see their wrinkling-as-we-speak skin magnified 8X. Boy, is Mother Nature cruel, or what?!

Nevertheless, I am thrilled with having my makeup table set up and organized.

Not only that, but a friend of ours delivered my Christmas gift from Vince early – and I would have none of that “Wait to Open Until December 25th” stuff. It is a beautiful jewelry armoire; something I’ve wanted since, well, forever.

I’m a jewelry-lovin’ fool and I have lots of it. Some of it is fine jewelry, but much of it is not – and that’s okay with me. Until now, it has been spread all over the place. Necklaces hung up there, rings hidden away here, bracelets in this bowl, watches in that box…well, you get the picture. As a matter of fact, I had so much fun rediscovering jewelry I’d forgotten about, I might not have to go shopping for any more jewelry for a good long time. (Yeah, I wouldn’t count on it, either…)

I was particularly happy to find some of the sentimental pieces that I’d stowed away – like the sapphire earrings my Uncle Joe gave me when I graduated from college and the charm bracelet that belonged to my Nanna, which she gave to me before she passed away.

So now that I have been bitten by the organization bug, I’m turning my laser focus on other areas of our home that need some attention. Frankly, I think this scares Vince just a little bit. Before I could get to his desk and all the paperwork piled on his table, he boxed it all up and practically wrote on it “DO NOT TOUCH! THIS MEANS YOU, JANE!”

But we also had a little incident where something (like maybe an old desk chair) fell onto the hood of my car in the garage and put a nice ding in it last weekend. Some of us in the household were not happy about this little event, and so we made an unexpected detour from our holiday cheer to work on reducing the clutter in the garage. I’m happier, although not completely satisfied. But I have several large bags filled with items to donate to charity – and we gave the trash collection guys a workout yesterday. We’ll have to see what else we can part with this coming weekend.

And that darn old desk chair has magically disappeared, too. Yahoo!

The only problem with all this organization? It never seems to last. Every time I get organized, I vow to keep the drawers and the closet in pristine condition…and then life gets hectic or the seasons change – and then it’s a slow slide back to disorganization. Why oh why is this?

Martha Stewart, indeed. Wonder if her stuff ever gets disorganized? Maybe she has “people” to help keep her organized.

But I’d be willing to bet that no old office chair ever fell off a stack of boxes in her garage and onto the hood of her car! (Just a guess.)

Where Can I Buy A Giant Shoe Horn?

Vince and I went shopping the other day for miscellaneous stuff. It can only be called “miscellaneous” when you have to shop at one store to replace a broken glass globe for a ceiling light, another store for a bottle of mature multivitamins and a third store for a shoe horn. There was no such thing as one-stop shopping for us the other day.

We went to three stores before we chanced upon the very last shoe horn that Target carried. Vince had a bit of a desperate look in his eye as he practically badgered the clerk into finding another one – any other broken down and ratty old shoe horn they might have lingering “in the back.” Why? Well, because it was an animal stripe print. Only I don’t really know any animals that are hot pink- and black-striped.

The clerk said it was the last one they had and even tried to convince Vince that it was a “manly” sort of shoe horn. The look he gave her caused her to scurry away in hopes of finding something easier to handle, like perhaps tackling a shoplifter or something. In defeat, we ended up purchasing it. Vince wasn’t very happy about having to use a hot pink striped shoe horn, but was a little happier when it rang up as a dollar, down from $10. Frugality wins over manly posturing every time.

I was thinking about that shoe horn last night when I parked my car in the garage. We have so much crap in there I can barely fit the car inside. Could’ve used a giant shoe horn to maneuver the vehicle so that it doesn’t hit the sky-high pile of boxes on the right, or the shelving unit in the front – but leave enough room to get out the driver’s side door without bashing into the trash can on the left. Even worse, we currently have a large carton that needs to be unpacked sitting in front of the shelving unit – so I had even less room to maneuver.

Sigh. We need a bigger garage.

Or maybe we just need to get rid of a whole bunch of junk.

Sadly, I didn’t have that giant shoe horn last night because I didn’t pull the car in far enough, and unbeknownst to me, the garage door scraped the bumper on the way down. Vince noticed it right off when he came home after me – probably because he heard the screeching sound as the garage door scraped the bumper on the way back up, too.

So he kindly moved my car farther into the garage and then also kindly didn’t mention it until we finished dinner. Probably he wanted to have a nice meal together before I got all pissy about the bumper. And, sure enough, I was mad at myself about it all night about it. Not to mention a little sick about it, too.

This morning was a different story. I started to pull my car straight back out of the garage as I do every morning…only I couldn’t. Apparently, Vince had pulled the car in a little too close to the right-hand side of the garage so that it was rubbing up against the sky-high stack of cartons.

I hadn’t moved two inches before one of the boxes lost its precarious hold on top of the pile and crashed down upon the top of my car. I immediately stopped and got out to see the next cataclysmic tragedy that had befallen my vehicle and noticed that the entire pile of boxes was leaning dangerously close to my car ready to topple over at the slightest movement.

Clearly I couldn’t fit between the right side of the car and the stack of boxes to do any good. Heck, a 90lb. emaciated supermodel wouldn’t even have been able to get through there. Nor would a giant shoe horn have helped in this situation. Feeling the beginnings of a headache coming on, I walked around to the front of the car, but couldn’t even reach the boxes to move them away from my car.

I stood there for a moment debating whether or not to call my boss and tell him I’d be late as I was feeling a little, uh, “boxed in,” (sorry), but instead figured it was more prudent to shut off my car. No need to asphyxiate myself as the garage – despite the open door – was filling up with carbon monoxide. While scratches on the bumper are upsetting, they are not a good enough reason to end it all.

Feeling even more determined (and a little desperate) to get myself out of this situation, I gave a superhuman stretch and was somehow able to shove some of the boxes out of the way – although not before disturbing another stack of flattened boxes, which slid off and conked me on the head, making my headache even worse.

By this point, I could only shake my head a laugh a little ruefully. It was either that – or scream. And I didn’t want to disturb any neighbors that had the good fortune of sleeping in this morning.

So I got back in my car, started it up and gingerly pulled away from the boxes. And, lo and behold, I was out of the garage without suffering more dings or dents to my car.

I quickly shut the automatic garage door opener without looking at the mess inside because I didn’t want to deal with it. And then I drove like a bat out of hell toward work so I wouldn’t have to explain my tardiness.

I can only wonder what Vince will think when he gets home. He’ll see a pile of flattened box (probably impeding his progress to the back door). He’ll also see either (a) a Jenga-like configuration of boxes haphazardly stacked along the wall ready to topple over any moment or (b) a disturbing pile of boxes lying in the middle of the garage floor because they finally gave up and fell over.

Yeah…I think we’re definitely gonna need that giant shoe horn. It’s either that – or we’re gonna have to rent another garage somewhere. I don’t think my car can take any more dings, dents or scratches and I don’t think I can take too many more shots to the head. I’m dizzy enough.