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I crave order

They painted my kitchen - re the water damage - which meant I had to take everything off the walls, counters, and shelves, remove the shelves themselves, remove all pictures and racks, and move all the furniture into the center of the room. This also meant my kitchen was essentially out of order with no place to sit and no way to prepare food. But that was ok. I had the brilliant plan to order takeout food. Except when the time came, I couldn't find my menus because they were buried somewhere under the mass of furniture and kitchen items in the center of the room. Plus I wasn't exactly sure when I could order food because my clock was unplugged. Eventually I checked my computer for the time and looked online for the takeout number.

After the painters left I tried to get some cleaning done, but there were some large items to clean and the best place for those was the bathtub. Except the bathtub was full of bathroom items that had been taken off those walls and shelves because they'd painted in there too. So I put all the bathroom stuff back up and away (which was far easier than the kitchen) and that wore me out for the next few hours.

Once night hit, I walked around in the dark a lot because my window shade wasn't on (it had been taken down so they could paint the window frame) and I didn't feel like doing "Noisy Quiet TV" for the neighborhood. Eventually I decided to put the shade back up, except I wasn't sure where the ladder ended up, so I looked for it in the dark with the help of light from the street lamps outside. A few minutes later the ladder was found and the window shade was in place again.

With the window shade in place, and the lights on again, I decided to clean (there's SO much cleanup to do. It'll take a few days.) Except I have this "thing" nowadays where I pop a VHS tape in whenever I'm in the kitchen, so it can play in the background and I can be sure there's nothing important on the tape before I toss it out. - It's an ongoing project. (So far the contents of every tape has matched its label, but I still feel the need to go through all of them just in case.) So I go to turn on the TV and it's not plugged in. - Finding and untangling that extension cord from the mass in the middle took about ten minutes. Then I wondered what time it was and of course there's still no clock plugged in.

So now I have the shade down, the light on, the TV and VCR plugged in, and I'm happily drinking water out of a small bowl because my mug rack is currently soaking in the bathtub and all my mugs are still under the table.

 

7 Comments:

Judy said...

Sorry, I don't mean to make light of your "situation," but that is hilarious! And it reminds me of a couple of years ago when our dishwasher flooded and our kitchen had to be gutted - right before Christmas - and it didn't get finished until March! We had sandwiches for Christmas dinner :). The good news is that we had an ugly 50s kitchen before and now it's stylin!!

Noisy Quiet said...

*Right* before Christmas... OMG.

The closest I had to that was a kitchen table that broke the night before I was expecting 15 guests for Christmas dinner. A table might not seem like a big deal, but 15 people due and stores closed... where was I going to put them?! And the turkey?! "Hey everyone! We still have chairs, so just bend into the middle and pick up the food on the floor..." ;)

Beyond that, I've been through far worse household damage than this that, like your kitchen, required gutting and wasn't repaired for several months. As much as this overwhelms and disrupts my life at the moment, I am very much aware that it's not as bad as other times! - Or yours!

Congrats on your stylin' kitchen! I bet you put it to good use the next Christmas!

Noisy Quiet said...

Oh, and *thank you* for saying you found it funny! I feel better adding a "humor" tag to it now !

Anny Sabine said...

This reminded me a bit of my post where I started by doing the dishes and went crazy along the way, or something like that. I'm not that much for order, at least not keeping it, but this would frustrate me. Had a laugh reading it though :P

Noisy Quiet said...

I'm not a huge germ or clean freak - unless something is really gross. If it looks dirty I clean it. But I *am* a neat freak in my own home and/or work area. I function MUCH better that way. I've had friends who could have been on those reality shows where the clutter is halfway up to the ceiling and there are only small paths to get through a room... sideways. - Not a problem for me. It's not my stuff!

Stella said...

NQ- 'twas funny but also a GREAT reason not to cook! I might have my kitchen repainted just so I never need cook again. .. btw, did you take photos of the stuff just everywhere? That'd be fun to look back at. I can relate to needing to check those VHS tapes- your first mistake was to start checking. When I moved I simply threw they ALL out. I have lots of advice on throwing stuff out if you ever need it.
Stella x

Noisy Quiet said...

I've been trying to save money. Normally I get take out about 3 times a month. I probably haven't done that in about 4 months now. But I most definitely took the opportunity to order that day!

I always forget to take photos of piles of stuff. Not just mine, but "before" pictures of other people's if they've asked me to help them out. Must remember to start doing that! - Looking back on my *own* piles, though, would just stress me out all over again! :D

Re the VHS tapes, if I knew they were all TV shows out they'd go! But I have important stuff on them too. The thing is, they're ALL labeled and filed (if you can believe that!) so I know which ones have what. But knowing they were used for things that need to be saved as well as things to toss, makes me want to be extra certain before they go out. Besides, I liked the shows I taped so I don't mind them playing in the background while I do other stuff. :) I actually have DVDs for those shows now, otherwise I'd probably STILL keep the tapes (or transfer them to DVD! What a headache that'd be!)

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