Clump #234:  Clear out bedrooms in advance of carpet cleaner; day 29 of 30-day challenge … one more day!

The clump for today was a tremendous achievement, but not in terms of getting stuff out of the house.  Our son and I had to clear the bedrooms and basement floors of every bit of clutter before a carpet cleaner arrived. Our older daughter’s room had been serving as a holding zone for clumps that our younger daughter had mined from the basement … it was especially grueling. Too late to do the necessary sorting and decision making.

In summary, scheduling a carpet cleaner felt like the best and worst thing I could have done.  Wow.  Up close and personal with our excess belongings.  The previously cleared-out basement storage area is now re-clogged.  Nooo!

I had taken the photo below of an old Parade magazine during the big paper purge.  This is exactly the way I felt today. We were working against the clock, and at one point, I said to our son, “What would I do without you?”  With a strained expression and pleading tone of voice he answered, “Start earlier?”  From the mouth of babes (or dudes, or gents …).  The truth hurts, as do my sore muscles and back.

I guess people pay good money to do step aerobics with weights. That’s essentially what the job felt like.  The complete works of Charles Dickens, below, weigh about a gazillion pounds.  I have hauled them from my parent’s bookshelves to our home, to at least two used book sellers (who were not interested in buying them); our younger daughter hauled them upstairs, and I lugged them back down to the basement. Somehow this description doesn’t seem to include enough hauling steps, but you’ll just have to trust me.  Talk about an albatross.  Enough is enough!  I’ll donate them to whoever will have them.  This will be the first clump out of the basement.  I promise.

I’ve got the motivation, I’m in the Tow Away Zone,

soon the wheels will be on and the junk will be moving.