<p>SOOOO glad to find everyone here muttering about maintenance. It’s the last thing I have time for right now with DS working on apps and all the rest of the chaos in our lives, but I’m glad to know I’m not the only one ready to chuck it all out the door!!</p>
<p>Our downstairs toilet needs its innards replaced. The stove beeps incessantly unless we leave it set to 170 degress all the time. I started painting the walls in the basement so the kids would have a cool place to hang out. Three years ago. DS1 is now a senior. The seals on the fridge are shot. So is the ice maker. Replacing the fridge is cheaper than repairing. Only problem is, DH wants a fridge with “the works” (or at least some of the goodies) – and those don’t come in a 30" width. </p>
<p>Did I mention I did the PROFILE this weekend? Every Freakin’ Cent. Cur is right about that one! And I’ve had three surgeries in the past five weeks? <em>I</em> need maintenance.</p>
<p>WashDad, DS1 is my mountain goat who blows the leaves from the storm gutters. DS2 is 6’3" and changes the bulbs without even going on tiptoe. I am used to doing much of the maintenance around here, but it’s going to get pretty desperate when the guys leave.</p>
<p>CountingDown, TallSon is now 6-4 and still growing. He’s 15. He wraps his arm around my shoulder and says, “That’s my little daddy! How’s the little daddy today?” I’m 6-3. I think I can still take him…</p>
<p>About decluttering–I have come to the conclusion that all the clutter is the fault of the children who leave it all behind when they go…but we have no way of knowing what is clutter and what is Extremely Valuable Keepsakes from My Childhood, for Heaven’s Sake, Couldn’t You TELL?</p>
<p>Right. My father still has stuff in his attic from my childhood. By now, if I wanted it I would have taken it, but he probably is still suffering guilt over throwing out something I wanted to give my children but had been pitched.</p>
<p>And now my kids are doing the same to me with all the detritus of their techno lives. A stack of old computer discs dating from Windows 95 era–probably one of them is worth saving, but who knows which one? Not I, certainly. So they stay.</p>
<p>Haha. Someday when I’m gone it’ll be THEIR problem!!!</p>
<p>Ladies who clean when their husbands are away and rid of clutter. I’ve been missing this secret. Kind of sublimated cheating. </p>
<p>I repeatedly asked both kids to clean out shelves in a really neat storage unit in family room. Been longing for it for ten years. They did and each told me it was completely done and there was nothing there that either of them wanted. </p>
<p>So, the day after number 2 was dropped off I cleaned out the unit and made it as beautiful as I always knew it would be. First thing D said in a belligerent voice when she came home for the weekend was, “Where’s my stuff?” I was relieved when I could say, “On your desk,” instead of “In the garbage.” Whew!</p>
<p>Hi bethievt,
i didn’t know that I could “inspire” anyone to do anything. Now I feel so guilty that you have started on your basement, that I will have to do more tomorrow in mine. We also have the acorn leftovers indicative of field mice making themselves at home in our basement. I am hoping they have all left safely, bothered by the noise I am making. I already spent several hours in S#1’s room, partially cleaning his desk which he has promised to do for years. I made a command decision to throw away his AP Chem practice tests. He’s in his first year of graduate school. :rolleyes: In political science, not chem.</p>
<p>Yes–throw away the AP chem tests–you definitely inspired me. My basement is really bad. Embarrassing. You did give me the cue to do something. Thanks again.</p>
<p>Okay, is there a wagering corner in this Muttering about Maintenance Establishment?</p>
<p>Because I am betting that my basement mice are smarter than your basement mice. I put out peanut butter in traps, and they ate the peanut butter but left the traps un-tripped. Geez. </p>
<p>I found the real solution was to put EVERY morsel of edible product in airtight plastic bins. Our basement is a kind of Costo/Sam’s-annex, with multiples of numerous things. Mice are not daunted by cardboard box and wax paper barriers if they want to get to the Triscuits. Nor sealed plastic bags if they are in the mood for some walnut halves. But Sterlite or Tupperware bins? They rock.</p>
<p>BTW, what’s up with this? We had two cats. These beloveds are now in cat-and-doggie heaven, but when they were with us they would frequently grace our doorstep with the little “presents” they had hunted down and bested from the woods all around (chipmunks, birds and yes, I do believe some mice). So how is it that they weren’t on the job with the little meeses who were after our larder? </p>
<p>" …he was extremely unhappy about the lack of a remote."</p>
<p>My Mom gave me a hand-me-down armchair and I found a big honking TV remote under the seat cushion. I still don’t understand how she didn’t notice she was sitting on that. Or why she didn’t look for it there if it was missing.</p>
<p>On another note, Clean the Basement has been on my To Do List for so long that I renamed the list “The Perennial List.” You all are inspiring me.</p>
<p>Well, jmmom, I will not take your wager about your basement mice being smarter than ours. I don’t store foodstuffs in the basement, and the bozo mice still gnaw around looking for stuff. Of course there was the time that I stored leftover Passover spices in a tied plastic bag inside a shopping bag. Didn’t stop those devils from eating the labels off the spice jars!</p>
<p>WashDad - my big little brothers used to pick my dad up and carry him around, calling him “Little Eddie.” I can still remember him struggling yet laughing and saying “Put me down!”</p>
<p>I well remember the day my dear departed pack rat mom asked my older brother and I to help her “clean out the garage”. He took one look at the mess accumulated after years of saving things and asked “What do you want us to do? Stir it?” My mom just cracked up, rolling on the floor in recognition of the irony of her request, and the job never got done.</p>
<p>Since D2 left for college six weeks ago, I’ve started my three-year plan. Yes, it will take me three years to clean out the house (20 years of accumulated junk doesn’t disappear overnight, ya’ know) and repair the house. So far I’ve made about four trips to Goodwill (and there will be many many more), I’ve thrown out things I never thought I would (SAT vocab cards – surely someone could use them!), and I have a notebook with a page for each room showing what I have to do. Believe it or not, the list gets longer the more I do.</p>
<p>Example: I’m cleaning out the nanny bedroom (we had someone live in there for about 12 years of our 20, and I have barely touched the room for 8 years). I remove the vertical blinds (they never, never worked anyway) and discover that part of the trim around the sliding door is rotten. Add it to the list for the carpenter to fix. I start to spackle so I can paint. Discover that the doorknobs down there are all scratched and crappy. Add it to the list.</p>
<p>My mom has given away my old prom dresses and most of my old clothes, which I am fine with. I am not fine with her giving away my pj’s – what am I supposed to wear at night when I visit home? :)</p>
<p>We ended up with a surprise move and downsized dramatically, it was almost painful to give away everything we did, but there was a battered women’s shelter fund-raiser a week after, so we had a pick up that divested us of everything unnesc. A bit rushed, a few things I could have kept, but all in all, I am glad it is done or it would have taken me three years, too.</p>
<p>It seems the day of reckoning has arrived. The 3 excuses are in college or out of the country, and it’s time to dig in and get things organized once and for all. Sigh. I’ve been putting off, in anticipation of this stage for years, and is hard to face the music and get things done, though so gratifying when finished, and even in process. My basement too, is an archeological site, though there are bigger fish to fry at the moment. The ex moved to a new part of the country, and in leaving town, brought over many relics of bygone years. Boxes full. Middle school carefully done artwork I never was privy to at the time. What to do, so new, yet old? </p>
<p>I dream of an austere simplicity. Soon? </p>
<p>Somemom, an adrenaline filled experience such as you had is probably the efficient way to go through the process. Send something similar my way.</p>
<p>It seems quite unfair that appliances seem slated to last about 18 years, so when bought new for infants, they die as college tuition bills start. I’ve replaced a few in the last year. What’s next? Maybe is time for life in a tipi.</p>
<p>What do I do if I’m ready to rake leaves and the village is scheduled to pick them up, but they’re not down yet?</p>
<p>Darn! I’m just going to have to wait!</p>
<p>BTW, I’ve been inspired to finally fix the toilet. I really don’t mind jiggling every time someone who doesn’t hold the lever down long enough leaves it running, but my job of plunging is getting tiresome.</p>
<p>Time for a new paper clip. (I’d do it now, but I heard somewhere that late at night is not a good time to work on plumbing.)</p>
<p>great lakes mom: Oh, how I like the image of the new/old artwork. Really beautiful. There’s a literary work in their somewhere, I know it.</p>
<p>My eight-four year old mother insists she will die in her house so I have the job of cleaning it out! She’s lived in her current house since 1957. Fifty years!</p>
<p>WashDad,
DS2 is also 15. Now 6’3 1/2" (he just insisted we measure him again). He was 5’8" at his Bar Mitzvah. He can bench press his older brother.</p>
<p>Ebeee, Alas, when we bought our house ten years ago, the prior owners had recently replaced the appliances, roof, etc. “Aha!” we thought. “We won’t have to do anything for at least ten years! We can build up equity for college!” We’ve been in the house 10 1/2 years. The house is now 42 years old. The kids are 15 and 16, a sophomore and a senior. What were we thinking… </p>
<p>Mommusic, we have a box of 5 1/4" backup floppy disks in the closet. WHY OH WHY!!! (you’d think the mice could take care of this one small chore…) ;)</p>
<p>Hell, I’m pitching the tent in the front yard.</p>
</p>