She was last seen walking into a room with a bunch of boxes and packing tape and black magic markers in her hand.  An occasional sigh is heard from that general direction….

Well, actually the men (I just can’t call them boys anymore after these past few weeks) have been home and have been my worker bees.  (The last few days they have changed that to “slaves.”) Jeff finally convinced me to rent a storage unit as Al had suggested at Thanksgiving and that we did.  So the stuff has been steadily moving out.  Joe suggested the Dot System – we bought colored dots at the office store and blue means storage, green means donate, yellow means dump and red means I need it to live day to day so it stays. It has worked very well, allowing us to work without them having to listen to me bark orders or stand around while I figure out what’s what.  And not to be dismissed lightly, Andy provides endless comic relief during the process along with the muscles.  He does do a lot of farting around, too. (Inside joke, you have to be there and be glad you’re not.)

It really is quite amazing how much stuff there is in this house.  The carport – tools, camping equipment, paint upon paint.  The guys took the paint/toxics to the hazardous waste dump today.  Apparently 15 gallons is the limit so they had to sit and wait and when other people came in the guy supplemented other people’s donations with ours – everyone who came in today from three to four p.m. was up to the limit of 15 gallons thanks to our truckload!

The men also had a great idea at the beginning – we should ADD stuff to the house and then call the producers of the Hoarders TV show and have them cart it all away.  I was practicing refusing to give anything up, but then we quit fooling around and got back to work.  We did have to be careful of not just moving stuff around, but making sure it only got handled once or twice.  None of this “put it over there for now” business.

Our friend Robbie, a young man of 22 who lives on a piece of land up north was happy to take random tools off our hands but his eyes really lit up like it was Christmas morning when I showed him the basin of nails and screws we don’t want to move.  He will also eventually take the table saw which was inexpensive to begin with and serves the purpose pretty well.  Too heavy to move for sure.  I just love having someone I know who really appreciates the stuff taking it off happy as can be.

As previously mentioned I have given up on craigslist and am just donating everything and will take a tax deduction.  Tomorrow a truck comes from Hospice of the East Bay to cart off several large pieces, including the dining room table.  I went back on craigslist in Orange County and we should have no problem finding another nice table for a very reasonable price.  My friend down there tells me the rich people get bored with their furniture and buy new so you can find great deals at consignment stores.  I can’t imagine getting bored with furniture and if I did, I wouldn’t want the hassle of getting new.   What is with that?

I said goodbye to the coffee table much to Al’s delight.  He’s been wanting to get rid of it for years.  I bought it for $35 about three blocks from our home in San Francisco when Joe started to walk.  It was a long oval maple table with little drawers on the side.  My thinking was that when Joe fell he would not crack his head on a sharp corner.  It never occurred to me that a tumble on solid maple could knock out a pro wrestler, but fortunately none of the boys ever did land on it head first.  But after 26 years off it goes – it served us well!

I really did consider a carport sale the other day – everything $1 – but nah.  Still too much work.  I’m really in a purging mode.  Donate, dump, store, stay.  That’s the drill.

So slowly the house is emptying out.  Al’s office is definitely moving March 1, so now I’m starting to look for rental houses down there.  I probably will send Ed the Dog down there and stick around here beyond March to tie up loose ends.  It is becoming a reality as I knew it would once Christmas was over.  The men have been invaluable and except for an occasional meltdown on my part (before the Dot System was instituted), it has been a great experience.  Ed the Dog runs around a little confused but loves the craziness, Twister the Cat hides alot, and I fall into bed at the end of the day exhausted, excited and grateful for my three fine sons.