GrumbleSmiles

Still working on the clutter.    Today I turn my attention the  wonderful piece of furniture that takes pride of place in our main bedroom.    It is an apothecary’s chest that was made by my Uncle Den.   Den was a master carpenter, who over many years came to stay with us at Christmas, and each year presented us with a miniature apprentice piece of furniture that he had made specially for us.    It was always a joy to receive these unique and lovingly crafted gifts and they now adorn almost every room in the house.

Then one year he arrived with a big parcel strapped to the roof of his small car, which he had driven all the way from Gloucester.   This time it was no small apprentice piece, but a full-sized mahogany chest of drawers —-  5 drawers high, 4 drawers wide, each drawer perfectly fitted and made with sixteen dovetail joints, that makes 320 dovetail joints just for the drawers. Then there were 20 identical lathe turned holly button handles.   It was a masterpiece of craftsmanship that took him almost a year to do.

For once I can confidently say that none of these family treasures are clutter.  They deserve to be displayed simply and contain treasured possessions.

This could be my nicest de-cluttering task.    I have two top shelves in a chock-a-block cupboard which are laden with half-full malt whisky bottles, deliberately out of easy reach, otherwise I would be an alcoholic by now.

I acquired most of the bottles as gifts, as a result of the quite unfounded reputation I had at ExtraCare Charitable Trust of being a frequent tippler of malt whisky 😀.     My undeserved reputation came about because I used to do an induction  talk to new staff at the opening of every new housing scheme or retirement village.   It was called my ” suitcase talk”.   I dressed up as an old man moving in with his lifetime possessions in his case.      The idea was to challenge them to draw up a support plan for me based on what they could learn from my suitcase contents.

One of the things I had in my case was a miniature bottle of malt whisky, which I proceeded to drink in front of them, while denying that I drank at all.    They made lots of incorrect assumptions about me e.g.:- “do you come from Scotland?”— No, I was born in Abergavenny in Wales;   “Do you like whisky?” —- Yes, especially Spey-side malts and Ardbeg, a wonderful peaty Islay whisky I discovered on a 60th birthday salmon fishing trip to Scotland;    and then finally out of caring concern for my health  ” should you be drinking, won’t it affect your medication?” — Yes, probably but my doctor told me to take my pills with a drink, so mind your own business.      By the time I had finished my talk, some of the staff had me down as an irascible old man who was probably drunk half the time!

The point was they needed to talk to me not just make superficial assumptions from what they first saw.     That applied to all my possessions and to all their new residents.

Now, thanks to all those excellent staff,     I am going to have an enjoyable few years of retirement de-cluttering my shelves of whisky bottles.      I will no doubt turn into the old man the staff first thought I was.

CHEERS.    😀

There must be a better idea for dealing with how to de-clutter my shelves of whisky :-).   Any inspiring ideas ?

There will be a copy of Walt Hopkins and George Simons’ book — “Seven Ways to Lighten Your Life Before You Kick the Bucket” — for the best ideas on de-cluttering.

Here is a little apocryphal story about clutter, which explains why some odd things are found around the house.       Today I found 4 bottles of Tippex in a rarely opened drawer.     I have never used Tippex in my entire life, so where did it come from?     This is how in de-cluttering I have had to hone my investigative skills.     I am becoming a clutter detective 😀

My wife, Mo started out life being trained as a secretary and developed excellent high speed touch-typing skills.     However, even so, I imagine that maybe once a year she might have made a typing error,  so I guess that makes her the prime suspect!    As that was over 50 years ago that could explain the accumulation of four bottles of Tippex.

Since she doesn’t use a typewriter any more – who does? – I can’t see why I shouldn’t throw away the  Tippex.    However, knowing how attached she is to old things, I decided to check with her first.   That’s how the interrogation started, but as she later went on to be a magistrate, she is more than capable of  dealing with a police investigation :-

” Before you say anything, I  must caution you that this conversation is being recorded in cyberspace and may be used against you in a charge of Cluttering.   Do you admit to owning these 4 bottles of Tippex ?”

” Yes.  I need to keep them.”

“But why, you don’t have a typewriter anymore,  except for the ones you have hidden under the desk in the study?”

“No but I may still need them one day, if  computers don’t work anymore and any way I use the Tippex for touching up the white melamine shelf in the bathroom.”

Case dismissed !

That’s where some clutter comes from.

How many more things are there from our past that are now obsolete, that we continue to cling onto ?

There must be a better idea for dealing with this clutter.    Any inspiring ideas ?

There will be a copy of Walt Hopkins and George Simons’ book — “Seven Ways to Lighten Your Life Before You Kick the Bucket” — for the best ideas on de-cluttering.

Light bulbs used to be simpler in the olden days !     When I was a child, to me, there appeared to be one type of light fitting and one type of bulb to go in it.      Life looks simple to a child 💡

In my growing up years I discovered they had something called tungsten filaments and could be clear or opaque.    To make matters more complicated they had watts, although most were either 60 or 100 watts.     Oh and finally —— they could be pushed in with a twist or screwed in.    That was it.

Then I became an architect and learned there was an illumination of light bulbs out there.   Flourescent ones first, not much used in the house, but there were also, up lighters and down lighters —— and recessed lighters —– and wall lights —-and spot lights.

More recently when we discovered all these  lights meant we were running out of energy, there came along a new breed of ‘low energy bulbs’.    Watts were bad, saving the world was good!    They just cost more to start with but would save a fortune eventually.

What has all this got to do with clutter, I hear you ask?     Well our house has lots of light fittings and the bulbs for just about each one are different.     That explains why we have cupboards and drawers with light bulbs in all over the house.    It is also why, when a light bulb blows, it sets off a search around the house in the dark which can take days.

We have attempted to get organised by having one cupboard for light bulbs next to the fuse board in the hall.   Low down, behind a chair, with a sticking sliding door, with one broken handle.   It’s very convenient, especially in the dark.

When you finally open the door bags full of light bulbs fall out.  Which is generally not good for light bulbs !     At the latest count there were 56 bulbs all ready to light up our world and half of  Blackpool as well.   Of course we also have bulbs for light fittings that were replaced years ago.     And for fittings we never had that were bought in mistake 😟

Now you know why light bulbs are clutter.