Let’s just call this week a ‘clearing off my desk’ sort of post. We’re getting ready to change countries again for a short few weeks, and that is always the time to clear up the piles on my desk. The lists of things to bring, the things to pick up while we are away, the things to get done before we leave, and so on. Also, there are the eternal piles of things without a deadline that I’ve meant to be getting around to: they have piled up as well.
Instead of dealing with life, I have spent a bit too much time figuratively biting my fingernails whilst listening to news analysis podcasts the last few weeks, as each news cycle seems to bring yet more unbelievable news from the US. My way to process has not been in any way productive, but instead to stew. Not healthy, and hence more piles of paper than usual.
There also have been a flurry of these landing on my desk: “enter this contest to win a trip to this exotic destination for two weeks/ten days/ of fully covered travel by plane/train/elephant to enjoy our very specific and once in a lifetime opportunity to taste/drink/photograph our unique products/scenery, etc etc”. It must be the extra long February we were subjected to this year that precipitated all the travel offers.
Well, they got me this year: I signed up for ALL OF THEM. Even, weirdly, the Scandinavian ones; not just the ones to warm Australia and Thailand. So there are ripped-out magazine pages with photos of all the pretty places on my desk that need checking for selection dates to see if I have won and so can begin planning for all my trips. HA-I wish.
There are the paperwork notes from past trips that still haven’t been filed away, alongside new receipts and random paperwork that is stacked neatly but really belong in my nearby file cabinet rather than on or around my desk.
The crumpled piece of paper with the list of all the stores I wanted to get to in London last week along with the addresses of a few that I hadn’t been to before has now finally been tossed. As always, there were more stores on the list than I visited. There were surprisingly TWO stores that weren’t actually open due to ongoing renovations. TWO out of seven; I thought that was quite unreasonable. After I made the effort to look up their location, traipse over there, only to find shuttered doors and cheerful posters on the outside walls announcing “We will be open in March and we are ALWAYS open online." Well pooh; it was March when I arrived, and they were not open.
Finally, what do you do with those scraps of paper that have random bits of information on them that are slightly hard to catalog. If they are book recommendations, for example, I add them to my book lists. Easy-peasy. But other notes from, say, phone conversations that are not recommendations, per se, but information I don’t want to forget. If it is related to the person or their place, should I add them to notes about that person in my contacts list, even if it is ephemeral information? What do YOU do with those bits of information? Where do you keep them?
This is why things collect: they have no place. If everything has a place, then it is easier to put away. It doesn’t mean it always DOES get put away, but it at least has a home it may eventually find.
But the biggest news of all is that two of my daffodil bulbs finally started to bloom at the end of last week. It has taken two weeks since the buds pushed up from underground for them to finally get the courage to come out of their comfortable enclosed warm space. I can’t blame them; after the lovely green stalks first showed up, the temperature plummeted below freezing so they had second thoughts. But over the weekend it has been relatively warm and we’ve even (gasp!) had some persistent sun.
Update since I started writing this last week: SEVEN bulbs have now blossomed. I am as proud of my new bulbs as if I had raised them from babies. Also, our walkway is lined with stalks of the remaining bulbs that will bloom merrily next week once we have left. It is now much cooler in temperature—again—so I’m sure the new blossoms will not appear before we leave. Of course.
And now for something completely different (oops, not really, it is still about the weather)! This is what our weather app showed us recently when we were on the ferry leaving the island. Usually it shows us weather for the closest town. Even though we were in the water between the Isle of Wight and the Big Island, we usually see the closest city on our weather app (Ryde or Portsmouth). On this evening we had somehow left the sphere of a specific location and entered the generic country of England. Spooky? It was our own little maritime mystery.
Signing off from ‘England’ for the time being, and wishing you all a continuing warming spring. For y’all in the southern hemisphere: I wish you the cooling temps you probably crave by now.
Many thanks for reading! PLEASE do let me know how you save/remember/catalog random bits of information; I really need some help to deal with all the little scraps of paper! Does anyone else have this problem???
xoxo Sabrina
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Like Jayne, I'm a bit ruthless about throwing things out. These days, I use scraps of paper as infrequently as possible and instead make notes on my phone. This works very well for me as I always have them, they're easy to delete, and they don't take up space or get lost.
I've even transferred my checklists to my phone. I love crossing things off the list but I still get to on the phone. Not quite as rewarding though.
Have a wonderful trip! Looking foward to hearing all about it
Oooh, I do hope you win an Australian trip. If it's to South Australia, just be warned they are in drought and things are really dry. We're very dry here in Tassie as well, but not yet in drought.
Re the filing? I have an admin file on my computer desktop which probably classifies as a mess. Periodically I go in and clean the randon stuff (same with 'bookmarks') but I make little headway. It's all 'important'.