Made my bed sigh

Stolen from http://kittehkats.tumblr.com/post/102924383476/windypoplarsroom-vintage-french-postcard-1913

Trigger warning… I made my bed this morning (it is still, just morning)… Which is an incredibly optimistic thing to do considering my mindset. At the moment I’d just like to cease to exist.

That’s not suicide by the way. I’m too depressed to suicide. It would take too much effort and forethought. Spontaneous combustion I could probably do, although it sounds painful.

It’s depressing to be so depressed that suicide is too much effort. Maybe I’m just lazy?

I have the flu. Nothing is particularly good on a normal day, but the flu just makes it all so much worse. Things that wouldn’t normally phase you, take you down whimpering.

Sisyphus and I

Ancient rocks by Neil Degney

My partner and I decluttered for about 15 minutes. He got increasingly annoyed as the minutes went on and very sarcastic. Kind of things he was saying:

"Where are you going to put that? There is nowhere." (that last sentence on constant repeat)

"I will sort this out - eventually." (very slow and very angry nasty voice)

"Do I have to do this RIGHT now?"

"I suppose you expect me to move those things too."

This is decluttering things that he had told me he was throwing out, but I said let me try and sell them first. I tried for six months with no interest, so I said OK now you can get rid of them. We talked about this for three weeks or so, with him saying, yes we must do that. Ok, yes they can go...

During the time they had sat, things were piled on top of them and several boxes of unknown things were below them.

Because there is no where to put something you shouldn’t try. You shouldn’t make an effort to find somewhere or get rid of the things in the middle of a pile that you know you want to get rid of because other things are resting on them (as the pile just keeps getting higher with breakables in the middle too).

We rearranged. I found a place to put the breakable light fitting that had been the middle top bit of the pile. We moved things over making room to move in the small room. He decided to store a large backpack in front of the full length mirror. I said that it couldn’t stay there. He said there was no where else. We worked out what was in the boxes (one half-empty) and he grudgingly decided he could put the things from the half-empty box somewhere else. But not today.

It’s an uphill battle. Add in the world’s most spoilt cat trying to be involved by being underfoot and scratching people’s legs because they should be paying attention to him and it could almost be funny. Or not.

Come the Zombie Apocalypse we'll be at the pub

US people are so into ‘prepping’… I imagine we’d all just go to the pub. As we do during floods or when the power goes out. If we can’t hammer out our survival collectively over a few beers then we aren’t true Australians.

No Hawkers and no Hawkers doing surveys

The other day we had someone come to the door. He wasn't selling anything, he said, but doing a survey. Very shortly it was clear he wasn't selling anything - he was just getting my contact details so others could sell me things.  When I demurred about giving my email address, he said not to worry - he would just put down a fake one and it was a win win situation. He was a student, working to study, so I felt sorry for him. However, his company wasn't doing the right thing by householders and he wasn't doing the right thing by his company. But why should he care? They were blatantly attempting a bit of a scam to get around the new rules for door-knocking. All he cared about was ticking off his list and getting paid.

All in all it made me think about overseas call-centres. I think about them quite often because we are having issues with our internet connection and so we have to talk to them all the time. Why should someone in another country who is earning a pathetic amount care about my first-world problems, even if they understand what the hell I'm talking about. They don't care. How can I get rid of you sir? We'll check into that and someone will call you back in a day.... All they care about is ticking off their check-list - being seen to be doing the job - and getting paid.

Decision making super powers please!

I'm so methodical, that if only I had a better decision capability I'd be on top of this house organisation thing. My house has improved. Or at least not gone backwards with the influx of things from my partner's parents house. I get rid of things almost every week. Yes, I do regret some of them, but I can live with regret. It's not nearly as bad as the negative emotions from having too much stuff....

I freely offer advice. I know it's a failing, really I do, but I find it hard to stop. I learnt it from my father who was always trying to help people. People often hated him for it. Sometimes all people want is to be listened to. I'm trying to learn to let people complain, offer meaningless sympathy and to try not to want to help them to solve the issue.

Washing Up!

We hand-wash our dishes rather than use a dishwasher for many reasons:

• Dishwashers are too destructive on vintage dishes and cutlery
• It's another machine to breakdown or need maintenance
• I don't like the chemicals in the dishwasher detergents

I have lots of arguments with people about how environmentally friendly dishwashers are.  I maintain the actual creation of a machine, the waste when they are disposed of and the harsh chemicals going into our water system all outweigh the fact that they often use less water than hand washing.