Decluttering the earworms - a poem a day

The definition of year at Year of Finishing Off is broad as is my definition of decluttering. I'm fired up to exorcise the earworms (those songs that get stuck in your head) that I awake to every morning. A poem a day for April is my weapon of choice. Today I awoke with one line of the words and music of an Angels song, Marseilles. 'Gimme the whiskey, don't think twice'. Here is my Whiskey haiku

Gimme the whiskey
don't think twice - summer is gone
and spiced tea beckons

One down, thirty to go. One earworm banished.

Goodbye Solitaire, goodbye Freecell

A year well advanced and not much finished off. Maybe I'll change it to The Years of Starting Again and Again and Again.

This morning I started resolutely. I deleted Solitaire and Freecell from the main computer. Freecell - one word or two? I'm resisting turning on the laptop to find out. Already I'm amazed at how many times I've had the urge to play those games. Instead, I browsed websites that have Getting Organised/Organized as the subject.

On one website, in the context of cleaning and decluttering, I discovered a link to a video that shows you how to clean windows. And a link to another one that shows you how to clean an oven.

I wonder who watches things like that.

A Quest

I’m on a mission. I want to be more obsessive-compulsive about order in my house and find good homes for the things that I’m clinging on to. Starting with my wool stash.

Trust me, you may not be able to see the Great Wall of China from outer space, but my wool stash is clearly visible on a clear day. If I were a Trekkie I could be the Klingon of Klutter. But I’d rather eat gagh than use a ball of my most precious stuff to knit a garment that is usually too big or too small.

When I enter a wool shop I develop an automated response like the Borg. I assimilate yarns that come before me into my pile at home.

A trip to the Bendigo Sheep and Wool Show is a trap. I tell myself I’m going just to look at the sheep. Before long, I’m disarmed by the lustre of English Leicester, the luxurious staple of premium mohair or the silky smoothness of alpaca. Resistance is futile.

I’ve known for years that this stuff is weighing me down, but I can’t put it in garbage bags. In fact some of it is stuff that has come into my house in other people’s garbage bags from friends and mothers who have gone to that big wool sale in the sky.

Is there a way of being more ruthless about these acquisitions? How can I tap into my inner Ferengi?

And then there are the books and patterns...

This is my quest. A project a week in the Year of Finishing Off.