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BS: Neat or Messy?
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: GUEST,rock chick Date: 27 Aug 07 - 06:47 PM without any shadow of a doubt I am neat, cant stand clutter, there is a place for everything which makes life a lot easier when lokking for things. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: wysiwyg Date: 27 Aug 07 - 11:25 AM What a great summer it's been for getting rid of stuff and for assigning places to things BEFORE they pile up. I carried bags and bags of gently-used linens, gently-used CDs, and old dresses-cut-down-to-skirts into my house. I went through casual clothes in the house and camper. I bought some new clothes. Here's what I learned about managing all the STUFF. Clothes and Linens: Does this item belong in the main closet (new), the drawer out in the camper (stained but serviceable), in the thrift shop pile (worn but serviceable), or the trash? It's a constant FLOW. Move each item down the line-- don't plan on keeping it forever when it's been bought. Look forward to enjoying it for a time, and then passing it down the pipeline. Result-- opening up the camper each year to find old favorites I haven't seen all year, waiting for me to enjoy a few more times and pitch as other items replace them in coming years. CDs (bought cheap, used): Is this an artist whose work I know? Pay up to $3. Never heard of them, but looks intersting? Pay up to $1.50. Back home or in the car-- is this potential music to keep? Rip it to MP3 and store it in the external drive. Is it potential workout music? Use software to estimate BPMs and add BPM to filename. Copy usable workout items to this year's folders on C drive, sorted by BPM for different times of the year's workout season. Is it good listening music? If so put it out in the car for car tunes. If not, put it in the thrift shop pile. When car tune CDs pile up in the car, put them in the thrift shop pile. Since any CD worth using has already been ripped to MP3, any CD I am tired of is fair game tro pass along. It's a FLOW. STUFF Stuff and stuff, it's just a flow. Love it some, then let it go. There will be more before you know! ~S~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Bee-dubya-ell Date: 22 Jun 07 - 08:50 PM When it gets to the point where I can't find my car keys, wallet, or checkbook, it's time to straighten the place up. Anything else I can probably do without until it turns up of its own accord. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: John Hardly Date: 22 Jun 07 - 07:46 PM I prefer neat and if I lived alone, I'd probably get it. I live with someone who can only tolerate spotlessly clean -- sterile, even. But since she cannot attain that goal, she sacrifices "good" at the altar of "best", and we rarely ever even have things straightened up and neat. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: SharonA Date: 22 Jun 07 - 05:18 PM "Are you a neat and tidy persons or a messy slob like myself (didn't used to be)?" Neither. I'm a messy slob and I always used to be! In my late teens through my thirties, I used to clean up the mess and organize things (i.e. beat back the things as they encroached upon the free space). "If you are messy is your mess still organized as far as you are concerned?" Not anymore. When I was in my forties I lost several older relatives including my parents, and some of their stuff got added to my stuff, and I added more stuff on my own, so now I'm fairly drowning in stuff. I can't find my stuff because there's too much stuff in the way. I find it difficult to sort through stuff because there's no place to pile the sorted stuff that isn't already covered with unsorted stuff. "And most important[ly] does your mate share your standards?" No mate at present, but I recall two former live-in man-friends (not living with me together at the same time!) who complained repeatedly about my standards while exhibiting less-than-neat behaviors of their own which only contributed to the messiness. Looking back, I think that they had believed in the stereotype that a woman "should" be the neat, organized one who picks up after the man, and that any man who is "too" neat is too effeminate (a Felix Unger type). But I am a female Oscar Madison type, still searching for a man who's proud to be a Felix! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: mouldy Date: 22 Jun 07 - 06:49 AM Mrs Duck has been to my house and seen it tidy (organised chaos theory). In my head I do want to be tidy, but brain to hand connection, she get severed! I am also intrinsically lazy. At the moment I am using the following excuses: Still sorting out after losing Ian; having work done on the house; am going to declutter antiques soon and put some up for auction, but I haven't had time; my heart's not into it yet; the dishwasher's full; it's too humid to iron; this dog is constantly shedding; I'd rather be in the garden; I'll do it next week; the world's not going to end if I don't... I had a man playing about with my flue yesterday evening, and now I keep getting soot on the hearth. House smells lovely. Andrea (sitting at an old desk which is to be replaced any day now by the half built one). |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: wysiwyg Date: 21 Jun 07 - 02:10 PM PM sent. ~S~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: beardedbruce Date: 21 Jun 07 - 11:03 AM When can you pick it up? I'll need to find you a cartridge... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: wysiwyg Date: 21 Jun 07 - 10:58 AM You want to donate me a printer to support my charity efforts? ~S~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: beardedbruce Date: 21 Jun 07 - 10:35 AM I have spare LaserJet 4 printers... Inkjets WILL have the print disolve/smear- it takes the thermal "sealing" of the laser printer to make it (more) permanant. But laser print on transparancy plastic has been soaked ( don't ask) in various fluids* without problem, and then washed off and used. * I would not suggest anything that disolved the PLASTIC, however. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: wysiwyg Date: 21 Jun 07 - 10:16 AM My inkjet printer's results will probably prove less than permanent too-- water is said to be the most powerful solvent on earth, over time. ~S~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: beardedbruce Date: 21 Jun 07 - 09:52 AM The problem is DElamination. They are made to be water resistant, but constant soaking will get INSIDE and disolve ink, esp. with pool ( clorinated) water. Staples or a business supply catalog should have them. And use the money you save for better porpoises... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: wysiwyg Date: 21 Jun 07 - 09:49 AM ...all plastic 3 ring binders now, with teflon "rings" ( anchored at one end) that are completely water-proof. And, using a laser printer, one can print on plastic sheet... Thanks. Here in rural America, I haven't found these yet, but I've been keeping an eye out. I need a laminator anyway, so that may come first. In a way, the cost of laminating helps keep a lid on the number of pages I create-- I could so easily fill a whole shelf with aquatics info!-- since I only want the real essentials in the binder. :~) ~Susan |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Don(Wyziwyg)T Date: 21 Jun 07 - 09:32 AM MESSY! I can point to the exact square inch of floor which contains whatever I may be looking for..... ......Until my better half follows her usual procedure of gathering it all into a carrier bag and hiding it God knows where. AAAAARGGHHHHH! Don T. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: beardedbruce Date: 21 Jun 07 - 09:27 AM WYSIWYG, One can get all plastic 3 ring binders now, with teflon "rings" ( anchored at one end) that are completely water-proof. And, using a laser printer, one can print on plastic sheet ( I have used transparancies, but I presume they make transluscent and opaque as well) for a totally waterproof, usable underwater notebook. 8-{E |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: wysiwyg Date: 21 Jun 07 - 09:20 AM Now I've done it-- I wanted a bulletin board at the pool I use, to put up aquatics info I often refer to when working with newbies. Then I realized that inviting someone to get out of the water to go see a an item, then get back in to resume discussion or try techniques-- a clumsy process at best! "Gee, I wish I could use a binder in the water!" So I took a cheap binder and made a foam cover out of a 1/2" camping pad, and laminated the pages I inserted. I insert new pages as needed and I can take out the page someone may use to guide a workout (diagrams, etc.), for them to take over to the part of the pool they'll use. The metal binder rings will rust eventually, but that won't be a problem. My office is now in the pool, not just AT the pool. Yesterday I made a large-print page that diagrams the controls of the spare (waterproof) MP3 player I lend folks-- all set up with the music their particular workout calls for. The net effect of all this is that I can respond to folks' help requests without interrupting my own workout, and without getting entangled with a lot of non-productive conversation to interfere with their workout, or mine. And material only goes in there when something emerges as a Frequently Asked Question. I also can email binder pages to folks as attachments. How to exchange email addy's to facilitate this? I laminated a pageful of address labels that contain my name and email address. Cut up, they make nice small, waterproof business cards. There's a pile of 'em tucked in my MP3 case. Oh yeah, the case..... the newer MP3 player came supplied with a cheesy little drawstring bag? I lined an unused plastic VHS case with more of the blue camping foam, and cut out compartments to hold the player and the headphones. Padding, plus flotation. All that's missing is the waterproof notepad and pen-- thats' next. ~Susan |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: wysiwyg Date: 04 Jun 07 - 10:49 AM Wow........ new binders...... Various suppliers make a tear-proof poly binder that can be gotten very cheap in bulk. All-poly, not poly wrapped over cardboard. Cheap binders-- I think we paid less than a dollar each at the time we got them. We'd had similar ones for band arrangements way back when we started; I've re-used them over and over and no ring failures. Anyway, they are very easy to cut down as CD albums, into which go C-Line products' #61958 hole-punched sheets which each hold 4 CDs and liner booklets. I think they were about $5 a pack when we got them as a box of 10-packs. Each binder will hold 10-12 sheets filled with CDs. So these are good, sturdy, cheap CD albums almost as cheap as the Dollar General ones I wished I'd gotten in bulk whle they had them. Unlike the premade CD albums, it's easy to re-organize/re-alphabetize, because you can swap in or out whole sheets as needed. So I am a ways off from needing an external hard drive for more memory-- by the time I fill these, the smaller drives I can use should be almost on giveaway pricing as the bigger ones come to the fore of the market. I can "archive" current projects off into these binders. As projects become inactive, I can put the CDs on the leftover spindles and re-use the binders for new work. ~S~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Mr Yellow Date: 30 May 07 - 08:28 AM neat and tidy are distinct if you can find it it is tidy if it looks pretty it is neat. and you can't find it - what is the point of neat? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Mrrzy Date: 29 May 07 - 02:26 PM Messy. *I* can usually find things, though nobody else can. Single. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Mrs.Duck Date: 29 May 07 - 08:42 AM I like my CDs in alphabetical order, my books arranged by size, the childrens toys in labelled boxes, all letters filed by date with the latest at the rear and all the cups on the hooks facing in the right (not left) direction. Meanwhile back in the real world.......... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: redsnapper Date: 29 May 07 - 05:17 AM Unashamedly................neat! (It's an obsessive-compulsive thing) RS |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Gurney Date: 29 May 07 - 01:09 AM Slag, having chosen a pen-name like yours, you are obviously aware that there are some jobs that you simply aren't doing RIGHT unless you get messy. Sticky, anyway. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Mickey191 Date: 28 May 07 - 12:40 PM When Jim was here and the week-end was new on Fridays everything was neat & spotless. Sat. things started to drift-Sunday went like this: Newspapers, crossword puzzles, mussed bed & dishes here and there. We had an agreement that anyone at anytime could call out "10 minute break!" Each was bound to stop whatever we were doing & fly thru the house & clean up the mess. Regardless of who did it-there was no talking allowed - ergo No Blame could be assigned. We went like whirling dervishes-truly. The dog thought we were nuts! But it was fun & Monday when we came home it was grand! Nice memory. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: wysiwyg Date: 28 May 07 - 09:02 AM stack of 347 CDs At the Dollar General they had CD albums one day VERY cheap, big ones to hold a lot, for $5. You also can get binder inserts with 4 CD pockets each (2 front, 2 back) via your office supply catalog, and use a regular binder. The binders do get awful heavy, though. Me, I just put my archive CDs back on the empty spindles and label the whole pakage with a Sharpie. ~Susan |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Bainbo Date: 28 May 07 - 04:27 AM And most important does your mate share your standards? Mate? I'm sure I had one here somewhere. Is she under the ... nope. Behind here? Err ... Give me a while. I'll get back to you. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: JohnInKansas Date: 28 May 07 - 04:09 AM I find it sufficient to keep a neat and orderly mind, within which I keep the locations of everything important. The system works except when someone decides to "help" by "straightening things up." I have been working on the paperwork clutter by scanning everything and shredding originals that might be of value/interest but don't actually require hard copy. (Note to self: I really need a faster scanner with a document feed.) Now if I could just find a place where the stack of 347 CDs with the scans on them won't get tipped over and scattered everytime we have a 1guest in the house or when one of the cats decides to play... 1 Someone always decides to be helpful and "clean up" when guests are expected. My partner is perfectly compatible: "You don't have to mop the floor if you can't see it." "Hairballs only require removal when they start to growl at you, or when they actually leap out to trip you." "But dear, I'll need it John |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: JennieG Date: 28 May 07 - 01:43 AM I can live with clutter. However we are planning to move from this house in a couple of years - and we have been living here for 20 years. So there will have to be the grandfather and grandmother of all clean-ups. Not looking forward to it at all........ Cheers JennieG |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Liz the Squeak Date: 27 May 07 - 08:47 PM It's those bloody cable fairies that get my goat.... I put cables in neat rounds in a drawer or on a table and the next morning or when I go to that drawer again, some cable fairy has been knitting with them. Bloody cable fairies!!! LTS |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Mickey191 Date: 27 May 07 - 07:06 PM I'm incredibly neat-but then the damn bears come in & mess the place up! What to do? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Ron Davies Date: 27 May 07 - 11:29 AM I figure if I know where things are that's what counts. Others might say--and have said--that other factors should be considered. But as of now, that's honored in the breach. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: wysiwyg Date: 27 May 07 - 07:41 AM I mentioned binderizing, upthread. I'm doing this more and more these days. The fat insurance binder now has sections for medical, dental, vision, etc., and subsectios for bills and insurance notifications coming and going. A similar one for tax returns and pension-tracking notices is shaping up. The one I really like though-- Next to the recliner now sits the "Current" binder. No tabs, no sections, just a slim (recycled of course) binder where anything of current interest is easily hole-punched and inserted and held till no longer of interest. Since December, for example, it's been hockey stuff-- team rosters and the NHL collective barganing agreement-- to browse or refer to during games on TV. A proofreading copy of our band's timeline/history was in there for awhile; fitness articles printed from online to share with Hardi; recipes in mid-refinement to scribble notes after a bulk-cooking effort. Example: a low-cal, hi-protein breakfast casserole that no longer resembles the hi-fat, really yummy one we serve guests at Mudcat weekends. Sixteen serving-size recipe with nutrition analysis all calculatedm, in I think 4 flavor varieties. Takes about ten minutes now to whip one up for an hour's oven baking. No more excuses for bad or skipped brekkies-- from freezer to microwave to plate, zap! Portion control, the whole deal. Anyway, this "Current" binder is sort of a personal magazine kept always current and purged often, since it's very narrow, maybe 3/4 inch and doesn't hold more than a body can pay attention to. ~Susan |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Peace Date: 31 Jan 07 - 10:12 PM S'all I'm gonna say about it. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Bernard Date: 31 Jan 07 - 02:24 PM Yup - I tidy up on a 'need to know' basis... if I need to know where something is, I'll tidy up until I find it! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Grab Date: 31 Jan 07 - 12:17 PM To quote Bill Bryson:- "I only ever knew one really tidy journalist, and he was eventually arrested for molesting small boys." My problem isn't so much that I'm untidy, it's that I do things on *my* timescale, and that doesn't always involve putting them away immediately. Also that being an engineer, I'm a compulsive pack-rat - I've yet to find an engineer or anyone who does any kind of manual work who isn't. Graham. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Scrump Date: 31 Jan 07 - 11:11 AM What do you think I use them for Bernard? :-) (I prefer Booth's ones, more classy ;-)) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Bernard Date: 31 Jan 07 - 11:04 AM That's what Asda bags were made for!! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Scrump Date: 31 Jan 07 - 10:50 AM Messy, but part of the reason for that is lack of time. I have piles of paper that accumulates and needs to be filed, sorted etc., but there's always something more important to do (like falling asleep in front of the TV :-)) Every now and again, I get in the right mood and have a big tidy up, even though sometimes a pile of unsorted stuff just gets shoved somewhere else, out of the way. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: GUEST Date: 31 Jan 07 - 10:32 AM messy.....I try so hard to be tidy but it just never works. Congrats Khatt..lots of poly boxes for the baby toys |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: gnu Date: 29 Jan 07 - 03:33 PM sIx.... it's the Chevy. Go ahead. Throw anything you want in the box. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Slag Date: 29 Jan 07 - 03:14 PM CatsPHiddle, good job! Maybe LIFE will spontaneously appear! don't give up. Good point WYSIWYG. And yet clutter makes it harder to get the dirt up (I've decided to take up gardening after all!) and it becomes that Self-Organized Chaos stuff. LIFE will appear! I keep telling her it's a "work in progress"! Very, very slow progress. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Bill D Date: 29 Jan 07 - 02:46 PM "Everything must be somewhere..." Alfred North Whitehead - Process and Reality P.73 ...then he goes on at interminable length to explain just where 'where' might be. I read this in 1968, and have had trouble finding stuff ever since. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Bernard Date: 29 Jan 07 - 02:02 PM Yes, yes and 'not applicable'! At least I know things are exactly where I left them...! If only I could remember where... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: number 6 Date: 29 Jan 07 - 01:58 PM Hey gnu .... do you park your truck out on our street ... if so which one ?!?! biLL |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: gnu Date: 29 Jan 07 - 01:52 PM I also live alone. I WOULD like to keep things neat and clean, but I find this a good excuse to keep company away. "I'd invite youse over, but, the place is such a mess I'd be embarrsed." Hey, it works. Especially in the workshop. Friends and relatives used to come over and use my shop and tools. Not anymore. It's too clutterd and it almost seems as if someone had hidden tools and parts. And, the box of my truck is kept disgusting. Old rotten leaves and branches and whatever the wind blows in. And, at this time of year, ice and snow. Haven't had to move anyone or save them the $10 delivery charge on the new stove or fridge or whatever for ages. Their is a method to my messness. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Mrs.Duck Date: 29 Jan 07 - 01:49 PM As I stare at the square foot of carpet visible under the piles of shoes, boxes, toys, clothes and miscellaneous rubbish I think I'm a neat person who lies a lot! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: GUEST,maire-aine Date: 29 Jan 07 - 01:11 PM I'd be inclined to use the word "cluttered" rather than "messy". I keep way too much paper-- newspaper articles, recipes, etc., and I don't have anyplace to organize them. I've just boxed up my holiday decorations, but the boxes are in the middle of the floor in my spare bedroom. I have sheet music and song lyrics in piles all around the room, too. And my dining room table is the place where everything waits, until I find space for it. Maryanne |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: wysiwyg Date: 29 Jan 07 - 01:02 PM Neat or Messy? I'm not an Either-Or girl; I'm an And/And girl. So YES, as best suits my time, my resources, and my situation. I think my BEST organizing trick is to never organize papers that are in current use except to binderize them when they get bulky enough to need something to keep them together, like I just binderized our insurance matters. Till that time comes, it's mere pile-making time. For most of the paper that accumulates, I have learned that I will actually not know how I should organize them (what to keep/pitch), till long after. So I have a box-of-the-year out back in our storage area waiting to catch, at all times. As the house looks too messy, and as I finish projects that use those piles, I take the paper piles out there. They accumulate out there in a simple reverse-chronological order, most recent on top. When THAT pile is box-ful sized, I'll organize/purge all of that, label the box with the time span and subjects covered, and add it to the pile of labeled file boxes. I will NOT worry about how much more to organize it, till we move again. At that time I will go through all the year-boxes created since the last move, organize/purge them down to a smaller number, and take them along. I use that old stuff more frequently that I might have predicted, as old projects become new "work-product" samples for positions I'm interested in or new projects I take on. It isn't used often enough to warrant a full court press on filing, but it IS used often enough to hang onto it. The oldest ones are the most-purged, by now, but I have a hardcopy of everything I've ever created and every resource I've ever liked; I purge the older ones when we move, once we unpack, as a rainy-day project. I've been know to hire a teen helper to tote purged items to the trash heap and to carry the boxes to quick-sort, re-label, and re-stack. Newest boxes are on top; the boxes are stacked in rows I can access so that at no time do I need to get a box out from under more boxes than I can manage to move, by myself. The stacks are tidy; they look like rows of file cabinets. Boxes of books resourcing those time periods' interests are in there, too, once they are no longer needed in my "current" library. I purge the digital media of it as time and media change-- the DOS digital files are gone for example, but the hardcopy remains, scannable for text. Next time we move, Windows 3.1 files on floppies will go-- I already copied forward anything really important onto the hard disk and that's backed up too. And I always know where to immediately grab for whatever I was most recently working on, in case we have a fire or something (as we did once). ~Susan |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Catherine Jayne Date: 29 Jan 07 - 12:49 PM I come under the organised caos theory too, although I seem to be getting alot better. Moved into a new home in December and there's alot still in boxes while we decorate and have the new carpets fitted but on the whole we've kept the place pretty tidy. Now I suppose that will all change in a few months with baby toys and stuff! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: GUEST Date: 29 Jan 07 - 11:57 AM I keep my front step very tidy based on the theory that more folk pass by than come in. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Neat or Messy? From: Becca72 Date: 28 Jan 07 - 05:16 PM definitely messy, but I live alone so it's only me who has to worry about it. |
