How I spent my first MHGS Tuesday

Not how I wanted.

Had a decent breakfast. Made some killer chicken salad and a sandwich on chiabatta for lunch. Packed it carefully and then left it in the refrigerator when I came in to work. Spent most of the afternoon trying to move stuff from one office to another, wondering why, oh, why do we keep all this stuff, but not quite willing to take time to work out what's worth keeping or not. I guess that's why. Came up with a plan to get rid of stuff really nobody wants, which was roundly rejected by the person who I charged with doing it, but then somebody else came up with a better plan, so fine. Main thing, it's not my problem any more.

Then, towards the bottom of a pile of boxes to be moved, I hit a bankers box, you know the kind, with a stickie on it that says, get this, "SHRED". At the bottom of a pile of boxes in an office being used partly as an office and partly as a storage room. "SHRED".

So I spent about half an hour of my life shredding papers going back to *1993*. Honestly. a) what were these things doing in storage in the first place, and b) why was it my job to shred them? But I realized if I didn't, no one would, so I did. At least my colleagues, once they realized I was missing, took it upon themselves to move the rest of the stuff off the bookcases. But sheeshwhiz.

So I was working on my goals, while I was standing at the shredder which for some reason always makes my back hurt after a while, but what I came up with was the themes for my administration as acting head:

1. get rid of stuff no one in range has an earthly use for
   
2. get rid of stuff that someone in range *might* have an earthly use for, but is easily and inexpensively replaced when and if such a use is discovered
   
3. of the remainder, find a way to arrange for individuals to
   
   
   
   1. liberate things to their own private collections
      
   2. nominate stuff for public use, like intro textbooks, workbooks, stuff like that
      
   3. nominate stuff that could usefully have a home elsewhere, like the language departments, anthropology, etc.
      
   4. for anything that remains, arrange for them to go to the library, where they can decide whether they're worth keeping or not
      
   and finally
   
4. get rid of stuff no one in range has an earthly use for
   

Part of me really wants to find a way to apply this to my personal life. For instance the elliptical trainer I have which is still too hard on my knees, and basically just sits collecting dust and getting in the way; the gazelle trainer which I like but basically just sits holding laundry until I come up with something else to do with, and anyway could be moved out and give me space to do yoga at home; the dead TV and ancient computer sitting in storage waiting for me to take them to the e-dump. That sort of thing.

I haven't been keeping up with my 10 minutes of stuff, although I have been better about throwing stuff out and getting or keeping stuff in useful piles, but I really have to get off the stick, 10 minute-wise. So here's my goals.

15! minutes of domestic activity a day;
30 minutes of domestic activity at least once in the next week;
and getting the tray of my humidifier into the dishwasher sometime this week, and clearing the tabletop of my bistro table to the point where I could actually wipe it off and serve a meal on it. Haven't see the whole surface of that table in years. Oh, and get my new vacuum cleaner out of the trunk of my car and into the apartment. Not that I have enough floor to vacuum yet, but maybe having it staring at me will be incentive. Certainly can't be less incentive than sitting in the trunk of the car.