Suited up and ready to work

Big progress on both project fronts last week!

First up, at home: Emma and I loaded 900 pounds (literally 900) of stuff into neighbor Jodi's utility trailer, and then Frank and Emma and I unloaded all 900 pounds into the transfer station pit and watched their heavy machinery make that 900 pounds look like tidbits. Always an interesting experience going to the dump!

All that quantity of stuff came from nearly 30 years of... not hoarding exactly. It is more laziness or a lack of ruthlessness about getting rid of stuff. In any case, Frank and I share the trait to varying degrees, and there is a lot of never or no longer valuable stuff in our house, yard, and garage.

But its quantity is greatly reduced now! Feels great! We cleaned out under the deck (swing set, a muffler, old tiles, a dessicated Christmas tree, and other flotsam and jetsam), hauled about 8 eighty pound set-in-the-bag bags of concrete from under the rose of Sharon, finally parted with a bunch of toddler toys that have been rotting and rusting away in the play log cabin (and making a cozy home for ginormous spiders), and loaded up a bunch of stuff that we have been pre-dumping into the garage for the past several months (old carpet pad, old subfloor, old toilet seats, a dead boom box, and much, much more).

On the wedding front, Frank has ordered a suit and I have ordered four (yes, four) dresses. We'll know this week if any of these options will be fabulous enough. If not, we'll break down and do some in-person shopping.

MJ and I met out at the farm for another work day. Unfortunately, this was the day after the aforementioned 900-pound dump run, so I was only good for about three hours. I knocked down a sagging section of fence and weeded around the play area, and then I did the very satisfying job of cleaning out a couple of overgrown horseshoe pits that MJ hopes will get used during the reception. Wheeling my debris piles off to the pre-dump pile about did me in, so I called it a day!

And then yesterday was Seattle Pride. Niece Maddy and I marched with the ACLU, had a blast, and about killed our feet. My Fitbit tells me I walked more than 7 miles yesterday, between pre-, parade, and post- walking. We finished off the day by walking her dog, Kodi, to my house for (our) dinner, and then she walked him home again! The woman is a badass.

So, today, I'm having a much needed rest day. Frank is off, so that worked out nicely, and we've had a lovely day together. We spent some of it chatting with Koyo about his experience of Pride (positive) and other random topics (he learned the phrase "speaking of which" today, which tells you a little what the conversation was like). Then I ran a few errands, which mostly involved sitting in the car. Perfect!

A tale of two summers

I have two big projects going on this summer: emptying out our house in anticipation of our departure, and helping to prep the farm for MJ's wedding.

The former had been delayed by number of factors (Frank's bday party, LIFE is Good, trailer swap, and, oh yeah, my procrastination), but I got it underway in earnest these past couple weeks by cleaning out Koyo's room (as it's now called with the arrival for the summer of a  Japanese student--Frank's friend from Kendo--here until he leaves for UND in August) and starting to empty out the tremendously overstuffed laundry room.

Koyo's room is where we had stored a whole bunch of things (things we considered "keepers" before we decided to hit the road again, including our 800+ VHS tapes) while Frank redid the flooring in the basement family room. So that was a big job. Some got relegated to the donation pile I'm growing near our front door, and a lot got moved elsewhere in the house.

In case you're wondering, after much debate, we're keeping most of the VHS collection. VCRs can still be found, and it would cost thousands to re-create the library on DVD or cloud. But problem: where to store them. Solution: the murder room. It's a cubby in the basement, behind the furnace. It had been open to the furnace area, but when Frank built the second closet in Koyo's room, it became its own little space behind its own little door. Chloe and Casey took one look and dubbed it the murder room, and so it is now named.

Did I say emptying Koyo's room was a big job? Ha. Yeah. The laundry room puts it to shame. Our laundry room is large, with eight big deep shelves. LOTS of storage space. And we have used it well, most recently as a dumping ground for "keepers" scavenged from all over the house. The room had become so crowded that it was down to a single walkway to the machines. Not cool.

But it's better already. A significant portion of the keepers turned out not to be keepers after all. We decided to keep our LPs due to sentimental value (plus, they sound better, says Frank) and part with our cassette tapes. The LPs joined the VHS tapes in the murder room.

A significant portion of what's left in the laundry room (not including sporting goods and Christmas decorations) is trash, not even worth donating after nearly thirty years of dust, damp, and neglect. I see at least one dump run in my future.

As for the aforementioned sporting goods and Christmas decorations, I'm ready to be done with 90% of it. We'll see how Frank and MJ feel.

The last category in there is paint and other home-improvement supplies. I suspect at least half of that can go, but Frank is more familiar with what's there.

As for my other project, I had my first workday at the farm yesterday. MJ and I worked together to rake out the amphitheater, bridal walkway, and play area, and we strolled all the grounds making my assignment list. I'm the only member of the crew who doesn't work, so I'll be out there on my own some days. Pity me: all alone on wooded acreage with a couple of friendly dogs.

It's a hard life, but somebody's gotta live it.

How it will be

How it was

Tent trailer in action

Farewell, old friend

We dropped our tent trailer at its new home today. Sad to see it go, happy to see it already getting some love from its new owners (especially the 10yo!), exciting to take this step toward our new adventure.

Onward!

It's here!

But we're too tired to enjoy it! 😀

Book review: The Five Second Rule

The Five Second Rule is by Mel Robbins, a no-nonsense self-help guru I think I'd enjoy having a beer with. She mentioned the five second rule almost in passing in her TedX talk and was flooded with comments from people it helped. So, she published this book.

The TedX bit is very short. The book should have been shorter. It's full of (cringe-inducingly unedited) testimonials, and Mel made the unfortunate decision to introduce the testimonials by telling you what they say. Then you read it yourself. So, especially the early chapters *really* drag without giving you any great quantity of practical info.

The later chapters are better, and the book as a whole is, well, a miracle cure for procrastination.

When I started reading the book, I was procrastinating many things, but the most public and pressing thing was my one-hour talk for LIFE is Good Unschooling Conference. I had nothing done, just a collection of links and some half-assed scribbled notes. I sat down with the book one day, got about ten pages in, and then got up and started writing my talk. I made significant and high quality progress on that talk and its accompanying slides for three days in a row, and then it was DONE. What's more, it was done two days before my personal deadline and five days before the actual presentation. If you know me, you know how unprecedented this is.

And I hadn't finished the book! The Five Second Rule is life-changing. Skim or ignore the boring, repetitive bits, pick out the good parts version, and watch things start to happen.

Also, definitely do the free 31-day coaching Mel links to in the author blurb area. Good stuff!

Spoiler: One of the lessons in the mentoring asks you to do something you've been procrastinating. That lesson hit my inbox maybe ten days after I read the book. Friends, there wasn't anything. I couldn't think of anything I was procrastinating because I'D DONE OR STARTED EVERYTHING. Seriously. Miracle cure.

Cleaning is hard

I cleaned 14 years of road dirt out of the tent trailer today. So. Tired. But it looks good. Then I closed it up. It's not the last time--we'll open it up again to give our friends who are buying it a setup/takedown lesson--but it was the last time with it as *ours*. Bittersweet.

BUT that gets us one big step closer to moving it out of the back yard and moving the new trailer in. We pick up the new one tomorrow!!

After cleaning, I took Rigby to the vet for her annual exam and vaccinations. I've also (today and previously) stocked up on food, flea meds, and kitty toothpaste, so she is cleared for launch! I'm really hoping she'll immediately find the new trailer homey and more secure than she found the tent trailer. (Have I mentioned it has walls?!) I trust she'll adapt in any case. What choice does she have?

I was going to wash the exterior of the tent trailer tonight (we have light until 9:30 these days), but I am beat. ¡Mañana!

Instead, I vacuumed out the basement bedroom, which we have been readying for our summer guest, Koyo. He's a student here and a friend of Frank's from Kendo. He'll stay with us for two months, starting next week, until he moves to his new school in North Dakota (brrr). I'm nervous about having someone in our space again, especially given how busy this summer is, but he's extremely nice and Frank and I are both really looking forward to learning more about Nihon.

And now I'm drinking some of the beer our bandmates left as tribute and pondering all the goodness of the weeks ahead, god willing and the creek don't rise.

We join our story already in progress

If I try to catch this blog up with everything we've done since the last post... No, there's too much. Let me sum up.

Currently:
- Frank and I and Rigby the cat are living at home, cleaning out our lives.
- Frank has two new knees and is working part-time to supplement our income. He just celebrated his 70th birthday in grand style, with a birthday bash where he got to provide the musical entertainment (along with some fellow musicians and his faithful Hot Backup Chicks).
- I am still joyfully, gainfully unemployed--coming up on three years post-MS. Wh00t! At the moment, I'm playing the role of a 50s housewife and loving it. #whoknew
- MJ is getting married in August! She and her fiancé, Joe, live in a cute apartment in Arlington near their pack of friends.
- Chloe is coming up on her two-year anniversary as a resident of Minneapolis. She recently completed her first term at U of M on her way to obtaining her BA in history.

After MJ's wedding, Frank and I are hitting the road again. To that end, we are trading in the tent trailer for a travel trailer. Walls! Just park and sleep! Such luxury! A local unschooling family is buying the tent trailer, so that feels good. Rigby will come with us and will just have to adapt. MJ and Joe will rent our house, lose their commutes, and get a dog.

We have no itinerary. We don't care much where we go. Everyplace is just right.