Monday, May 17, 2010: Getting (Re)started

Apparently this is not the first time that I have set about "planning" to organize my time and physical surroundings. In fact, I found a journal that I wrote after my junior year in college. On May 17, 1970, exactly 40 years ago, I wrote the following:

...I need to "just basically GET ORGANIZED!

On May 18, 1970, I elaborated:

"If I want to get really organized, it's going to take more than just a couple hours. It's going to involve sorting through things in the attic, like mail I've gotten for the past 20 years until now, putting it all together, filing and sorting and putting it in a useable system. There's lots of resources there, but it's a matter of organizing (just like with tennis--I have lots of ability but it needs to be put into a workable framework and that takes patience to develop and the ability to determine priorities). Besides correspondence, I have books to sort through and put in shelves in Mary Jo's old room and we could work out a way to fix that up as an extra room. After dinner, we can work out a plan of how we want that room arranged and then if we spend a small time each day we can come up with something satisfactory."

Many things have changed in the past 40 years--I have finished college, played and taught tennis professionally, called lines for the Billie Jean King vs. Bobby Riggs match, lived in Texas, California, Illinois, Michigan, and now back in Ohio, got my Master's and Phd, and rode my bike cross country.

One thing has not changed--I still need to get organized!! Apparently, that has not been the priority that those other things were. It's time to make it a priority. Today it is.

After making a one page list of things that I need to do that are related to school, I came up with the following ideas to start in my living room:

1. Video tapes: need to be cleared out of the living room, labeled and put in a central location.
2. Magazines: sort and store.
3. Bills: file receipts for bills paid.
4. Paperwork: shred what is not needed; sort and organize notes, readings for future reference.
5. Clear out furniture.
6. Vacuum and shampoo carpet.
7. When all of above is completed: Buy a big-screen TV (in time for French Open)!

How does that sound?

Still organizing stuff in kitchen

This is how things looked earlier today. It actually got better and there was a method to my madness. The biggst obstacle today was playing a game on Facebook. I should have never started it! The after pictures will follow. And I am ready to work on classes as soon as I finish doing this.

Cleaning the cupboards

This is where I started today--cleaning out cupboards below kitchen counter--in the hope of putting stuff that was on the counter into the cupboards. Now that everything is out of the cupboards, I just need to figure out where to put everything. Hopefully I will have an "after" shot of this before this evening ends.

The Kitchen Counter

Below (left) is the "Before" picture of my kitchen counter. As you can tell, it was taken earlier in the day, when I had all kinds of high hopes for getting things organized, and before I spent too much time on my other blog. Below (right) is the after, at least for the time being. I obviously need to do more. So, it is "to be continued."

"Where did everything go," you asked?

Mostly into boxes or the trash... but, it's a start!

Update: Tuesday, December 30

For the past several days, I have been working on sorting my huge collection of magazines. To begin, I wanted to sort through all the Tennis Magazines which I have--dating back to 1966. While I do not have every single issue, it is useful to be able to go to them when I am working on an article about tennis, especially since I cannot always find such articles in Library research databases. Yesterday, I filed 6 bag-a-boxes full of magazines that filled 2 file drawers. Today, I sorted and filed 6 more bag-a-boxes that filled two more file drawers. I am now about mid-1990s and still have quite a few more magazines to go. I would like to finish organizing them by tomorrow. Then I still have a ton of other magazines that need to be filed--ESPN: The Magazine, Sports Illustrated, and many more.

Kitchen table covered with books

These two photos reflect the dilemma in my kitchen. The table is covered with books that I have used in writing the last several chapters on which I worked. But it has been several weeks since I finished the last one, and yet the stacks of books, note cards and other materials remain. The book case was filled before I started writing--containing books that I planned to use for the writing that I was doing. About half of the books were from the library, so I should be able to return some of those, rather than waiting until May and needing a shopping cart to return them.

For today, my assignment from Mary Jo is to spend 20 minutes cleaning and organizing a book case. So, I have chosen the above to do that. When I have finished, I will post the AFTER shot below this entry. It should look somewhat different (hopefully the table will as well!). Here goes:-)

Cluttered Counter: November 30, 2008

The above picture captures a shot of my cluttered counter in the kitchen. I took the photo while I was riding my exercise bike. It reveals where I need to begin to clear away the clutter. When I sent a copy to Mary Jo, she asked: how do you work in such clutter? I wrote back to say that I do not work IN it, I work AROUND it. That is how I have been doing it for a long time. But, that has obviously not worked so well. I started this blog well over a year ago, but I am returning to it in the hope that I can write more regularly and perhaps make progress, even if it is a little bit at a time.

I have found that I watch a lot of show on HGTV, like Clean House, and Clean Sweep. Part of my fascination with them is that I wish that someone would come in and help me to get organized--albeit I am not sure I am that committed to throwing things out, as people are required to do. I think I also rationalize that at least my house isn't as bad as some of those shown on the "messiest house in the country." But, as can be seen above, I do have a long way to go. I thought I might begin tonight but then got involved with grading papers--another thing that I really need to do. So, another day passes without making appreciable progress. So, hopefully tomorrow (which is now later today), I will try to spend at least 15 minutes working on that counter. Perhaps by the end of that time, I will be able to actually see the counter. That will be my goal for tomorrow.