Scattered

I'm a clutterer, and I'm drowning in it.

Much of the last week or two, and particularly the last day or so, have been very frustrating. I can't seem to focus on where I put things long enough to remember when I need them again, even over just a few minutes. Recently we've done a bit of 'shove it into a box and put it aside' sort of tidying for visitors, and I've been trying to sort out those boxes/baskets so that the contents can resume life in their proper spots. As you may know, this usually leads to bigger messiness than you start with, since the piles of similar items multiply and you are left with trying to figure out homes for some which were previously living in clutter.

What really got to me on Saturday was my inability to find a couple of circular knitting needles I've arranged to sell to another knitter. I *know* that, the day we agreed on the deal, I pulled those two out of the group of needles I want to sell and wrapped them into a nice little circle. But what the heck did I do with them after that? I looked everywhere on Saturday and even hauled DH into the hunt Sunday. No such luck. As it happens, I did have duplicates, so after a bunch of fumbling around and semi-stupid emails to the buyer, the needles will be on their way to their new home tomorrow.

I've felt as lacking in concentration as in the worst days of my stress overload. I'm not on drugs, well, not recreational drugs, and my overall mood has been good for months and months. That's not to say that I haven't had some down days, because I have. But the downs are pretty shallow these days. I've figured out - with good help from friends - how to set up this blog. I can type coherent sentences, I can knit cables on my gift scarf - which does require some concentration. So what's with the constant 'where did I put that thing I just had?'

So, let's count the good, finished and/or organized bits. I've tossed a lot of clothes I haven't worn in a couple of years, a big box full. I restored order to the sheets and towels in the linen closet, including culling out 2 old sets of sheets and one truly ancient set of towels, also to be given away. Out of the umpteen hundred bits of paper with telephone numbers and addresses that have been living on the desk and shoved into my phone book, I have re-done both my main phone book and the little one that lives in my bag. My friends and family, my repair resources and my knitting friends and LYSs, all neatly alphabetized and legible. More order. More order is good.

I still have to work my way through the remaining piles of stuff and getting them back to where they're in some order. Before the cats take up sleeping on them and turning them dark with shed hair. I have to re-think the bookshelf storage for my looseleaf binders full of patterns and collections of knitting magazines, since those have overflowed their space, too.

I can find the big stuff, like towels; it's hard for them to hide. Circular needles, well, those don't take up enough space to be seen under a magazine. Sigh. In case you're interested, I'm de-stashing my Addi Turbo circulars, and they're for sale. I've added a link to email me, so I hope it works.

Progress on tan scarf? Some.