Cleaning this damn place

It’s kinda stupid how quickly one can let things go. And I try to be regular with the cleaning of the apartment. But it’s not as easy as mom made it look when I was young. Kitchen dishes stack up quickly. Dust returns 5 seconds after you dust it off. And the cat just runs around on purpose, I am sure, to add fur everywhere. Anyway, this week it’s cleaning time for this damn place.

The last month I have made a group on the bookmark section of my browser for lifehacker and a few more awesome sites, and went back a few months and through top stories and readers tips, and what not. And learned a few new tricks that are affordable, time saving and give excellent results. Together with traditional knowledge and simply “doing the actual cleaning” I have an army of material to use against the unclean apartment. Yes baby, go time!

Oh, and I bought a big writing block with a medium thick sharpie so when I get a thought about ‘oh those boxes need to go downstairs tomorrow’, I can write it down, even though I am doing something else. It feels accomplished having a list of a few small to big things and you can just strike through the items as you complete them. It adds to the motivation to just write stuff down, and pick something once in a while. And for me personally, that’s the trick that did it. I’ll explain.

My motivation is gone when I have to clean. Oh my gawd, look at this pile of dishes, ugh, I don’t want to do them, I am doing laundry already, and I have to clear the litter box. etc. <- Just an example.

To get motivation I just have to wake up a bit early, do some work, do the essentials and take it easy for a while. Then I just update the list with one or two items, and pick the toughest or the easiest (depending on free time available) and just do it. Seeing the list grow might sound negative, but I look at it from a positive angle. It means I already have stuff done and find more things to do. This lets me to complete them in the near future. Having them organized is better than not even thinking about it. Having items done, is better than not having something done at all. This is a positive motivator for me. It makes me feel ‘okay’ about just taking 15 minutes to do some dishes.

I simply can’t wake up, start cleaning and stop when I have to go to bed. I am not that person, I can’t force myself. I might do it once or twice a year just to ‘catch up’ on everything I am behind on. But it is like a punishment. Who wants to feel punished?

So yesterday (Monday) I went to the store, and instead of cleaning, I invested my time buying cleaning equipment, latex gloves, that cleaning liquid to help clean sink, shower, toilet, etc. And extra stuff so my stock is stocked again. Anyway, prepared myself for taking it serious. I threw the trash out, went to the store, got the stuff, got home. Organized it, and started on a few lists. Big things, small things, buy things, sell things, and a few more like those. But also an important one: repeat things, one for weekly, and one for monthly. I know, cliche. But, don’t mock me (just yet). When it comes to computers, I have it in my mind, the overview of what is required to code something, design something, or whatever, an overview, easy peasy. I don’t have that with offline stuff. There are of course things I do daily, like the litter box, feed the cat, hehe, stuff like that. Essentials are always done. But somehow .. doing those dishes, doesn’t seem like an essential. The individual lists are just to get me started, to get it organized. And the repeat lists are just to help me figure out and get that overview. There are simply enough times when it’s night and I am tired, but can’t sleep. And I just want to go do something. Just picking up a list of seeing ‘oh yeah, I could check if any of the mail can go into maps’ as an item, gets something done.

It’s Tuesday now. And while I walk around I spend more time thinking about what I can do, or what has to be done. And once in a while I note it down. And when I do so, I pick something and go do that. It’s done. Done = Done. And then I just ignore it again for a while, until something pops in my mind and I want to write it down.

The plan is to just do it for a bunch of days, so through this week. And force myself to not do something on Saturday. Then pick it up on Sunday and until Friday. So catching up on the Monday I missed this week.  Hopefully forcing myself a few weeks to at least have one or two things done (additionally to whatever I already do daily), helps me to get this place organized and cleaned.

I am not just talking about dishes of course, but also about dusting off, vacuuming, putting furniture in their place. Putting administration away, pay the bills, work on getting an overview of finances. Organize the closet where I have my clothes. Sell stuff I don’t use. Buy stuff I am out off. Etc.

Writing this blog is probably just for me. Once this blog is out there, I sort of have to keep myself to it. So here we go *click*


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