Winter clean

I've been blitzing the house for the last half a week or so to get it ready for the Crazie Party on Friday. It's been much needed because since my last relationship broke up a few years ago, I'd been a bit static and not really looking after things all that well. Which includes myself plus the house. Also, the chores arrangement before the breakup hadn't really worked that well. Evil Ex was supposed to be looking after the general cleaning type stuff while I did maintenance and surprise, surprise, washing up and cooking. So the house had got into a fairly poor state.

It's happily a bit different now. I've not been on the cleanup job all hours except sleep and work, keeping a little bit of time back for games, film and relaxation. But I'm pretty happy with the progress so far. There's still work to do though, the vacuum has been waiting to come out until most of the clutter is out of the way. No point picking up the clutter to vacuum if the clutter is going to get put right back again.

Bathroom - it's not done yet but that room is starting to freak me out a bit. My loo has been described as requiring napalm, a hammer and complete replacement (beyond hope I believe was one description). I'd gotten kinda used to that, so to see a 90% clean loo is a bit disturbing to a brain that likes to see the same patterns ! But I can live with being freaked out by that and my brain will quickly adjust to a loo that I wouldn't be ashamed to get used by other people. There's still work to do though and I need some stronger scrubbers ...

Living room - there's a clearer path through now ! Although my pooter corner behind the sofa is still cluttered. This is the room in heaviest need of the vacuum cleaner, which will be Tuesday's job when I'm not in work. However, it's easier to get to the back doors now and all 3 of my soft chairs are available again and by Friday, I'll have them moved into positions where they can see the telly. Electronic clutter has been moved out of the way too, I gather wires to connect anything to everything and most of those are now out of the way.

The light fitting is now not hanging off the ceiling by one screw (out of two!) and my two PC Box Boxes are now clear of garbage. I use the boxes that PC cases come in for tables beside the sofa. They're just about the right size for a pint glass and a packet of biscuits without being Too Big. By the way, my Dining Table just happens to be a plank of wood from the back of my desk that had to be be removed to allow a PC to go in the bit that a PC is supposed to go in. It works ... especially as there's not really the space in my living room to get a proper table in.

I'll still be keeping the two PC Corpses in the room. One is perfect for standing on to change lightbulbs (they don't make 'em like they used to!) and I'll put the side plates back on the other. They'll both be available on Friday as tables for drinkz n popcorn n feet. It's going to be a shame to chuck out the Quality Street and Liz Shaw mints but with Best Before Dates of 2005, they aren't going to be around where little kiddies can get their hands on them. (And so Big Quality Street Addicted Kiddies can't be tempted either !)

Kitchen is also on the list for blitzing and I started on that tonight with some overdue scrubbing of the sink ... That's another one that'll benefit from far better brushes than I have available at the moment but I have time to get those later in the week. Tesco better have some good stuff in stock on Wednesday :-)

So - good progress so far, house is no longer in a Repel Boarders state but there's still lots of work to do. Next job after this one - clear the back yard enough to let someone in to fix the SkyDish. But that's something that can wait a bit.

It's long overdue but it'll be worth it when it's done. 3 years is far too long to stay rooted in a routine that allows fixing the neglect to become hard work. It's always easier to keep up with the chores than to be forced to put excessive effort into cleaning up later.

PS I'm not so sure that scrubbing the sink with cleany type stuff was such a good idea considering I have a bit of a poisoned finger ! Time to get that under the hot tap to make it feel a little better.