Junk Drawers

 It's been a month since we closed the shop to customers and said good bye to our staff and a few days since the shop has been completely cleaned out and it's that time to see what true full time retirement will really feel like. Before I get to that I want to do a big shout out to the 2 young fellows who came to the shop to take the unsellable items (yes, we even had a dishwasher at the shop). If you need to clean out I'd suggest calling on these guys at Got Junk, they did a fantastic job. They had called when they said they would, they showed up when they said they would and they were fast and efficient - very affordable to. 

So after cleaning out the shop, tossing what wasn't sellable and selling what I could, I came home and looked at my house. Did I need everything I had in 3 (not 1 but 3) junk drawers? The answer was no. So as my new Kitty Mai Tai (adopted from Save - A Friend to Homeless Animals) sat high on the kitchen chair watching me, I empty each drawer and organized each into 3 different themes. 

1. Office Supplies - this included working pens (and I mean working, I must have thrown out 40 pens), scotch tape, scissors, staplers, paper clips, rubber bands, notepads and post-it notes, address book (more on that later), push pins, etc. 

2. User Manuals - I went through each one and matched them up with all our current appliances.  I could not believe that I had a manual for an outdoor grill that was 3 grills ago not to mention for TV's that are long gone. We've been in our home 27 years so it's understandable that when we get a new appliance, we just added it to the drawer while not taking the old one out. These take up most of one drawer but it's handy to have them there instead of filing them away somewhere. You never know when you need to read up on your dishwasher, TV or frig. 

3. Miscellaneous - in this drawer is really all the odds and ends stuff like extra ear buds, pieces to the hubby's new telescope, etc. 

Ah, this really does feels like retirement. Having time for such frivolous pursuits. You might laugh but after working 6 days a week for years and years just having 3 days off in a week feels like a vacation. Obviously, it took my one day off (assuming I had one day off, which did not always happen) to do grocery shopping and laundry while sneaking in some fun time to meet up with friends, go to a winery or just veg out on the couch. 

I've had many people ask me what I'm going to do and the answer is I'm not sure but so far, it's been fun to have a more flexible schedule and that was while still going to the shop to clean out, wait for people who were picking up items we were selling, etc. We've done more this past month with family, friends and just sitting (in our rocking chairs, of course) on our back deck listening to our new little outdoor boom box. 

For now, we are just going to take it day by day but I have to say - thank goodness I finally cleaning out and organized those Junk Drawers!!