Monday, April 17, 2006

Spring Cleaning




Radio Question of the Day:

A recent poll asked: During my Spring-cleaning, I'd like to throw out all of my significant other's _____...what was the most popular answer?

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I'm busy with Spring-cleaning. Yuck. Housework is like stringing beads…without putting a knot at the end of the string. Everything you do just has to be done again. And again. And again. Like beads dropping off onto the floor.

Where does dust come from anyway? Turns out that dust is made up of all kinds of stuff. Some of it comes from you, some comes from the ocean, and some even comes from space! Anything that is dry and light enough to be blown around and carried by a light breeze can be called dust. The grossest stuff that is a part of dust (it seems to me) is tiny insect bodies, but dust is also soil, pollen, and dead skin cells from people and animals. Dust is other disgusting junk that I don't want to think about. Don't get me started on dust mites. Shiver. They show those on television sometimes. Gross. I asked you nicely not to get me started on them! You guys.

So a lot of what is dust and mess in general is of course, caused by people. There might be one-too-many people livin' in this house. Problem is, which one?

My answer to the question of the day would be books and magazines and pamphlets and just paper stuff in general. But the most popular answer was clothes. My husband's belly grows at a rate that prevents most of his stuff getting that old these years. He used to keep clothing forever, but it's not a big problem these days. His memory is a big help too. That Niks. He doesn't have much memory left. If I don't like something, I disappear it. He forgets he had it. Works like a dream for clothes. Not so much for books. *sigh*

Got get back to work here.

31 comments:

Kristie said...

ya, i am not a fan of spring cleaning. Somehow, even tho i dont live at my mom's anymore, i still get sucked into helping her too! I would have said paper stuff too. And mites are grooosss!!

Rachel said...

So there is something good to be said for someone losing their memory!! LOL

Spring cleaning...I agree with you...Major Yuck! I think dust just breeds with more dust, etc, etc, etc. I mean clean it up today and it comes right back. There is no stopping the stuff. I liked how you described it, like beads falling off the other end. Exactly.

OldLady Of The Hills said...

Oh yes.thge dust and the mites! HELP! I too hate that these thingfs have to be done over and over and over and...so on...
It is just an endless cycle, isn't it?
I admire you for doing Spring cleaning...I am talking about it, but that's about as far as I've gotten...just yada yada yada!

btw: I have put up 100 things about me in honor of my 100th post! If you get a moment, do drop by! Always a great pleasure to visit you Lucy...I can count on a smile and a laugh, which is a great thing to know you are going to have...Thanks for that!

Anonymous said...

Yea - here at our home - Old clothes..and books, magazines are our biggest piles. Tom gets free shirts @ work... i told him you need a separate dresser just for those. Many he has never worn - and probably won't. I should just haul them down to the Salvation Army. Moving helps clean out clutter...

Speaking of dust..your post reminded me of a guy i use to work with -- he always wondered about smokeless ash trays - specifically Where does it go? ha ha ha. Beats me.

Logophile said...

Spring cleaning, ack!
Lucy, I can't believe you would even bring UP such a thing, I expected better of you.
Wasn't your fault though, really, was it, those darn radio question people!
I have a dust allergy so they always get into way too much detail about dust, eeeeoooowwww.
My honey doesn't seem to keep too much of anything, neatnik that he is, I am sure if you asked him he would have a different answer regarding MY things.

The Lazy Iguana said...

You think you have dust. I have four cats. I gave up trying to battle dust, and adopted a policy of living with acceptible levels of dust.

However, on a windy day you CAN open up your windows and beat on stuff. The dust blows out. Hurricanes are good for something.

Jennytc said...

Dust mites? My partner was talking about making pets of them the other day. He was playing with a digital computer microscope at the time. Luckily, they were all camera shy! Interesting blog!

Anonymous said...

Spring cleaning...yuck! Remember when we used to take down the drapes, move the bed, dust down the walls...who has time anymore? Years ago I asked my Mom why the faucets in Grandmother's bathroom were so dirty. Her answer? "She can't see that well, honey, so she doesn't know their dirty." So glad I've joined the "can't see that well" crowd! LOL. The only good thing about getting older -- you can't see the dirt!

Trucker Pete said...

You mean we were supposed to fill in the blank? We can't just get rid of all our significant others? :P

Peter said...

Thank goodness it's autumn here not spring, I can put off spring cleaning for another 6 months.

dddragon said...

What the rest don't know is that YOU LIKE TO CLEAN.

you know it's true. all three of your daughters have stories to tell ...

bornfool said...

I don't have a good memory either. I bet my wife is pulling that disappearing trick on me and I don't even know it.

Libby said...

yes, lucy likes to clean...but it's easy to clean when you have kids...(wash the walls...scrub the bathroom...make sure there are no cobwebs in the corners...)
i said old t-shirts for the radio question!

Anonymous said...

cleaning? aieeeee!! i used to be so good at it, and then, something happened. don't remember what. (there's my age showing... hee hee)

my sweet husband used to have a bad problem leaving things out, so one day, i literally took everything out of his drawers and closets, and left all his clothes piled up all over the bedroom. the look on his face when he got home was pretty funny (why did i do it? dunno, pms, perhaps?). he did get the message, and started putting stuff away from that point on. now i'm the one who leaves junk all over the place--lucky for me, tho', he's too forgiving to try and teach me the same lesson! (why he's still married to me is anybody's guess!) : D

Doug The Una said...

What are you doing with Spring cleaning. The way I hear it you keep clean all winter long. Like coyotes do rabbits or vultures hunters.

OldHorsetailSnake said...

You know, of course, that the bigger the belly the more skin there will be floating around in the air. Belly button dust can be the worst kind...

Jay Noel said...

You "disappear" it? Oh that's classic!

Saur♥Kraut said...

Oh I am so in agreement with clothes. I don't do spring cleaning (though god knows I should!) but I was just talking to my friend and assistant, Zen Buddhist, about how I am just itching to get rid of some of The Other Half's 350+ t-shirt collection.

Lila said...

Good luck! Yeah, I'm starting to purge. I can pawn some stuff off on the church yard sale; other stuff I'll eBay.

Jamie Dawn said...

Cleaning is a neverending task. When I get serious about it, I usually wish I would have just kept the closet doors shut and those messy areas as they were.
The best part about spring cleaning is when it is all finished. You get to enjoy it for about a day until things start getting messed up again.

Tom & Icy said...

Just get a couple of those huge jet fans and open all the doors and windows and blow everything that isn't nailed down out of the house! Then start over again collecting new stuff and dust. Stuff is just big dust.

Anonymous said...

Too much dust in my house. And even knowing what it's made up of probably isn't going to change that, sadly. Even when I clean it, it just comes BACK!

Unknown said...

Hi Lucy - long time no chat. I'm Charity - the long disappeared blogger who used to write All Life's Little Adventures. Just wanted to stop in and let you know I read the last few months worth of entries - very entertaining reading but I miss the stories about Momma! (pout) Anyway, still entertaining! Take care!

Charity

Lainey said...

Who started the concept of Spring Cleaning anyway? Yuck!

Anyway, Texas Goodies tagged me and I'm tagging you. Go to my blog for the details.

Happy Spring!

Ivy the Goober said...

OH, I guessed wrong. I was going to say "body parts"

lime said...

i was going to just delete the space....bad lime, very bad lime

BarbaraFromCalifornia said...

Oh, can I identify!

Clothes, and papers that have been stored for such a long time!

GABRIEL C. ZOLMAN said...

My significant other used to throw out all my hopes and dreams.

That's ok, though; I wasn't using them.

(Yeah...I'm back)

)+(

Hale McKay said...

I guessed significant other's significant other. Oh, I knew it wasn't right. I didn't want to say pictures and letters of "former" significant others - because I thought it might be right.
...So much for thinking....

LZ Blogger said...

The "Husband's Belly" comment was CLASSIC! ~ jb///

Miz BoheMia said...

Ha, ha, haaa!

Actually I am an organizing and categorizing freak! I actually went through his closet and took out all things old, worn down, outdated and things I simply did not like... it yielded about 10 garabage bags of clothes and shoes and off they went to Goodwill!

Now he has succumbed to my fashion sensibilities and I choose his clothes too...

yeah, a bit of a control freak here but I lucked out with a great man! Unfortunately he keeps bringing unnecessary items home and I have to figure out how to make them disappear!