Mundane but necessary tasks

 no matter how you dress them up, are just that – mundane but necessary.

I’ve been in my ‘pad’ for three and a half months now, and while I am very very settled, lurking like the 20 foot Gorilla in my spare room/grandchildren’s bedroom cum study are three boxes.

 

Three unpacked boxes.

 

To be fair to myself I did unpack them when I got here and then repacked them! I sorted them in my head and now two of them are waiting on me to purchase some key pieces of Shabby Chic furniture that I have decided the spare room/grandchildrens bedroom cum study need.

So I had one box, one quite large box of a mixture of clothing that needed to be rehomed in my new Oak Bedroom Suite (I say new, but that too is now some three months old).

Time is flying past and while I can account for my time in the last three months, I really thought that room would be finished by now.

Hence todays task was to unpack box three.

I’m sure I’m not alone in this but why does unpacking and reminiscing come hand in hand. Do you know how much time ‘reminiscing’ adds to  a one hour task? About three hours!!

Yes it took me four hours to unpack one (albeit quite large box) of clothes. First I picked up the Black and White Jumper I brought on a whim in Portobello Road. I remembered the day well; I had made plans to meet some friends at Liverpool Street for afterwork drinks, and thought my outfit might not be warm enough come the time we embarked on our journey home. I kicked myself for not bringing a jacket and being seduced by the morning sun. So off I trotted to Portobello Road, and very uncharacteristically of me – I purchased the first item I saw and liked. Normally I view the item and then tread the whole of the Mall, High Road, Market and end up buying the first thing I saw. But on that day I just bought it – Rebel (lol). So I made a new home for that and other jumpers from the box.

Then it was PJ’s and what I like to call Lounge Wear (infact this consists of a bunch of old Tshirts – all with a story). So the first one out of the box was my darling Arsenal Tshirt (not a strip shirt) the tshirt that commerated our Golden year 2004 – 2005 the year we had a run of 49 games unbeaten. The year that most Arsenal supporters still dream will happen again every time we win more than two games in a row. That season was phenomenal, I had my Football Academy at the time and at least 70% of the boys were Arsenal supporters, that was probably one of our best (not the best) seasons too. One of the boys dads worked in a print factory and I remember the Friday night at football training when he turned up with the said Tshirt. I pulled it on over whatever I was wearing that evening and it became my favourite Tshirt from that point on.

To be fair when I looked at it today, it looked as shabby now as Arsenals past few seasons, but I am a fan through the good and the bad and so I found a draw for my PJ’s and Lounge wear excluding the favourite Tshirt which I had put on for old times sake.

Considering how many boxes I used in my house move, and the amount of money I paid for a month’s storage, I was quite gutted to again realise that at least 20% of the contents of that box were in fact rubbish. Well not real rubbish, but certainly items I would not wear again. But that takes time too, you know making that heart wrenching decision to throw an item of clothing away. You have to try it on, have the conversation with yourself ‘is it still fashionable’? can I still get away with this? And when you have to do this for 10 or 12 items you can see how some of those additional three hours were spent this afternoon.

But its done! And I feel GOOD, that is one of the great consolations for completing mundane tasks, you feel good afterwards and you don’t have them hanging over you.

After all that hard work, I couldn’t be bothered to cook, so I treated myself to a takeaway and spent the rest of the evening lounging around.

Goodnight people