Us 1, Clutter 0

Yesterday was a major blow to clutter in our household. Armed with four family members on a de-cluttering spree and a large, empty dump trailer, the junk around here didn't stand a chance! As much as I hated to do it, I did have to step in, though and put a damper on the festivities. In an effort to get Andy's room de-cluttered, Jerry told Andy he would park the trailer under his bedroom window and Andy could have a grand time tossing things out the window. Andy thought this was a wonderful idea, and I would have too, except that I was afraid that Andy would toss the things that he didn't care for - but that we still needed - like portions of his curriculum for next year! I finally agreed to the arrangement with the stipulation that I had final veto power about the things being tossed out. Eventually, though, the trailer got full before we got to that point, so we haven't done that yet.

It was kind of a sad day on Friday. Andy's goldfish died. I had thought that the fish was getting sick earlier in the week because he would just lie on the bottom of the tank and didn't seem to want to eat. He used to love frozen peas, but he wouldn't even eat them. On Thursday I changed his entire tank, scrubbing everything, reconditioning the water and changing the filter, but I guess it didn't help. We think the fish died of swim bladder disease. Andy's last fish died of the same thing, too. When fish have this disease, they can't really control their swimming and look like they are doing acrobatics in the tank. It is amusing, but only for a little while because then you realize that they are sick and only have a 50/50 chance of surviving. Swim bladder disease is like that - either they will recover by themselves or they won't. Andy's last fish was one he got from Wal-Mart. We were amazed at how big he got. We had him for over two years and when he died last September he was 5 inches long and 2 inches wide (yes, we measured him when he died!). This last one also amazed us with his tenacity! Andy won this fish from the county fair last October. You know, the game where you land a ping-pong ball in a fishbowl and win a scruffy-looking goldfish in a plastic bag?! We couldn't believe he lived as long as he did. Andy was very brave about it - a little sad, but he chose to take the fish out of the tank and take care of everything himself. We have decided not to replace the fish as it would be something else to move, if that's what we decide to do.

Tom was feeling a bit sore this morning, but we got a chuckle out of it. We had decided a long time ago that his mattress needed replacing, but he kept putting it off until finally yesterday while we were loading the trailer, we told him the mattress HAD TO GO! It was falling apart and didn't smell too pleasant, either. He and his drummer friend were already going to play music in our garage yesterday afternoon, so since his drummer friend has a truck, they were going to go get Tom's mattress first in the truck and then bring it here before they played music. Well, apparently Tom decided that just hanging out with his friends and getting back here to play music was more important, so he decided to put the mattress-buying off. We told him in no uncertain terms that he was not going to sleep on any of the furniture just because he chose not to go shopping. This morning we saw him asleep on his floor - a sheet underneath him and a blanket on top. When he got up I asked him how his sleeping arrangements worked out. He said that he was NEVER going to do that again. He said he was so stiff and sore and had such an awful night, that the FIRST thing he was doing when he got off of work today was to find a mattress. Looks like he got a lesson in procrastination!