Technology is not my friend

My computer has been slowing down over the last little bit and I attributed it to not shutting it off and clearing the memory from time to time. But the other day something serious happened and it went into slow motion mode. In Outlook almost every keystroke meant a "not responding" message. I couldn't take it anymore - besides it was getting harder and harder to get anything done.

I called GeekSquad. They took control of my computer for hours - I mean hours and it's much better today. Not sure that it's 100%, but better. They suggested I might want to upgrade to Windows 10. Is that a good thing??? I've no idea. For now - it's much faster and I think I might actually get some work done.

Funny thing though - I'm a somewhat patient person. But when it comes to the computer, I have zero patience. I can literally feel my blood pressure rise when I'm dealing with the service people. Fortunately, it was all pretty seamless. They took control and for the most part, we chatted online. And those chats were brief. I didn't need to be at the computer for most of that time They called me when something needed to be done. Yep - I sure appreciated that service.

As a result, not a lot of paperwork got done. But I should be able to play catch up today since I can now work much faster. Instead of doing paperwork, I started to get ready for a Diabetes pickup that's scheduled for Friday morning. When M was home two Christmases ago, we went through some of her stuff and I was supposed to deal with it. I didn't. Some of it ended up in the office. Yes - I know - I'm not good with getting rid of this stuff.

I got out boxes and bags and this is what is waiting for the pickup. There are five bags and four boxes of stuff. The office is still crowded, but not nearly as much as it was. That's all a good thing.

Stuff ready for pick-up

I think your brain or at least my brain can only handle getting rid of this stuff in small bits. My recommendation to anyone with small children. DO NOT buy them all those junky toys and if you do, periodically get rid of them. We had a lot of that kind of stuff and I see in some more boxes that I have yet to go through that there is a wee bit more of that kind of thing. Most should probably go straight to the garbage, but I feel compelled to go through it piece by piece.

Here's a better idea. Do that tidy up process with your kids! Teach them how to sort through their things - what to keep, what to sell and what to give away. If kids had some skin in the game from day one, they might think twice about asking for a new toy. Or about cleaning up. Yes - my kid is an adult and I had to clean up some Christmas garbage from her room. Now, why is that? and who does that at her house?

I came across a bag of magnets. I think these had actually been in the garage and they came in when a few things got wet because of a leak in the room. Which is supposedly fixed now. That's another story.

Oh - magnets!!!!  Those fun, innocent little things you buy when you're on vacation because they seem like a good thing. These magnets brought back some great memories - places we'd been on vacation or work. What a great trip down memory lane.

Magnets found in the garage

Oh yes - we had already cleared up our fridge once. The ones above are the "old" magnets and in the photo below, you can see what is still on our fridge, although many of them have been there for years.

The fridge today

Gosh - do you see in the bottom left - that round brown one??  We've had that since M was a baby! Good grief - why can't we get rid of these???? 

I might throw them all on the fridge for the moment and then every day pull one item off the fridge. Like we do NOT use those clips so why are they still there?? Funny how these little things pile up - we don't really notice them, but after a while - boom - there's a huge mess.

Maybe I could take a picture of each of the magnets and find a picture related to the trip or a small anecdote about the trip where we bought the magnet and then put them in a picture book. That would be kind of fun. Who needs tons of vacation pictures - besides where are all those pictures??? Oh, I know - I'm just not sure what order they are in.

I have more pictures on the tidy up front to share with you - that's for another day.

Oh - I have one bag of garbage from all that. There are still 10 boxes in the office of crap to go through. Actually, I'm lying. There are more than that. So if I could get myself in gear and do ONE box a day? Maybe a week? How hard could that be?

Then it was downstairs where I wasn't nearly as productive as I've been. I managed to get a customer quilt done. But it was a huge one.

Customer quilt - DONE

I pulled out the next one to load but I didn't get it loaded which is a good thing because thinking of who I would see in the next couple of days, I'm switching up the quilt that was to be done. A different one will go on the machine later today.

I got a few quilt blocks made for upcoming classes and a few embroidery blocks tidied up and that was it. I crashed on the couch at about 5:30 PM. Thankfully my class was rescheduled until next week because of the bizarre weather. I went to bed about 9:30 and got up really late for me. I have no idea why every once in a while that my body just shuts down like that! I get lots of sleep during the rest of the time - but every once in a while - I just need more sleep. I think it was the computer stress from the morning that was catching up with me!!!

I'm still working on my list of things to do that I made up a couple of days ago. HA - as if I could get that all done in one day!

As I go through e-mails every morning, I notice a couple of things. We get e-mails from a lot of companies that are trying to sell us stuff. Hmm - I should just unsubscribe to them. I don't usually open them and if I want dog food or dog treats or new camera equipment - I know where to go. I don't usually buy anything just because it's on sale. OK - just unsubscribed from one e-mail. That is the non-quilty stuff. I get e-mails from about 5 or 6 non-quilting companies. I will unsubscribe from all of them.

Then there are the quilting e-mails. Have you noticed that everyone and their dog wants you to sign up for a sew along?  Seriously - EVERYONE is doing a sew along. I delete those - I just don't have the time, nor do I want to do the same project that thousands of others are doing. I have so many projects right now that are waiting for my limited attention. I won't unsubscribe from those as not every e-mail from them is a sew along.

I will unsubscribe from every quilt e-mail that comes daily. I don't want daily e-mails and there are some culprits out there that are very bad for this!!!  I will accept weekly or monthly, but dailies?? No way. Hey people - even if I delete - you're eating into my PERSONAL time and I don't like it.

Have you noticed that I'm getting really grumpy these days?? Well - it's not grumpy at all. It's just facing reality and realizing how much of my time and money that everyone wants. Well - I'm tired of it and I'm doing something about it.

On that note, I'm out of here to delete e-mails and unsubscribe! Have a super day!!!!

Ciao!!!