Declutter needed - help!

I continue to enjoy my week off.  I've been exceptionally lucky to have chosen this week, or at least have this week chosen for me because it's between jobs time, and the weather has been glorious.  If I had any chose, I'd have booked this weather for next week as we're going to the Lake District for a photography holiday and I could do without rain.  Extrordinarily, I've never made it to the Lakes before - when I was a child, we headed towards Devon and Cornwall as it was nearer to S Wales and when I lived in Manchester, I was terribly remiss and didn't go out into the Peaks often enough at all and didn't get to the Lakes either.  However, we're going to go out for nice walks and learn how to use cameras better too. 

Before then, I've got more work to do on the decluttering my house.  Now before I go much further, I have to stress that it couldn't feature on any kind of dubious Channel 5 show but I'm just poor at throwing things out if they are in anyway useful.  I blame my parents and the post WWII values of being thrifty.  I also know I'm too sentimental and just need to get rid of stuff.  And very risk averse, so don't want to get rid of things that I might need in the future.  At some point in the future.  Some time. 

But it's really hard.  Both to motivate myself to keep going, there seems very little reward at the moment.  And also to do the hard things.  It's easy just to put it back again and move on.  The reward would be to move in with my very nice man - which is not contingent on my decluttering, he's still not divorced, she's still being difficult etc etc, but I know he doesn't like my place because it's somewhat cluttered.

And here I am procrastinating.  I will continue working on this.  Deep breath and off we go .......

Sitting here in the sunshine ....

I'm sitting in the back garden, in the shade, and marvelling that it's March and we're able to do this.  I'm really realy hoping that this doesn't jinx all good weather for the rest of the year.  Particularly because I've agreed to go to Cornwall for a week in July which can either be fantastic or dull if the weather isn't the best.  Fortunately it's to stay with a friend but still, I want sunshine for that week too.

I'm having a week at home because when I start my new job - despite transferring from one department to another - my leave is going to be messed up.  I have to move to the new leave year there which leaves me with holiday to use up before I start but then not enough to last for the rest of this (calendar) year because I have plans for holidays later on in the year and when you take these into account, I have 1 day to cover all eventualities between start day and 31 December - including anything other than bank holidays over Christmas.  Maybe it is my own fault for having too many holiday plans but it's not excessive - just two 2-week trips - nor does it involve carrying days over at all. 

I'm very much enjoying my inflicted week off now.  WIth this beautiful weather, I could very easily not do everything that I want to do, which includes some much needed spring cleaning.  I've cleaned and tidied the living room today, which is a start.  I just need to keep going in the same vein.  I almost brought my hammock out into the garden today but I realised that that would be fatal in terms of getting things done, so am saving that for later on in the week, as apparently it's going to be nice for days to come.

The last few weeks have been hectic, trying to finish off work in the current post, and also playing the piano for a pantomime locally.  Yes, we are a little behind the times, with most pantomimes finishing off at Christmas time.  A local drama group writes its own scripts and has a very loyal following from the local community and it's really fun to be involved with.  The group are very grateful for my help - which is minimal, as I pop up once a week and knock a few keys and help them to sing vaguely in time and in tune.  It's nice to be liked and respected by them but mostly, it is all very good fun, with everyone pulling together and enjoying themselves at the same time.

Divorce trundles along slowly.  Latest joke is that she's said she needs some additional financial help in the short term until she can pick up more hours in work which have been promised in a few months time - sounds almost reasonable until you realise that she's just booked a holiday to Turkey for her and two of the kids in the summer.  Because that's an essential!! (Grumble, grumble).  Just keeping my cool and hoping that it truly won't last too much longer.

Counting the days to the new job .....

It's been another long week, with very little to show.  On the job front I've been fighting with security clearance and the people who implement the policies for what seems like weeks now.  You'd think that moving from one Government department to another would be simple but apparently not.  I'm also fighting to sort out a new member of staff - new to my team but not the department, and you'd think an internal move would be easy.  But no!  There are some bonkers policies but these are also being carried out by some real jobsworths, who are not using any kind of common sense when what they are asked to do is pointless in a particular circumstance.  Don't you hate it when that happens - it's like the people who read you their script on the phone and don't notice that it doesn't apply to you at all.  Also frustrating.

Anyway, the stress levels have dropped this week on the divorce front - but that's mainly because she's not done anything and not engaged at all.  But for this week, we both need the lower stress levels so we're not discussing it.  And not discussing not discussing it!

Today I'm feeling virtuous because I've cleaned with some vigour.  I've been threatening to get a cleaner for years and years but never done it because I've not wanted to let anyone loose here until it was to my satisfaction and - probably because I'm my mother's daughter - it never has been.  Now, I'll be the first to admit I'm not the tidiest, I have good intentions but I'm a terrible hoarder and I have STUFF.  I also have a WWII thrifty sense of not being able to throw things out when they can be useful to someone.  If I could give them away to that person, I'd happily do that, but I don't like the idea of waste.  I know this is admirable in today's climate, but I take it to some extreme.  This is going to be a rubbing point should my very nice man and I try to move in together.  I'm trying to be good and have something of a sort out, starting slowly, but it's slow progress. 

I'm not doing this for him - well, of course there's some involvement on that front but it's something that I want to do anyway.  I want to be better but there are some habits which are hard to shake!  There's no plan to move in at the moment - nothing like that until after the divorce.  Therefore there's no rush and I can do it properly -right?!

Back to the grindstone - must been good.

Dropping in briefly to say hello

Remember me avoiding the blogging when I didn't want to be ranting about my very nice man's ex …… well I've now calmed down, but it's taken weeks.  What I don't understand is how and why someone can be so selfish.  And actually expect that she deserves lots of stuff. 

But the thing that I can't calm down about is when you see the number of lies she's been willing to tell the kids.  I can be a little more rational and realise that there are two sides to every story but no sane person would be able to describe what she's said as anything other than deliberately misleading and it stretches to down right vindictive.  The house needs to be divided in the divorce and it's not yet clear how that is going to happen.  But already she's been telling the kids that their father is trying to throw them out of the house and he wants to see them homeless.  When at worse case scenario (from her perspective), he's offering her all the equity which is enough to buy a house of the same size which is still within the school catchment area and where many of their friends live, even if it's not in the same village.  I know this is hard for her too – but how is it fair to cause them uncertainty when it might not come to fruition and also set them against their father.  And this isn't the worst of it.  She's said things that I can't write down even on a blog where I think I'm fairly anonymous. 

It makes me so cross but worse it makes my very nice man feel very stressed and upset.  He's been ill, including high blood pressure, and a visit to the Doctor put it down to stress levels.  It's just terrible.

And now breathe.  Nicer things have also happened in the last week.  I've got a new job, a loan to another Government Department for a couple of years but a really interesting role and one I'm thrilled to have got.  I only applied on a whim because I didn't think I'd get it even though I'd have really liked it but I wanted to put a shot across the bows here where they were once again messing around and not treating me particularly well.  I'm sure the powers that be also didn't think I'd get the job because they signed off pretty begrudgingly – as my post was under review, they couldn't NOT allow me to apply for another job in case I didn't have one – and then spent a week pontificating about whether I could go or not.  But I can and when I do, I'll not be throwing a backward glance.

Other nice things – I'm so looking forward to a quiet weekend.  I bought myself a new computer last Saturday as the old one has been dying for a while, just doing it one step at a time.  I did get time to set it up last night and enjoyed the fact that I could edit just a couple of photos on it in a very small fraction of the time it used to take.  So I'm going to do lots of editing – yay – so I can finally put some of my photos from last year into albums.