AGH!

[telophase]

I'm addicted to those household organization shows, mostly because I am totally not organized, but sometimes the advice they give is just ... ugh. The howler today is that the organizer says that keeping negatives is not necessary, because you can scan or make copies of photos at many places today. Uh, well, yeah, as long as you don't care that you have crappy copies. It might be OK for someone who really doesn't care about the quality of the images, but the woman who's getting her house organized today is an artist.

If you've got to get rid of the negatives, take them to a place that can scan them for you and burn them to CD. That way you've got the best copy you can make.

Comments

[kittikattie.livejournal.com]

I'd never let organizers in my house. They'd try to get rid of my ponies and papers, and I'd be forced to smite them.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Technically, if you got the right one, they'd work with you and find a way to feature the ponies, but I expect they'd probably want to store most of them and put a few on display at any given time. Or something like that.

[kittikattie.livejournal.com]

Yeah, and that's not happening. ALL the ponies stay out, all the time. I'd rather have 20 on my desk and no space than only a few out. Clearly, I need my own room for them.

[kutsuwamushi.livejournal.com]

I knew a family that used the guest bedroom for Barbies, rather than guests. It was the pinkest room I've ever seen. I'm not sure what they did with Aunt Bertha when she came to visit.

[kittikattie.livejournal.com]

Oh, I probably won't have a guest bedroom. I want a separate room full of nothing but my dolls and plushies and artwork stuff. It will be my hidey hole.

[tammylee.livejournal.com]

I have found the only way for me to be organized is to get rid of stuff.
XD

[telophase.livejournal.com]

I need to do that, too. :D I have a pile of clothes to go to Goodwill that's been filling up space on my bedroom floor for months, and that's not the half of it.

[kintail.livejournal.com]

I'm addicted to those too (and far too many other HGTV shows), but I'm always hyper-critical of Clean Sweep and Mission: Organization, as it seems there's always some kind of stupid-it-burns. My favourite is Neat which is Toronto-based, so I don't know if you get it in the US.

I hadn't seen the one about the negatives, though -- I would have been ranting at the TV too. Makes much more sense to keep the negatives, which take up very little space, and get rid of the photos, if you've got to get rid of one or the other. Grr.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

I've seen Neat a couple of times - the PBS station down here occasionally runs it.

I know I've got a slightly skewed attitude from the rest of the population, having worked in museums and being a librarian, plus my natural tendancy to distrust any object whose sole purpose is to be decorative. But most decorators and organizers have ideas about what things are important that are 180° from mine. Hide the TV? Why? It is the focal point. Allow seating for many people? I don't entertain-with-a-capital-E. Hide my work area away? 85% of the time I'm at home and awake, I'm in the work area. And get rid of or hide my books? OVER MY DEAD BODY.

[kutsuwamushi.livejournal.com]

Either I saw the exact same show or I saw one in which the organizer gave the exact same advice. Urgh.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Wouldn't be surprised either way.

I thought I heard the organizer recommend that the homeowner get rid of all but the most recent 3 or 4 of her kids' drawings, but I noticed that at the end of the show theyw ere storing them away in plastic boxes, so I think the homeowner had some Strong Opionions about that idea.

[kutsuwamushi.livejournal.com]

I got a better one.

There was one show where the organizer convinced the woman whose house she was clearing out to get rid of the police reports/evidence from her mother's unsolved (rape and?) murder.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Now *that* is just plain irresponsible, insensitive and several other words starting with "in-".

[kittikattie.livejournal.com]

...What is wrong with these people?

The only thing I hate more are those people who think that more than a certain amount of years old means irrelevant and to toss it out. Like I know they'd tell my mom to get rid of all her unused fabric--she has things going back that are older than my oldest sister. That's our legacy, dammit.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

They'd tell me to get rid of a lot of my art supplies. OK, so I havne't used these pencils in six months. But that's because I go in cycles of the type of work I do, and I haven't done pencils in six months. I know I'll get back to them at some point in the not-too-distant future, and I'm not about to drop another $100 on pencil supplies later on just to clear the space now.

[kittikattie.livejournal.com]

Same here. (Somewhat unrelated, but I need new accrylics.) I hate to think what they would say of me keeping every back card for every pony I've gotten one for. And I stand by the belief that if all the books fit neatly on the shelf, then you don't have enough books.

[kutsuwamushi.livejournal.com]

I think they're crazy.

I actually envy people with sentimental stuff like that. The only thing with sentimental value that I own is a stuffed animal I've had since I was tiny; I wish I had more. I don't have much clutter either, though, despite the book and Barbie addictions.

[kittikattie.livejournal.com]

I have sentimental stuff going back for years. There's no replacing sentiment with money or cleanness. None. I'd rather live in chaos.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Most of my sentimental stuff is pretty small - a pair of diamond earrings that belonged to my grandmother, the letters my mom wrote from Africa when we lived there - or over at my mother's house - the set of silver that my grandmother bought.*

Other things are sentimental only for a few years at a time, and I'll be able to get rid of them before too long, to make way for new temporariy-sentimental things.


* My grandmother was into silver, and had a set of her own, and a set for Mom. Every year or so, or whenever the price of silver took a dive, she'd go buy another place setting or a serving utnetil or something. As a result of which, Mom's got a 10-seat place setting and I inherited my grandmother's set and have an 8-seat setting. I have just about zero opportunity to use it, but I have never once seriously considered getting rid of it. Also, my dad carved a mantlepiece for the other grandparents, and when they both go I'm going to insist on getting it back. :D I may have no fireplace, and it may sit int eh back of a closet or something, but I'd never get rid of it.