Day of Labor

So, it's Labor Day and, miracle of miracles, I actually have the day off. A friend of mine from Albuquerque called and wanted to know if I was doing anything this weekend, and whether she could maybe come down into town and hang out. I told her no, 'cause I'd sworn to myself I was going to use the three-day weekend to get a bunch of stuff done around the house. Having told her that, I now feel obligated to spend today housecleaning and such. Sigh. Honestly, I'm very, very tempted to call her back and ask her if she wants to come down and watch some DVDs or something, instead, but no. I am being strong! I am being productive!

Actually, I've already got quite a lot done this weekend. You can even see the floor in the computer room now, which may not sound like much, but given that it's the space where all my random junk has been accumulating since I moved in, I consider it quite an accomplishment. I cleaned out the fridge, too. Go me!

I have a good system for getting housework-type stuff done, if I've got a day or two to spend on it. I put on an album, or 30-60 minutes of random music, and the deal is that I have to keep working until the music stops. When it does, I'm usually ready for a break, and I can go watch an episode of Buffy or something. (I'm halfway through season 6 now, by the way, and will doubtless have a lot more to say about it when I'm finished.) Then maybe I'll go and work on something that involves sitting in front of the computer instead of scrubbing things and putting things away for a little while, just for variety. Then I'll put on some more music and start the cycle over again. This turns out to be way more effective, somehow, than making a list of things to do and just forcing myself to work straight through until they're done. And I often get a lot of little stuff done that otherwise I'd probably never even think to do, because the deal is that even if I've finished the current task, I've got to work on something until the music stops.

Now if I can just keep things in a moderately tidy state until my sister gets here next month, I'll be happy.