Trimming Down My Life
Well, I did it. I have successfully transferred posts and deleted almost all of my extraneous blogs. I’m down to eight, one of which is still being “liquidated.” When I finish it, I’ll have only seven. I think I had fourteen when I decided to cut back. I may decide to cut back further, if I find I cannot post in each of them every day.
I’m also back on my diet, which will be trimming an extra 80 pounds off my 5-foot frame. I will be so glad to be back down around 120 again!
I have been going through the closets and clothes-piles in the house, sorting what to keep, what to give away, and what to sell on E-bay. I’ve already got one lot of boys’ shirts up for auction, along with several lots of videos (a total of more than 30, but some were my mom’s copies) that the kids have outgrown. If you need Thomas, Kipper, or VeggieTales, or kids toys that are in new or gently used condition, be sure to check out Editormum’s auctions at E-bay. I’ve even got a couple of Brio train sets listed for auction, one of them brand-new, in the box. I’ve also listed a whole bunch of books on Half.com to sell. So the clutter in the house is slowly disappearing.
Once the clothes are out of the way, I’m going to start sorting through the boxes and piles of papers to file, either filing them properly or tossing them in the trash. And the books. I must have 25,000 of them. Too many. Need to cull and refine my collection.
I have a couple of big editing projects to finish, and I’m hoping to complete the largest on the weekend of Dec 11. The other one is dependent on the typesetter, who is composing the pages now and will have them to me “sometime soon.” If I can get it off my to-do list by Jan.1, I will be happy. I love editing, but I’m going to take a short hiatus — accepting no new projects — for about three months. By April 2005, I should be back on track completely and ready to accept new clients.
I’ve also been chipping away at the debt. I’ve got it down considerably from the $19K that it was in June when I lost my job. I think it’s down to about $12K now, which isn’t bad for only 5 months, two of which were jobless. Of course, I now have to pay taxes on that hunk of change I took out of the IRA to live on, but that just means making minimum payments on the debt in April, instead of paying the large amounts I’ve been putting on them. I’m “snowballing” it down pretty well. If I can keep going at this rate, I will have it all paid off by this time next year.
Then my children and I will have a real home, a nice, tidy, uncluttered, peaceful place to live, play, and enjoy life. Rah!
I’m hoping that I will be noticeably trimmer (and slimmer) for the New Year, but more importantly, I’m hoping that I’m establishing some better habits that will keep me from getting into a quagmire like this again.