even when i TRY to do the right thing . . .

so today . . . it became clear to me that i should always play before i work. rollie, the work before play guy, is now fighting the urge to scream, "NNOOOOOOO!!!!!!"

and his eye is twitching ;)

i've been cleaning for about a week now. i am not just cleaning--i am CLEANING! i am vacuuming nooks and crannies, i am scrubbing walls, i am checking for pesky cobwebs. i washed the filter in the vacuum cleaner, i used a toothbrush to clean the top edge of the baseboard, i used a pumice stone to eradicate hard water stains on porcelain surfaces. i've filled several bags with clothing we no longer need, for charity. this is how i know it is summer--i go into "i must clean everything!" mode.

it is good that i do this, because during the school year i am mostly in "i think i will just sit here and hope that the house cleaning fairies come while i am not looking" mode. but they never come . . .

i make lists. i make schedules. this is important to the cleaning process, because i feel successful every time i mark something off my list. when i started channeling mr. clean ten days ago, i even scheduled in a couple of days where i didn't have to do much--sort of like rest days. only since i never get everything done, they turned out to be catch up days.

and then saturday night, i realized that everything was not going to get done on my time table. so, what to do, what to do . . . i know! make new lists! so that is what i did--a list for sunday, a list for monday, and a list for tuesday. some things from the old list did not make it onto the new list. the drapes will not get shaken. the windows will not get washed. (ok, those things weren't on the first list either--i'm not insane!!) but my plane leaves on wednesday, so some tasks had to go.

yesterday was pretty much taken over by church in the morning and then the fireworks stand until midnight, so today i needed to spend some serious time with my lists. this was not going to be a day to read or watch tv or even turn on my computer (because that is where my trouble begins . . . ) i went to look at my monday list to see what to do first, but my lists had gone a.w.o.l. yep, they were nowhere to be found.

now what to do? i can't work without my lists!! rollie said, "can you make new lists?" no, i cannot! the whole reason i make lists is so that i don't have to think about what to do! once i write something on the list, it is out of my head. i tried to work, but couldn't finish anything. what was the point? i couldn't mark it off my list, because i couldn't find my lists! i finally gave up, started the laundry, and sat down with my computer.

and there they were. under my computer.

you see?!?!? if i had just been my usual lackadaisical self, i would have found my lists much earlier, and maybe been more productive! or maybe not, since i would have had my computer in my lap. because now, my computer is on. and facebook is only a click away from blogger . . .

maybe i should have put 'taking care of my facebook games' on one of my lists. because now that the lists are back in my possession, i feel this obligation to at least mark something off today . . .