Damply Decluttering

On Tuesday afternoon Bob had a meeting [on his Day Off too!] But fortunately it did not take long, and he came back bright and early, and suggested we did some Garage Decluttering, as the sun was shining and we could work in the garden. Superficially, the garage usually looks pretty tidy - on one side we have some metal shelving units on which are arranged a load of storage boxes. These are the "Marconi Boxes". When I met Bob he was working for Marconi Instruments in St Albans. 

Just before he left to train for ministry, the company decided to upgrade their Components Storage System. The heavy duty card boxes were to be thrown out, and fancy metal/plastic ones installed instead. There were hundreds being scrapped - and employees were invited to take any home if they could make use of them. So Bob got a couple of dozen and we bought two shelving units from Exchange and Mart [note to younger readers; this was a magazine we used before The Internet - Amazon came along, for cheap mail order products]

For nearly 40 years we have kept garden chemicals/ DIY stuff/bicycle bits/ cables/ car accessories/general garage stuff etc in these. It has been a good system. But we really needed to sort things out.  We took all the boxes out and put them on the tables and bench in the garden. I made a pot of tea. 

I was well into my stride, flinging away split packets of lawn food, empty cardboard boxes, and items which could not be identified. And the big yellow garden tablecloth [with the central hole for the parasol] which was spotty torn and stained. Then it started to drizzle. "It's raining" said Bob. "Not much" I retorted, and grabbed the cloth back from the bin and made an impromptu poncho, and kept on sorting. But the rain got heavier "Stop raining!" I yelled to the clouds. And they did. They began sending down hailstones!

At which point we had to admit defeat, and pull tarpaulins and plastic sacks over the boxes, and retreat inside. We stared glumly through the window at the rather wet patio. There was nothing to do except wait for the storm to pass returning to finish the task later. 

But I've been able to tick off another box on my Lent Challenge List, and put more items in the Charity Shop box [how many fancy ice-scrapers do we need? Why have we kept a brand new one, still wrapped, for at least 5 years?]