To do already

Does anybody else ever experience mental clutter? For me it’s usually caused by stuff I’ve been meaning to do, or get to, or take care of for a while. Not necessarily super-important stuff, just stuff that needs to get done. Stuff that takes time to do. Ah, my old friend time - where have you gone? :)

Anyway, I have quite a bit of mental clutter going on right now. It’s getting ridiculous. Here are some of the things I need or want to get done, and have been needing or wanting to get done for toooooo long:

1) Hang picture in guest room. Seriously. This picture has been leaning against the wall of the guest room for almost a year. It’s time.

2) Get some art framed. We were going to use part of our tax refund to get some pieces framed (sidenote: why is good framing so crazy expensive!?!?!?). This particular mental clutter has been around for YEARS. This time around I got as far as looking up framing places in town. The next steps in the process haven’t happened. And probably won’t for a while yet. I guess this one’s been around so long it doesn’t bother me quite so much. Still, it’s there.

3) Wash cars. I’m not a clean-car freak by any means, but our cars are filthy right now. And dirt is one thing, but my car apparently got pooped on by an entire flock of birds like three weeks ago. I hate bird poop on my car. For some reason it just says "I really don’t care about my car" to drive around with bird poop all over it. That’s just me.

4) Pick up charm at James Avery. 5 or 6 weeks ago I dropped off an adorable little charm to have Asher’s name and birth date engraved. They said it would take 2 weeks. So at around 2 weeks when I hadn’t heard from them I thought about calling to see what was up. I didn’t. I got a call about a week later that it was ready. I have to laugh at myself now, that I was so antsy about not hearing from them; it obviously wasn’t that big a deal if I’ve left it there for another 2 weeks! Part of the problem is that it’s at the mall, so it would take some time to park, get inside, etc. Also, the mall isn’t very close to home, but it’s very close to work. Practically every day since they called (they’ve called twice now) it has crossed my mind that I need to just go up there on my lunch break. So far, no dice. This week I will make it happen. If I were putting these in order of priority, this would probably be #1.

5) Deposit check. Considering how uptight I can be about money, it’s amazing even to me that this check is still in my wallet. The bank is like 2 blocks from where I work. I gotta get this done – it’s driving me crazy. I’m going to put this at #2 priority.

6) Get oil changed. The maintenance minder icon on the Honda popped up a while ago, reminding me that I had 15% oil life, then 10%, then 5%, and now I’m like 250 miles over the recommended change mileage. This is another task best taken care of on my lunch break (or – GASP! – before work) since weekends at the Express Change at the Honda dealership can be somewhat circus-like.

Those are the biggies right now. I will say, though, that I have recently taken care of some mental clutter items: I returned something to Babies R Us that has been sitting in Asher’s nursery since before he was born (I have something else like that to take back, too, but it’s from Wal-Mart and we NEVER go there). I also straightened up and organized my night table, Adam’s night table, and a big shelf in our bedroom! It always feels so nice to clear some things off the list. I’m looking forward to more of that in the next few days!!!