Sunday, October 01, 2006

Grrrrrrrrr...

Went to bed at 1...woke up at 3 and couldn't get back to sleep. Finally at 4:15 I gave up and came in here to blog-hop for a bit...

Worked 11 hours last night. A long time in the saddle...especially when you consider that 2/3 of it is driving backwards, lol! Home at 4:30, to bed at 5, tried to get up at noon, but after I talked to Dottie I laid on the bed while watching the Weather Channel and waiting for the local forecast; next thing I knew it was 3 something!

When Dottie was still driving the white Chrysler everyday and I had an old AMC around for the boys to drive, I was driving a $400 Dodge pickup for a couple of years. It was a slant-six, running on five when I bought it, and after 2 years it dropped another cylinder. We bought Dottie's first new car about that time, I got the Chrysler, and the truck sat in the back yard for a year and a half.

I bought a wrecking yard motor (it ran when they got it, of course, but I never heard it; I'll never make that mistake again!) and spent part of my model change 2 years ago hanging it. Never got it to fire, thought it was in the wiring, and didn't worry about it. Last year, with my back still in recovery, there's no way I was hanging over a fender to work on it.

I started trying to fire it up again this spring, and finally got spark to it when I figured out it had lower compression than the one I pulled out...

It never did run.

The Chrysler left for the crusher on Friday morning (me still feeling guilty, like I let it down by not trying to save it). This afternoon I hitched up Dad's log chain between the new truck and the old one, and when Dottie came home from work we pulled the old one out of the yard and onto the driveway, then swung the 2nd motor into the back, along with all the extra wheels that were around from things, and I've been throwing all the AMC and Chrysler and Dodge parts out of my garage into the bed this week. It leaves on Monday morning...

I remember people speaking of STB's penchant for organizing and minimizing, and I'm trying to do a bit of that for the first time in my life...

I've spent so much time making things out of junk for 35 years it's really hard to let it go...that fear of throwing away something you might need some dark and stormy night is hard to overcome!

The one thing that's helping in this round is that I also fear taking the new tires on my new truck anywhere near the metal recycling plant!

:o)

A beautiful Sunday to you all...

I'm going to try to go back to sleep now...I had the clock set for 9...

I wonder how far it's going to creep this time...

alan

9 comments:

puhpaul said...

I hope you get a better sleep this time. It must be a good feeling to get rid of the old stuff to make more room. You shouldn't feel guilty about it all, especially getting the new truck. You've worked for so long, you deserve something nice.

paul

Connie in FL said...

Your stars and mine must be alined Alan. I woke up at 7:30 this morning but dozed off and on until almost noon! The sorry thing is I was still tired when I did get out of the bed!

I can also totally relate to the hesitation to de-clutter... Hubby and I have lots and lots of it. Lately the urge to do something about it has crossed my mind. Mostly because I finally realized that if it's still hear after I'm gone, my kids are going to be stuck with the task.

the Book of Keira said...

And I followed you back!

Goodness, I am the same way. I hate to get rid of things. I'm not sure if it is remembering how much I spent on the stuff that keeps me from getting rid of it or if it is just the worry that I may need something from it oneday. Most of the time it is never really usefull to me again, but I hate to feel like I am giving up on it... ha ha ha. I wonder if it has some deep, psychological meaning behind it. Girl is tossed aside a bunch of times for being a little broken and now doesn't want to inflict that same emotional pain on her toaster... LOL! My god, I am a little freaked to think that may be it.....
I never feel guilty for getting new things.... probably because I know I'll never get rid of it! But boy do I need to... maybe next weekend :-)

mckait said...

grrr i just hate it when i am not able to sleep! i have been having a bad patch myself...
hope you had good restful sleep this time..

as for declutter..
i learned a very important lesson, years ago . We had to move from Pa to Ma.. i had to do it alone.. with 4 kids and a house filled with stuff..

there were so many boxes of books.. i gave away 12-13 boxes.. when i moved there.. and when i moved back. i had to get rid of so much stuff to move to Ma! I have never again allowed that sort of clutter ...

Each trash day i find something in the attic or basement to throw away.
Big or small each week something goes! that makes it sort of painless..

:D

because i am at heart very lazy, and always look for the easy way to do things..

sweet dreams

MB said...

Sounds like you could use a little extra sleep! I had a Dodge Dart for a while, those slant-six engines were great.

alan said...

I finally got 8 straight hours last night for the first time in ages...felt much better today!

Got up at noon, talked to Dottie, then called the scrapper. He was here about 1:15, truck was gone by 1:30 and I spent the rest of the afternoon cutting branches and bundling them for trash day tomorrow.

Off to work now...

alan

Sandy said...

ohh, you are one of those pack rats...like my dad and FIL!

CrackerLilo said...

I hope you sleep well, too.

Almost my entire maternal family is OCD to a degree, and the rest of us have been raised by them, so we all have a terror of throwing things away. But it's important to know what's worth throwing away and what's worth keeping, and how cool for you that you're learning it. (Hopefully I can too, one day.)

I'm happy you're enjoying the new truck, too! :-)

daringtowrite said...

Guilt. Up until I finally donated my rusty '73 Corolla to the Kidney Foundation, I would pat her on the dash every time we met or passed a truckload of crushed vehicle and tell her not to worry, I wouldn't let them get her :).