Tag: decluttering

I’m actually starting to feel caught up. My stepmother’s Quicken is up-to-date, including the checks written today. I know where most of the stuff in the office is. We’ve done a bunch of the legal stuff, and its in the outbox ready to mail (together with talonvaki‘s CD and my mail). I’ve been a busy, busy boy.

Tomorrow, I’m meeting with the broker on the trust that was mine and my dad’s alone so we can get that figured out, and hopefully I can get my dad’s accountant over here to let me know what can be shredded from the files, as well as starting to lay the groundwork for any estate tax returns.

Of course, from all this work, my wrist is feeling tired, but keeping the wrist brace on most of the day (I can’t really write well with it) is helping the arm immensely.

I hope everyone had the happiest of holidays. As a reminder, if you’re on my friends list and you’re a board gamer in the greater Los Angeles area and you are free on New Years Eve, give me a holler in the comments.

The dig has continued, and I’ve explored most of the file cabinets. I’ve found numerous cameras, transistor radios, more staplers, more hole punches, and more and more outdated paper. Whew!

I’ve spent the afternoon entering my stepmother’s financial data into Quicken. My goal is to get her to use this, for it will give her a better idea of her financial position, and make it easier for her to reconcile checks. I’ve been using the program for *years*, and it is one of the few reasons that I keep a Windows sytem around—no Linux-equivalent comes close.

Next is going through the paperwork we need to get done: sending in death certificates on Insurance Policies, dealing with IRA accounts, and figuring out legal stuff. Ugh. This is one of the areas I’m not crazy about, especially things like Estate Tax returns, and having to get current values of all assets. That’s going to be a real bear: here I think my dad’s accountant will earn his pay… as will mine (well, mine is my father-in-law).

Back to the dig…

It’s been a long day, helped with the dissipation of the headache around 2:00 PM. I’ve gotten my dad’s desk pretty well cleaned: only two drawers left to go. On the way, I uncovered loads and loads of stuff, some of which was a surprise. Lots of pens and pencils, to be sure, but also loads of nail clippers, swiss army knives, and miscellaneous outdated paper. But now it is a functional desk, which is a good thing.

Tomorrow, I’ll be doing a little bit in here. We’re planning to go see The Incredibles as our Holiday Movie (but heathen Orange County doesn’t have a 10:00 AM show 🙁 ), and then my stepmother is doing a holiday dinner (I explained why before). Sunday is attacking the office again, this time hopefully straightening out paperwork and getting my stepmother started on Quicken.

One thing I tend to do more of down here is cooking. I ended up making a breakfast scramble that everyone loved, as well as a chicken spaghetti sauce for dinner.

Happy holidays to those who celebrate on the 25^th. To those that don’t, do what I do: go see a movie and eat Chinese food!

Maybe I should have been an archeologist!

The day started yucky, with the headache still there. Luckily, it seems to now be about 98% away. I’ve been working in the office today, slowly cleaning and decluttering surfaces, seeing what I find, and what goes where. I’m finding all sorts of stuff, and the occasional interesting memory. Lots of old tax papers (he was an accountant): blank forms and journal pads get recycled; anything with sensitive stuff goes into a shred box. Still, the slow process is relaxing, in an odd sense. In many ways, I’m seeing in this a warning: don’t be a packrat!

Time to turn back to my fine-hair brush to look for the next fossil 🙂

First: I hate headaches. I’ve been fighting one all day: a total of 4 Excedrin this morning, a Benedryl, and a T3 hasn’t yet knocked it down. Arrrgh. Perhaps a night’s sleep will help.

I’ve begun going through my dad’s office. He was a worse packrat than I thought! So far, I’ve gone through about a 3′ section on one wall. I’ve uncovered 5 heavy duty three-hole punches, 6 B-8 staplers, 4 one-hole punches, 8 stamp pads, about a gazillion pens, about 20 erasers, and about 40 CDs. Just looking around, I see about 6 portable cassette or mini-cassette recorders, about 8 magnifying glasses, multiple calculators, multiple letter openers, etc. He has well over 300 cassettes, about 200 photo albums, and could open up an office supply store with his closet. What I want to do is leave my stepmother with a functional office with functional files and a functional filing system, and all the requisite paperwork on insurance in. It’s going to take a while.

I have gotten some case files to simplify filing paid bills, and a simple network router to provide additional protection for their computer (and to make it so I can plug in my laptop).

I think I have my work cut out for me.

A little bit later today, we’re going to be heading down to my stepmother’s for a few days. This will be the main time we’ll be spending sorting through my dad’s stuff (that’s the polite term for much of it–he was a packrat): going through the office, going through his clothes, etc. We’ll be deciding what to keep, what goes where, and so on. It should be an (ummm) interesting time, and I have no idea what I will find, other than lots and lots of memories, and probably some skeletons he never revealed to me.

It’s also going to be interesting in another way. When my dad married my stepmother, she was Jewish. At some point (I forget exactly when) she had a dream and became Christian. Now, that’s doesn’t bother me: she’s an adult, not having more kids, and is entitled to her beliefs. Why am I mentioning this? Being down there the next few days I’m going to get to experience a “Christmas Dinner”, which will be something I haven’t been to in years! We’re still going to do our holiday tradition, which is to go to a movie on Christmas morning, when everyone else is otherwise occupied.

This morning, however… I’ve got a bad sinus headache, my daughter is melting down about clothing, the house has gone from “neat” to “mess” in two days. I’ll see what I can get done before we head out around lunchtime.