Classy Recycling

8/31/09 A whole bunch of redundant paper, recycled

Today after school I held the first session of EEL 532: Good First Teaching, a graduate course through the University of Maine that I am teaching for kindergarten through second-grade educators across my school district. Looks like we have an absolutely fabulous bunch of teachers, all excited to continue learning and improving their work with children.

However, after the class I didn't get home until 7:30 (arriving just in time for a delicious dinner courtesy of my beautiful wife; thanks, Joanna!), and I hadn't figured out what would be downsized today. That's why the challenge is so great: it carries on whether it's convenient or not.

In planning for the graduate course, I have had a huge binder (see the BEFORE photo above) on my desk for the last month. This is the binder of teaching materials I used when teaching a similar course last year. Since the courses are related, there are materials I'll need to refer back to in this behemoth, so I can't just toss the binder. However, the thing was so chock-a-block full of random junk that I didn't even want to deal with wading through it to find the gems amongst the pebbles.

After dinner, I celebrated the first day of the new class by tackling the remnants of the old class. I was able to cull about seventy-five percent of the papers from that binder and, in the process, actually make the remaining information far more accessible.

Thank you, Downsizing Challenge, for forcing my hand tonight. Time for bed.

Clubbing

8/20/09 Set of golf clubs, sold on Craigslist for $45

Dear Readers,

I come to you seeking advice. Here's the scenario:

Our friends, let's call them Frank and Betty, gave us a set of golf clubs as a donation to Joanna's high school. Joanna's teaching partner is the golf coach, and she had mentioned to Frank and Betty that he worked hard to recruit girls to play. Many of the girls had never played before and some had no clubs. So, on a visit to us a few years ago, they brought an old set of clubs that had belonged to Betty's mom, I believe.

However, it turned out that the school didn't need the clubs. Subsequently, they've sat in our basement ever since.

Today, I sold those clubs to a very friendly family from New Hampshire. Ironically, they bought the clubs for their teenage daughter, who is about to start playing golf for the first time on her high school team. Hit 'em long and straight!

So, now I've got $45 sitting in an envelope on my desk.

Now, Dear Readers, feel free to jump all over me for selling the clubs. Whether or not that was the right thing to do is open for discussion. However, that is not the advice I come to you seeking.

My question is, what should I do with the $45?

I await your instructions...

Editor's Note: the video above was filmed and edited by my friend Vance, who passed away last year. He wanted to test out the super-slow-motion setting on his video camera, so I did some modeling after we played a round (using my clubs, not the ones I sold today). Later that night, I got an email from him telling me that I was now on Youtube. Thanks for the 15 seconds of fame, Vance. You're missed.

A few less gamma rays

8/29/09 Plastic microwave dish cover for re-heating food, recycled

For the last several years, we've heard whispers that microwaving plastic is bad for you. The microwave forces carcinogenic particles into your food, or something like that.

Is it true? I don't know, and it's far too late at night for me to undertake any serious internet research.

Nonetheless, the Dyer-Payne household is all about healthy, natural food. Joanna swore off the plastic-dish-cover-thingy in the microwave ages ago, but I've still been using it. Hey, it makes my food more evenly heated.

But, the more I learn about plastic (Dear Readers, I guarantee you that I'm going to get into a few seething Plastic Rants in the blog this year), the more I come to the conclusion that it's one of the banes of life on earth. Right up there with road rage, Glenn Beck, and the New York Yankees.

So, tonight I fired up the mico with the ol' plastic cover for the last time. I watched with slight uneasiness as the plastic dish cover irradiated my piece of blueberry pie while simultaneously bringing every atom in it to the perfect, toasty temperature.

The pie was delicious, the plastic dish cover is now in the recycle bin, and - with a little luck - I may now have enough radiation in my body to turn into the Hulk next time Glenn Beck cuts me off in traffic as I'm listening to the Yanks beat the Sox.

Gifts from the Greatest Generation

8/28/09 Cross Pen, sold on eBay for $6.51

Do people still give pens as gifts? I received this very fancy (and perhaps equally expensive) Cross pen as a graduation gift. It was so long ago, that I don't know if I was graduating from high school (Go Ramblers!!!) or college (Go Tigers!!!). I have the sense that my grandparents gave the pen to me, but that might only be because I associates such gifts with the Greatest Generation. I'm not so sure anyone born after 1930 has ever given a pen as a present.

Now, I could be way off on this. I just know that a pen seems like the kind of gift that is both classic and - to be honest - silly. Perhaps back in the day, it took momentous life achievements to earn functional writing utensils. Maybe, sixty years ago, that was the primary motivation for people to become lawyers: at least when they passed the bar, someone would think highly enough of them to give them a pen that actually wrote.

But let's be honest, we've come a long way, baby. Basically, any pen you grab at the Dollar Store is gonna work just fine. And great pens? The absolutely best pens in the world? Well, as I said earlier this week, you can pick up a pack of those at Staples for less than $10 a dozen.

I held onto that Cross pen (in its original box) for twenty years because I always felt I should appreciate it more than I did. Maybe the new owner (thank you eBay!) will truly love it.

I just hope she doesn't give it away as a graduation gift.

Sell Star Wars on eBay! Make Millions!

8/27/09 R2-D2 Model Rocket, sold on eBay for $5.50

True confessions: the Downsizing Challenge is rooted in a thirty-year Star Wars collection. If you went back in time and convinced George Lucas that he should buy a McDonald's franchise rather than go into film making, you would substantially alter the course of my life. From age five through eleven, Star Wars dominated my life. Since then, it's only occupied about forty percent of my conscious thoughts.

Popular lore says that if you have old Star Wars toys, you can absolutely clean up on eBay. If that were true, my parents' garage has long been worth a lot more than their house. This summer, Mom declared it was time to clean my stuff out of that garage. Fair enough, Mom. I lugged it all out, and brought it back home.

Ever since we married, Joanna has been encouraging me to get rid of all this Star Wars memorabilia. Once it arrived on our doorstep, these encouragements became a bit more, shall we say, emphatic. To her credit, Joanna has willingly compromised, as I am not at all ready to get rid of most of the toys. They represent my childhood! And they're really cool!

Stop laughing.

Nonetheless, it was the act of bringing boxes and boxes of thirty-year-old toys into my house that made me realize I needed to do some serious downsizing. Thus, the 365-day adventure began. While most of what I've gotten rid of so far was not related to Star Wars, I have identified some of the old collection that I can stomach (barely!) letting go.

Such as this R2-D2 model rocket. It was given to me as a gift, but I was never into rockets and didn't even take it out of the packaging. And yet I've held onto it all these years. I may have a problem.

This rocket, I thought, will be a true eBay test case. It could be worth thousands! First of all, it has to be fairly rare. How many R2-D2 rockets have you ever seen? Secondly, it's still in its original package, with the pieces sealed in plastic. George Lucas, himself, is probably desperately trying to get his hands on one of these.

Or maybe not.

Tomorrow I shall put it in the mail to California, where (for the price of $5.50) it has found a new owner. Too bad someone closer didn't buy it, since I might have tried firing it up and rocketing it over to them.

Pay it Forward

8/26/09 Phonics materials, given away

Teachers are notorious hoarders. Most of us are deathly afraid of getting rid of anything that might prove useful in the future. It makes sense. Teaching is all about the future. Working every day to help children grow into adults we'll likely never meet.

We had our district opening ceremony yesterday. At the start of each school year, our superintendent orchestrates an entertaining and inspirational presentation. Part of this year's ceremony was a video about many of the ways that people in our district go above and beyond the call of duty to help others. The mini-movie had clips from the Kevin Spacey film Pay It Forward. Sure, it was a tad hokey, but it also worked. I was pumped up and ready to begin the year.

My office is cramped and cluttered, so any downsizing that can also be classified (however lamely) as paying it forward is a double win. Today I gave one of my favorite colleagues, Deb Olmstead, a container of kindergarten phonics materials that I've had for several years. Deb is a kindergarten expert and her job is much more focused than mine on helping K-kids directly every day. I hadn't used those things in over a year, so it made sense for me to get them into the hands of someone who will.

And, even if Deb doesn't use them anytime soon, I KNOW she'll save them for the future.

Holy Cow (or socks)!

8/25/09 Pair of 'holy' socks, trashed

Are clothes with holes in them acceptable to continue to wear?

I have always said yes. Here's my thinking:

1) Sock and underwear with holes, as long as their functionality is not "compromised," are totally fin. Nobody can see the holes, the clothes still work, and nobody is the wiser. Why not keep wearing them?

2) Pants with holes are also fine, as long as you're not using them in formal settings. For example, most of my outdoor work pants have a large hole over the right knee. Why the right knee? I had never noticed that my pants wear out on the right knee until about a year ago. The reason, I quickly deduced, was that whenever I get down on one knee to do some project in the basement or outside, I always kneel on my right knee. In fact, after I noticed this, I started trying to go down on the left knee, which had the added advantage of giving me a thin layer of denim between the knee and the ground. (The right knee is just skin on rocks/grass/etc. because of those dang holes.) Turns out I can't do it. Kneeling on the left knee felt as comfortable as putting my shoes on the wrong feet. No matter, a hole in the knee doesn't make the work pants any less functional.

3) As for holes in shirt, I simple ask: what kind of activity are you engaged in that's causing holes to rip in your shirts? I never get holes in my shirts, so that's not an issue.

Tonight I decompressed after a day-long series of school-opening workshops by mowing the lawn. One of the socks I wore had a large hole in the heel and a small one near the toe. It worked fine -- my grass looks the same as it would have if I'd worn fine, silk stockings. (Which might actually make mowing the lawn a bit more interesting, but that's for another day...) Normally, after the chore was done, I would have tossed the socks into my hamper as I headed for the shower. Instead, these socks got tossed into the trash.

To further complicate the matter, only one sock had holes, so I could have saved the other one. I didn't, but I could have. Was that the right decision?

Re-Penned

8/24/09 More pens, some discarded, others donated to Teachers' Room at Guy E. Rowe Elementary School.

Today was the first day of school for teachers, so my downsizing time was severely restricted. Guess I better get used to it, since the downsizing challenge continues even when I must - gasp! - start working for a living.

Yesterday's pen purge was so thoroughly satisfying that I decided to kick of the 2009-2010 school year with a similar cleansing of my office at school. I didn't have as many unacceptable writing implements there, but it still felt good to get them cleaned out.

Now, I do not need to break stride for even a moment as I teach young minds to read and write. My instruction can continue on it's focused course as I reach for any pen within grasping distance, knowing they are all of the highest quality.

I will certainly point this great improvement out to all of my students, and they will doubtlessly sleep much better at night.

Penned

8/23/09 A whole bunch of pens & pencils, donated to Joanna's classroom

I'm a pen snob.

When I have any control over it, I never use a traditional ball-point pen. My tool of choice is the uni-ball roller, micro-point. It's a thing of beauty: simple, functional, classy. It even has it's own web site. And, yet, I somehow accumulate all kinds of other pens that clutter up drawers and plastic cups from the basement to the bedroom.

School begins again tomorrow, and I insist on starting the year out right by having only proper pens at hand (yes, it was a pun).

I shall feel no guilt over downsizing all of these other pens (and a few ratty pencils) since they are going to a good cause. Joanna's taking them to her classroom, where they will be available for students who might need them. Apparently high school kids these days haven't developed refined tastes in writing implements. Give them time.

I have to admit, however, that I would have forsaken Joanna's students for the "Thaispinner" kids in Bangkok if I'd known their address. Check out their mad pen-spinning skills HERE.

Trashing some bits and bytes

8/22/09 Thirty-six files (9.4 MB), deleted from the desktop of my computer

When I announced the downsizing challenge, my cousin Chad encourged me to consider "electronic downsizing" as well.

In his words: "Nothing feels better than cleaning out your hard drive (or so they say)." Chad has a classic sense of humor.

His suggestion was brilliant, especially given that school begins in two days. My laptop desktop had become a virtual dumping ground, yet I had lacked any motivation to do anything about it. The cool wallpaper of Joanna and me at a Red Sox game last spring was completely obscured by a thousand little icons of random files.

At some point my semi-organized system of putting the icons in certain places around the screen broke down when each cluster of files grew big enough to meld into the cluster beside it. Files on top of files, many of which had such cryptic names that I didn't even know what they were. Electronic mayhem.

The added value of this downsize was that it could be done on the road, as we continue our weekend at Joanna's sister's place in Charlestown. It took over an hour -- although I admit being distracted by the episode of Bridezillas playing in the background. (My God, have you seen that show? I don't even know what to say...)

Now my desktop is completely file-free and I am making a pledge to keep it that way. How hard can that be?

Of course, if I end up cluttering it up again, I can delete the new files and count it as another Downsize. That's forward thinking.

The greatest rivalry in sports

8/21/09 Extra large pillow case (converted into sign), abandoned at Fenway Park

One of the cool things about this downsizing challenge is figuring out ways to tie my downsizing into my activities, especially when I'm doing unusual things. I tried to do that by taking those 'disposable outfits' to my education conference earlier this month.

Tonight I had Red Sox/Yankees tickets (Whoo-hoo!) so the trick was figuring out how to downsize something at the game. Enter these two facts:

A) I'm going to roughly estimate that I've been to about 35 professional sporting events in my life, and I've never taken a sign to hold up.

B) I have several pillowcases that we're ready to get rid of, but I haven't figured out what to do with them.

A + B = Use an old pillowcase to make a sign for the game.

Now, it also just so happens that beloved Red Sox broadcaster Jerry Remy, who underwent cancer surgery last fall, made his return to the booth tonight. So I whipped up a little sign to welcome him back. We didn't end up on TV (as far as I know), but I thought the sign rivaled any of the others in the park.

GAME NOTES:
We were joined by my fellow Literacy Coach and die-hard Sox fan Jenn Felt and her young friend, Hanz, who was taking in his first game at Fenway.

Maine was apparently being drenched in thunderstorms - and even a tornado?!? - but we had clear skies thoughout the evening.

Our seats were not exactly front-row. Truthfully, they were back-row. Literally. Which meant that we could hang the sign behind us! Perfect!

In the eighth inning, as many people were leaving, we treated ourselves to a "free seating upgrade" and moved down to within a few rows from the field. My downsized sign was left flapping in the nose-bleeds:

As for the final score, don't ask. Rather than worry about such insignificant matters, let us all once again enjoy one of the sweetest moments in sports history: (CLICK HERE! CLICK HERE! CLICK HERE!)

Bed Bugs

8/20/09 Two disgusting pillows, trashed

I have some kind of pillow disorder. We're twenty days into this challenge, and three of my downsizes have been about pillows. Weird. The great irony is that despite all of the pillows around here, I can't find one I like to sleep on. Any recommendations of the perfect pillow?

Today's pillows were definitely not craigslist material, nor could I just mail them off to someone. Would you put your head on the pillow pictured above? I think not.

Which again raises the question, why the heck was I holding onto that pillow? Or the other one that was just as gross? I have no good answer, other than it seems such a shame to just throw them out. But, that's what I shall do.

Speaking of gross bedding, the disposal of these pillow reminded me of an episode of This American Life. If you're not familiar with This American Life, let me describe it this way:

This American Life is the best broadcast media show in existence today.

Let me say that again:

This American Life is the best broadcast media show in existence today.

It airs in Maine on Maine Public Broadcasting Network (our National Public Radio stations) at 6pm on Sunday nights. I usually listen to the podcast, which I subscribe to. At any rate, if you've never listened, I implore you to get the heck off of my blog and head over to the TAL website, where you can stream any episode for free. (There's also a TV show that runs on Showtime, but I've never seen that. I bet it's awesome.)

If you're interested in the one about bedbugs, click here. Now get outta here and go check it out...

Family Time

8/19/09 Two tubes of "Leg Lifts" lotion (by Origins!) and a baseball, given away

My grandmother spent the last three days with Joanna and me, delighting us with her stories and great wit. We took her to a Portland SeaDogs game last night (the good guys won, here's a recap), which reminded her and me of the Cleveland Indians games we used to go to back when I was in high school. (I have her to thank for summer-time room and lodging all through high school and college, my brief stint as a professional writer [working for the Galion Inquirer], and countless rounds of golf.)

Today, my mom, my sister, my niece, and my nephew came over for the afternoon to have lunch with us and play in the pool. Their visit marked the end of Nanna's time with us, although we will see her again before she returns to her home in Ohio.

Gotta savor the time we get with Nanna each summer. She's given the world 89 great years so far. I tell her she's only got eleven left until the century mark, which is a good goal to shoot for.

As they were all getting ready to leave, I was scratching my head over what to downsize today. The issue of what to get rid of has become one of Joanna's favorite games. She rose to the challenge, immediately recommending two tubes of skin cream she had found when we reorganized and cleaned out our medicine cabinet. Good enough for me! Technically these were Joanna's, not mine, but they count towards the challenge for two reasons.

1) Cleaning out the medicine cabinet had been my idea, although Joanna jumped at the suggestion like a kid on candy.

2) If I hadn't needed to get rid of something today (and vocalized my quandary) those two tubes would likely have sat in that cabinet for another year or two.

Plus, Katie and mom where thrilled to get them, and tried out the stuff right on our deck, as the photo above proves.

Now, I know that some of you out there are still going to object that the skin cream doesn't count. Fine, be like that.

I have a safety: As my nephew James was petting our cats goodbye, he noticed a baseball I had sitting on my desk.

"Baseball!" he chirped, pointing at it.

"Would you like that baseball, James?" I asked.

"Yes," he said, his eyes sparkling like only a three-year-old's can. Done deal.

So, anyway you slice it, I downsized several items today.

I just wish I didn't have to watch my grandmother leave with them.

Giving back

8/18/09 Three pillows and one pillowcase, returned

Time for a new category of downsized item: RETURNED.

Before we got married and moved up to Maine, Joanna's stuff was stored at the home of her dad, Meyrick, and his wife, Donna. In the move, we somehow ended up with a few throw pillows, which have spent the last six years moving from chair-to-chair-to-couch in our living room. It is now time for them to go home.

I placed them in the mail today to Donna. Honestly, I'm not even sure if she knew we had them, but I'm sure she'll find the perfect place for them in her house.

Looking around, there are a number of other things here that will eventually be RETURNED to their rightful owners. Whether they want them or not!

Comics are cool

8/17/09 Four Star Wars comic books, sold on eBay for $0.99

In 1985 I got my first and only subscription to a comic book: the Star Wars series by Marvell. I must have let the subscription expire after that first year, and likely threw out most issues shortly after I read them. I wasn't much of a comic book fan back then and remained indifferent to the genre for most of my thirty-seven years.

Today, I'm completely into comics, and we can probably blame National Public Radio. About two years ago, I heard a review of the graphic novel series Y: The Last Man. The NPR guy gushed about how good it was (click hear to listen to the book review that changed my life), so I decided to dive in. I loved it.

A short while later, I was visiting my friend Chris, who deposited two seminal works in my lap. One was the complete run of Sandman by Neil Gaiman. He lent me all of the books and I devoured them. The other was Watchmen, by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (here's a preview: just try and not get freaked out by Alan Moore). Even non-comic fans may now be aware of Watchmen, since it was recently made into a movie after twenty years of failed attempts.

After reading those, I completely fell down the rabbit hole. My friend and local librarian, Wes, has served as my mentor, leading me deep into the world of Batman and Justice League of America, with stops along the way for Swamp Thing, Planetary, and Preacher. Green Arrow is in my sights next.

Joanna just roles her eyes when I come home from the library with another comic. I insist it's art.

Earlier this summer, in the midst of all this comic-passion, I discovered four issues from those old Star Wars comics in my parents' attic. I enjoyed rereading them, although they clearly weren't classics. If I'd had enough to represent a complete story-arc, I might have toyed with saving them, but the four random issues held little collector value in my eyes. Or anyone else's, apparently. Nonetheless, someone was willing to pay ninety-nine cents for them, and I shipped them off to their new owner in Indiana today.

May the Force be with them.

Give to Libraries!

8/16/09 Two DVDs, donated to Casco Public Library

I love my local library. I hope you love yours.

The Casco Public Library (check out the website here) is truly the social and cultural center of our town. It is a beautiful gem, and is illustrative of how important public institutions are to our country.

Remember those two DVDs that Bull Moose Music wouldn't buy from me? Our trusty librarians, Carolyn and Wes, did not hesitate when I offered the movies to them. The best part, of course, is that I've downsized those flicks, but I can still watch them whenever I want. The library has a fantastic movie collection, which means Joanna and I have given up Blockbuster in favor of free library films. In all honesty, we've probably rented a half-dozen movies in the last two years, since almost everything we want to see we can get from the library.

I hope you give more than DVDs to your local library. Indeed, in times of economic hardship, library usage goes way up, so they certainly need your support now more than ever.

Or, if you feel so inclined, send a donation to:

Casco Public Library
P.O. Box 420
Casco, ME 04015

All contributions are tax-deductible, of course, and, as a Trustee, I'd be happy to personally write you a thank-you note!

Cheers to downsizing!

8/15/09 Packet of Hurricane cocktail mix, given away (then consumed)

I have been to heaven, and it's name is Alamoosook Lake.

Joanna and I are spending the weekend at my uncle and aunt's camp in Orland, ME. It's wonderful. The camp was built by my grandfather fifty years ago, and it was basically my childhood summer home. There aren't enough hard drives in the world to store all the wonderful memories I have of this place.

We arrived yesterday to a lobster feed and have been lounging away today on the shore front, with only a brief break for a sailboat ride. Maine: The Way Life Should Be.

Downsizing away from home is tricky, but just the other day Joanna reorganized our pantry and found a packet of Hurricane cocktail mix. We'd bought it at the "World Famous" Pat O'Brien's Bar on a trip to New Orleans. However, at home we pretty much stick to beer and wine. (Actually, Joanna basically sticks to wine, when she drinks at all). As good as the Hurricanes had been in New Orleans, it seemed unlikely that we'd get the urge to mix up our own at home anytime soon.

Joanna laughed that my Aunt Bobbi often had people "sending" her virtual drinks on Facebook. Piña coladas, rum & Cokes, margaritas. The woman is a virtual bartender. (It doesn't pay well, but at least you can drive safely afterwards.)

"Well," I replied, "Let's take them some real drinks."

We paired the mix with the necessary rum and garnishes and presented it after my Uncle Kenny and I had returned from that sailboat ride.

Within thirty minutes Kenny served up the drinks, complete with palm tree swizzle sticks. We enjoyed them in the sun, looking out over my favorite lake.

Uncle Kenny and Aunt Bobbi, thanks for a terrific weekend.

Ah, Maine. The way life should be, indeed!


-- Post From My iPhone

Delayed Giving

8/14/09 dog collar, given away

Joanna and I had a bit of a disagreement over today's downsized item, a Red Sox dog collar. She contended that it didn't count, since we bought it as a gift for friends of ours. It wasn't really ours to begin with, so I can't get credit for downsizing it. That was her position.

Our house, I countered, is actually full of things that may not belong to us. To begin with, we have a whole bunch of stuff that we've got on semi-permanent loan from our families. (Most of which will likely make their way into these pages over the course of the next year.)

I also tend to be irresponsible about getting gifts to people that we have made or bought for them. I could go into my basement right now and show you a bag of things that are for specific people. Why is that stuff still in my basement rather than in those people's hands? I have no good response for that question.

The worst example of this is a walking stick I made for my friend Jason's daughter. I crafted it as a gift for her when we went to visit back in 2007. Unfortunately, it needed a final coat of poly before we left for their home in Atlanta.

"As soon as we get home after the visit, I'll finish it and send it as a thank-you gift," I assured Joanna. Two years later it was still in my basement. I finally mailed it down to Georgia about a month ago.

Which brings us back to the dog collar. We bought it about two weeks ago to send to our friends Marc and Gianna. Their dog is a huge Red Sox fan.

If, as they say, past behavior is an indicator of future success, that dog collar could easily take up long-term residence on my work bench. But it won't. I put it in the mail today, and (since I get to make the Downsizing rules) it totally counts.

[NOTE: This is my first attempt to post to the blog
remotely, since we're enjoying a weekend at Alamoosook Lake. Hope it works.]

-- Post From My iPhone

3AC - 2AC = 1 AC

8/13/09 Two air conditioners, sold for $50

When Joanna and I got married and moved to Maine, we brought five window air conditioners with us. Only one was mine, the others were Joanna's. Apparently, in Connecticut the traditional dowry consists of a trunk-full of used AC units.

It's important to note that we moved to one of the coldest state in the country. As they say, Maine has just two seasons: winter and the 4th of July. We didn't need five air conditioners. We didn't really need ANY air conditioners.

We got rid of two of them some time ago. I think perhaps we gave them to my sister. I didn't document my downsizing so well back then.

Today I sold two of the remaining three. Craigslist works again! What will happen to the one remaining AC unit? Stay tuned...

Disposable (not so) professional attire, part 3

8/12/09 AmeriCorps t-shirt & Celtics shorts, trashed

Does the Bangor Goodwill store really add 300 items every hour? Seems rather hyperbolic. I can only say for certain that today I added six items to their inventory. Took an early morning run before the third and final day of my conference and carried my last two days worth of clothing over to the store to donate.

The run helped me liberate two more items of clothing: a t-shirt and shorts that had seen their last days. Both were over 15 years old and ready for retirement. They definitely weren't Goodwill material, worn out and unwearable. They went out in a blaze of glory, soaking up my sweat on a final, noble run before settling into their resting place, the hotel garbage.

Let us celebrate the last sweat-stain that shirt shall ever absorb:

Disposable professional attire, part 2

8/11/09 Complete outfit (shirt, pants, socks, underwear), donated to Goodwill (Well, not the underwear. Trust me, they wouldn't want it.)

It's day 2 at the Response to Intervention conference, which means I'm also on day 2 of disposable clothing. Shirt and pants may look acceptable in the above photo, but they definitely needed to go.

Yesterday's blog post generated a few comments on Facebook suggesting that it was somewhat irresponsible for me to throw away my disposable clothing. (By the way, if you're reading this on Facebook, you should really check out the real Downsizing Blog. I'd love comments left over there so my non-Facebook friends could see them.)

Rest assured, dear readers, that I do listen to you.

I am NOT willing to lug these worn out, dirty clothes back home in an effort to find a more environmental or socially conscious downsizing option. Everyone takes their clothes home with them after a business trip. It's so typical and predictable. The whole point of this challenge is to do things a little differently. Let me be clear: I AM DOWNSIZING THESE CLOTHES, AND THEY ARE NOT RETURNING HOME WITH ME!

However, as luck would have it, there is a Goodwill store across the street from our hotel. So, I commit to taking both yesterday and today's outfits over there before we leave tomorrow. All involved should pray that they'll wash the clothing well before they put it out for sale. I hope that is a compromise that you all can live with. I await your feedback...

Disposable professional attire, part 1

8/10/09 Complete outfit (shirt, pants, sock, and, yes, underwear), trashed

Hate to do laundry? Tired of lugging a hamper-full of dirty clothes down to the basement or, worse yet, to the laundromat? Feeling guilty about your ever expanding carbon footprint from all the electricity of washing? When you take a trip, does your back strain under the weight of your suitcase?

I have a solution.

After wearing your clothes for the day, simply trash them.

I'm on the road in Orono, ME, for the next few days at an education conference. Today's outfit? It's now in a pile in the corner of my hotel room. That lovely yellow shirt and blue pants (call it my Catholic school-boy look) shall not be going back into my suitcase for the trip back home. Disposable clothing. Trust me, it could become a trend.

Update: In response to comments from my caring readers, the clothing mentioned above was fished out of the trash and shall be donated to Goodwill (see post on 8/11 for additional details).

Re-gifting honestly

8/9/09 Wine decanter & glasses, given away

I want to change the culture of gift-giving. I think we should give less, give more thoughtfully, and give with a sense of purpose.

Tonight, my purpose was to downsize a wine decanter and two wine glasses we were given last Christmas.

Our friends Dan and Kathrine had us over to their beautiful new home for dinner, and naturally we wanted to take something to thank them. Joanna baked a delicious blueberry pie, but we also decided on the above mentioned wine decanter and glasses. (By the way, if you don't know what a wine decanter is, you're in good company. Neither did I until I was given one. Click here for a demonstration of this must-have item.) I thought the gifts were appropriate since Dan loves wine.

Plus, we had never used them.

Joanna, however, raised a concern: should we tell them that this was a re-gift? She contended that we shouldn't since it might make it seem less thoughtful. I objected.

"Let's be up front about it," I said. Of course, I also have this downsizing odyssey to hide behind. So, as we handed them the bag, I quickly explained about the challenge, and we all had a good laugh as they opened the gift.

Dan graciously placed the decanter and glasses on his kitchen wine rack (see photo above) for all to see, while Kathrine tried to figure out to whom she might be able to re-gift them, and the sooner the better.

That's the spirit! Give 'em away, Kathrine! (Just not back to us.)

Memory of my grandparents

8/8/09 Electric razor, given away

Memories can flood back at strange moments.

When I put the posting on Craigslist offering a free electric razor, I wasn't sure if anyone would bite. I didn't figure there'd be a huge market for pre-owned shavers, even if the price is free. Still, within twenty-four hours, a friendly-sounding guy was on his way over to pick it up.

I was ready to make fun him - on the blog, not in person - and was very curious to meet the strange man who was trolling the internet for used shaving equipment.

Scott pulled up in his family van. His wife and kids waited as he stepped out and greeted me in the driveway. He was probably in his mid-forties, a little pudgy, and he smiled warmly and shook my hand firmly. After a bit of small talk, I admitted to him that I hadn't been sure anyone would want a used electric razor.

"Oh," he said, "Well, it'll be perfect for us. It's for my dad. He's in the nursing home and, uh..."

That's when my grandparents showed up.

My grandfather has been a life-long mentor and role model for me. Although he passed away a decade ago, he continues influence me daily, through the lessons he taught and the examples he set.

He suffered a stroke during my freshman year of college and spent the last years of his life in a wheelchair, unable to communicate in meaningful ways. He also lost the use of his right arm, so my grandmother began using an electric razor to shave him. I remember sitting in their kitchen as that razor buzzed, my grandmother working so hard to care for the man she'd been married to for fifty years.

I don't even know if Scott finished that sentence about his father. Standing in my driveway, I was transported back, to a warm kitchen on the coast of Maine. For a few brief moments, I was back with two people I love so much that their deaths still make me ache.

I gave Scott a razor today, but he gave me something far more valuable. An unexpected visit from my grandparents. Thanks, Scott.

The book takes a walk

8/7/09 Walking Home: A Woman's Pilgrimage on the Appalachian Trail (book), given away

Books are emotionally difficult to get rid of. It just seems wrong to pull a book off my bookcase and decide it's no longer worthy of staying in my house. For cryin' out loud, I wrote a book (check it out here or here). That took time, effort, and more than a little chutzpah. I'd be ticked if someone pulled it off their shelf and decided it had to be disposed of. Of course, since I've only sold about a dozen copies and most of them went to my father-in-law, I don't have much to worry about.

Regardless, in the past six months, I've downsized a lot of my books. Many were donated to the Casco Public Library and the rest sold in a yard sale earlier this summer. (Oh, if I'd only known I was going to do this challenge, I could have saved them, and then counted them as downsized one day at a time. It would have gotten me through at least 200 days!) Subsequently, the books I've still got are, more or less, near and dear to my heart.

As a proud Appalachian Trail thru-hiker (feel free to check out the website my great friend Vance made to document my hike), I have a number of great books about the trail. I hate the idea of losing any of them, since I feel so intimately tied to the subject. Indeed, I have my own little A.T. library, with all my hiking books neatly arranged on one bookshelf.

Earlier today, I mailed one away as a gift.

Earlier this week I received a letter from one of my colleagues letting me know that she was moving out of state and wouldn't be returning to our school. It's a big loss for us, but I wanted to wish Christina well and make some sort of farewell gesture. She was an avid outdoor enthusiast and had talked of possibly hiking the Appalachian Trail someday.

I had bought the book in a used book store/organic vegetable market (shouldn't there be one of those in every town?) on the island of Vieques. The A.T. is apparently a hot topic in the Caribbean. It was an interesting read, and I think Christina will appreciate it.

Come to think of it, I didn't really get rid of the book, I just sent it along to its next reader. I can live with that.

The definition of insanity, part 1

8/6/09 A bunch of used painting tools, trashed (4 used paint trays, 3 old brushes, half-dozen used paint-stirrers, a paint-clogged wire brush, and countless sample paint swatches)

Is there any more asinine activity than water-sealing a deck?

Let's say a guy came up to you in a store and made this pitch:

Okay, buddy, here's the deal. I'm gonna sell you $50 worth of chemicals, another twenty bucks worth of tools. You take the stuff home, coat your deck with it. Careful, it's poisonous and sticky, and if you don't put it on just right, it'll look streaky and spotty. Yeah, and make sure it doesn't rain for at least two days before you do it and anther two days after you do it. Wear gloves. Clean-up is a nightmare. Pick a hot day so the back of your neck gets sunburned. Got it? Okay, now that's stage one. Stage one is the fun and easy part. Now pay attention, cause this is the important part. From now on, every year of your life, you get to do this: As soon as the weather is perfect and you've finally got all your deck furniture back out there, take it all off. Come in here, buy $25 worth of chemicals to completely remove the remains of all those chemicals you put on last summer. It'll only half work and the deck will look like a teenager with acne, but bear with me. Once you got it completely clean, you get re-apply everything you just stripped off. Yep, you get to buy all that stuff again and put it right back on. Since all this has to happen during beautiful, sunny weather, it'll probably occupy the best two weeks of the summer. Understand? Hey, don't make that face, friend, it's just time and money! Just remember, if you skip a year, your deck will collapse. Now, where's your credit card?

If some dude said that to you, would you ever say, "Sure, sounds like a plan!"???

Would I?

Apparently I would.

How it went down

8/5/09 Seven throw pillows, given away

Time: 6:22 PM
Transfer location: Denny's parking lot, Portland, ME
Driver: Joanna
Dealer: Reed (aka "The Asset")
Middleman: Craigslist.com free listings
Receiver: Beth
Beth's muscle: Emily (approximate age, 5)
Final report: Deal went down smoothly. Mission accomplished.

End notes: if you only click on one link in the above post, you've got to check out the Denny's ad.

I wash my hands of it

8/4/09 "MEN Moisturizing Body Wash," consumed (bottle recycled)

Through fifteen years of work in education, I've probably received about a dozen gifts from students and their parents. I hope that low total doesn't suggest a lack of appreciation for my work. I prefer to believe that parents were so thankful for my efforts, they felt no gift could adequately convey their gratitude. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Of the dozen gifts I have received, some of the highlights included a camouflage nylon wallet (with velcro seal!), a porcelain figurine of what I think was some sort of Hindu god, and a knock-off Tommy Hilfiger shirt that Bill Cosby would have rocked. Actually, I wore that shirt for several years, but I was just out of college and I hadn't yet developed my now highly-refined sense of fashion.

For Christmas 2004, a kindergarten student presented me with a box of men's toiletries. Hand cream, cologne (Joanna got a good laugh out of the idea of me wearing cologne), a bar of soap, the above pictured body wash, and a few other things I can't recall. Was this a strange gift to give your son's kindergarten teacher? I leave that judgment to you.

For over four years, that bottle of body wash has hunkered down in the back of my bathroom drawer. I'm a bar-of-soap kind of guy, not a body wash user. However, I realized about two weeks ago that the bottle was not going away on its own. Joanna objected to me using it on the basis that this highly artificial product would either A) cause my skin to peel off in wide sheets, or B) lead to a chemical fire in our septic tank. The back of the bottle revealed 27 ingredients, many of which contained numbers and one of which was -- I'm not kidding here -- 26 letters long.

I bravely forged ahead.

This morning, I shook the last few drops from the bottle, wrung out the bath scrubbie (oh, the shame of using a bath scrubbie), and checked by body for lesions. So far, so good.

Tomorrow, I break out a new bar of soap.

The price of movies

8/3/09 Sixteen DVDs, sold for $22.83

Maine has the coolest used (and new, but who would buy that?) music/video store in the country: Bull Moose Music. The people who work in there are always friendly and fun, and you can get really great buys on used stuff. For example, a few months ago, I bought a used DVD of Saw for about $4. C'mon, that's cheaper than renting! (Joanna, it turns out, really does not like slasher horror movies.)

So today I trotted in with a shopping bag of old DVDs I decided I could live without.

"Here to sell something?" the incredibly perky -- and artfully tattooed -- woman at the register asked. Why, yes, that was easy. She scanned each film and then announced the grand total: "It comes to $30.44 in store credit or $22.83 cash."

Yippee, options! I glanced at Joanna.

"We'll take the cash," she said flatly. Okay, we'll take the cash.

Honestly, getting rid of those DVDs wasn't difficult, since none of them made the cut as "Reed Classics." An Evening with Kevin Smith was the toughest, but how many times do you need to watch a fat dude stand on a stage and talk about his small penis?

As a side note, they wouldn't buy two films because they came up as promotional copies or some such thing. Feel free to make me an offer for Jaws 2 or Babe, Pig in the City (Check out how Siskel & Ebert fall all over themselves praising it!). I promise I came by them legitimately and I do believe they both won multiple Academy Awards. Bid high, so you don't lose your chance...

File under "Recycle"

8/2/09: Box of old school files, recycled

I've had this box of files in my closet for six years. It contains the absolutely vital files that I saved after leaving my teaching job at Future Leaders Institute to move back to Maine. Even now, as sort it for recycling, I have pangs of fear. What if I need these examples of student work? What if I forget this amazing idea? Well, then I'll be totally screwed, because this whole box is going to the dump.

Day 1: Birthdays are for Giving

8/1/09: Data the stuffed dog, given to my nephew James

Last spring I went with several of my teaching colleagues to Virginia for an education conference. On our return trip, they presented me with a stuffed toy dog that they named Data. The dog was intended to quiet my constant whining about wanting a pet dog, and the name referred to the data analysis we seem constantly engaged in as educators these days. (To which, I must say, I am not opposed.) It was a funny gag gift and one which I appreciated for both its humor and thoughtfulness.

Cute little Data has resided ever since on the stereo speaker in our living room. (Honestly, he hasn't been much of a substitute for a real dog, although he's been really easy to care for.)

Doesn't this represent so many of the things we have around our homes? Trinkets, bobbles, knick-knacks that we acquire in odd little ways. Why do we keep them? I say it's 10% appreciation, 90% guilt: "I can't get rid of that! Surely the person who gave it to me would be crushed to the soul!"

If I'm going to downsize, I'm going to have to conquer the guilt.

I chose August 1st to begin this year-long challenge because I thought up the idea in mid-July and wanted to start at the beginning of a new month. The fact that my nephew James also turned 3 today was completely serendipitous. Hmm, what to give, what to give?

Of course, we had already purchased a Thomas the Train toy for James, so Data (now renamed Casey) was a bonus birthday gift. Even so, kicking off the downsizing challenge by giving a birthday gift to my only nephew seemed like a perfect beginning.

(Now I just hope that the teachers who gave Data me don't read this, because I know they'd be crushed to the soul...)