Check mark

7/3/10 Four books of checks, shredded, then trashed

A new address means new checks, rendering our old ones worthless. And -- DANGER, DANGER! -- a threat to our identity.

Lacking a shredder, I needed to manually cut up all of our old checks, which proved to be not only a monotonous and time-consuming task, but also rather painful. By the end, my thumb was bruised from the scissors, and I was beginning to understand why a shredder is as essential to the modern family as iPads and minivans. If this downsize leads to upsizing, I'm going to be ticked, but sometimes it works that way.

Although I cut up the checks beyond all recognition, I made the decision to throw the million tiny pieces into the trash rather than the recycling bin, on the theory that it's even less likely that someone would dive into a trash bag to reconstruct checks.

Honestly, I did that final bit of "free insurance" because I didn't want any negative feedback from my good friend and frequent blog commenter CRM, aka "Frank." I know he would take me to task if I simply tossed the check pieces into the recycle bin, rather than slather them with coffee grounds and cat waste in our regular garbage.

Bad people are out there -- we must take every precaution against them!

So, if any of you, Dear Readers, would like a good shot at stealing my identify or passing off bad checks, here is your chance. Just be prepared with rubber gloves, a whole lot of tape, and about a year's worth of free time.

Beginning's end

7/2/10 Rowe School documents (and other random papers), recycled

I did something today I haven't done in almost seven years. I started a new job. I am now, officially, the Resident Principal of SOAR Charter School. Man, that should be exciting.

Of course, in the words of the Semisonic song, "Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end." That's pop culture poetry, folks.

As I prepared to go to work this morning, I cleaned out my book bag in preparation for the new job. A bunch of stuff from the old job was still in there, including my old school's staff directory, phone tree, and information about summer payment. These things, of course, are irrelevant to me now, and yet not easy to let go of.

The great joy of a job such as educating, however, is that you never really let go of the past. What you do today and tomorrow must be built on what you've learned yesterday. We're not building widgets here, we're teaching kids. It's not something you ever do perfectly, and it's not something you can ever stop striving to get better at.

I don't need that directory to hold onto the brilliance of my colleagues, to hold onto what I've learned from them, to hold onto the gifts they prepared for my future students. I let those papers go with the knowledge that the important stuff stays with me.

But, today was a new beginning, and that is notable.

Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end.

Christmas in July

7/1/10 Holiday bows, hand-painted towels, Jesus figure, and pewter pendant, given away

Yesterday Chase took his first official swim in the pool, which we prepared him for by slathering him with four and a half gallons of sunscreen. He seemed to enjoy himself, particularly when Joanna dunked her own head under the water and then came up directly in front of him.

When we got back to our apartment, the temperatures were in the 90s, we were sweaty and grimy, and the Brilliant Boy was hot and tired.

Naturally, thoughts turned to Christmas.

You may recall, Dear Readers, that one of my great downsizing feats of the past year was dealing with literally dozens of boxes of holiday decorations. It became known as The Great Christmas Downsize and it occupied at least thirteen blog posts. Go ahead and try to identify them all -- I need the web traffic.

Actually, getting rid of as much Christmas stuff as we did in a baker's dozen worth of installments is pretty efficient, if I do say so myself. And today's entry (number fourteen by my count) may just finish the job.

Joanna's Aunt Jane visited us back in April, and we got her in on the act, managing to hand off several Christmas items to her and her family. Glad to do it, glad to do it. However, some time later, Joanna found a few more goodies that she knew Jane would just adore.

As has apparently become a habit (see here and here), rather than downsize those things before leaving Maine, we chose instead to cart them all the way to Colorado before sending them off to her. At least the priority mail postage to Florida is the same from Denver as it is from Casco.

Merry Christmas, Jane. We're certainly in the spirit, here!

Double your money! Part II

6/30/10 X-Cargo cartop carrier, sold for $50

You can make money downsizing, which is as good a reason as any to do it. The Downsizing Challenge is not all about the Benjamins, but I'm also not going to turn away from a chance to collect a few greenbacks. As we near the end of the challenge, I plan to make a tally of how much cold, hard cash I've managed to pull in as a result of selling stuff, but no time for that tonight.

Instead, I shall merely close out Month Eleven with a monetary success story.

Clearly, my best sale to date was the trailer, which I bought for $200 and then sold for $450. However, I can't take credit for that, since it was my Dad who brokered the sale. Nonetheless, ever since he pulled that off, I've had today's downsize in mind.

As we planned our departure from Maine, I knew our cars were going to be packed to the gills. We needed to bring not only our basic clothes and all of the essential baby items, but two cats, their necessities, and my parents' luggage, since they were accompanying us on the drive. Realizing what a tight fit it could be, I started looking on craigslist for cartop carriers. Most of what I found for sale was in the $75-$100 range, but I did find an older carrier for $25, which I quickly snatched up.

It proved to be one of my rare moments of genius.

The wonderfully named X-Cargo (the logo is a snail -- absolutely brilliant!) strapped securely to the roof of the Yoda Mobile, held a tremendous amount of gear, remained watertight even through serious thunder and even hail storms, and only reduced my gas millage by ninety-three percent. Most importantly, it us some breathing room in the cars, making the journey far more pleasant.

Today, I sold that carrier for $50, doubling my money. Not exactly Dad standards, but a sale I'll take at any rate. Certainly an acceptable way to end the penultimate month of the Downsize Challenge.

One month to go. July 31, here I come.

The Interweb!

6/29/10 Wireless router box, recycled

Today's downsize prompts two commentaries:

1) Even though I have been downsizing for 233 straight days, it still isn't always automatic.

When we got a wireless router about five years ago, I carefully saved the box and the original packaging. Good thing I did. When it came time to move, I found the box and packaged up the router, confident it would travel safely. And it did.

Today, I set up the router in our temporary apartment and, out of habit, put packing materials carefully back in the box and stored the box away in our one, little living room closet. This was foolish because A) Our next move will be, literally, a few blocks away. I ought to be able to transport the router there without bashing it to smithereens. And, B) We have very little storage space in this apartment.

Still, my reflex was to save the box. Have I learned nothing? I pulled the box back out of the closet and put it with the recycling.

2) My life requires the internet. I've been without my own high-speed internet since May 26, almost exactly a month.

What a horrible way to live.

The only way I've been able to ensure daily blogging is because I've been able to use my iPhone in a pinch. When I have used my computer, it's been by cobbling together connections through hotel rooms, Starbucks, and -- more often than I should admit -- "stolen" WiFi signals.

I find my own dependence on the internet rather unsettling, but I am equally amazed that we have reached the point in America where it's pretty easy to get a wireless internet connection almost anywhere.

Here's the case-in-point:

The day we drove from Connecticut to Ohio, nursing babies, tending to cats, and nearly losing the front wheel of my car along the way, we arrived at my grandmother's house late at night. Clearly, my grandmother doesn't have internet, but I figured in a pinch I'd use my iPhone signal to throw up a simple blog before midnight. At about 11:45PM I turned on the iPhone to discover that I had no service. (Guess those Verizon ads were telling the truth.)

What, me worry?

I walked over to the window, leaned against it, and tried to find a wireless internet signal. I figured I had at least a 50/50 shot that her neighbor had wireless, and I could grab it.

Bingo. I could get just enough of the WiFi to write the post standing there at the window, finishing it literally one minute before midnight. (I'm a stickler for consistency with the blog.) As amazing as it was that that little trick worked, what's perhaps more notable is that I wasn't even that surprised. For the rest of the time in Ohio, any time I needed to use the internet, I just walked out on my grandmother's patio and could grab that signal pretty clearly.

I've did the same thing here last night, sitting on the swing in our courtyard grabbing the one unsecured wireless signal I could find. (Thank you "allshouse" for the complementary use of your internet.)

Such tomfoolery can end now, as the Comcast service dude arrive today to set up the cable and internet modem, and I spent the afternoon getting my own wireless router working.

Now that I've rejoined the twenty-first century, the last month of the blog should be a breeze, even without that box to store my router in.

Walk with me

6/28/10 Trash, trashed

Some of you, Dear Readers, may consider today's downsize something of a cop out, but I actually feel pretty good about it. Any downsize that leads to the world being a cleaner, more beautiful place counts in my book.

Chase was up early today, so Joanna and I were out the door shortly after 7AM, exploring the walking options around out new neighborhood. Fortunately, despite being technically in the city of Denver, we live in a walking wonderland. Our section of the city has literally miles and miles, acres and acres of interconnected parks, green space, playgrounds, and walking/biking/running trails.

Our walk lasted for nearly two hours, and almost none of that was spent on sidewalks or crossing streets. Chase enjoyed it, too, although he'd be the first to admit that he slept through much of it.

To the credit of the area, there was virtually no litter along our path. About half-way through our stroll, however, we did come across a baby's bib in the middle of the walkway. We almost walked right over it, but then my better nature kicked in and I dropped it in the basket under Chase's stroller. This little action created a small, yet powerful shift in Joanna and my thinking, and we spent the rest of the walk collecting every single piece of trash we came across.

In my old neighborhood in New York, this would have burdened us down beyond mobility within thirty feet. Here, however, we ended up with only nine items, including the bib, a child's sock, and a pacifier. It's unclear whether three babies had unfortunate moments or one infant was having a really bad day.

Since we arrived home with those items, they were technically now my possessions. Which took me all of a few minutes to immediately downsize into the trash.

I did save the bib, however, throwing it in the hamper to be washed. We don't need it for Chase, but I figure it could be an acceptable Goodwill donation. That's a downsize for another day.

Editor's Note, 8/15/10: That downsize for another day will happen, but not before we put the bib to use. It turned out that all but one of our bibs are still in storage. Chase has started in on solid foods (prunes are a particular favorite), so we resorted to using the abandoned, soiled bib as a back-up. Yes, that seems wrong, but this mission is in large part about the recycling adage: reduce, REUSE, recycle. Just staying true to the cause.

Nothing but air

6/27/10 Thirty-nine inflatable packing bags, recycled

The interesting thing about the Downsizing Challenge is that before it, I had no particular inclination towards saving boxes and packing materials. Downsizing led me to eBay, however, which prompted me to begin hoarding boxes and bubble wrap. The situation only became worse when we prepared for our move, although I can't blame that on the challenge.

As we unpacked from the move last week, my Mom carefully set aside bubble wrap and other packing materials, neatly packaging it up for safekeeping. I can't quite bring myself to part with the large box of bubble wrap, which will be invaluable if I sell anything else on eBay -- although looking around at our rather spartan apartment, I'm not sure what's left to hock.

However, I have made the difficult decision to part ways with the large air bags that we now find in Amazon.com packages, among others. They aren't as versatile and take up a lot more space than traditional bubble wrap. Plus, I'm a traditional guy. Have you looked closely at these air bags? The ones I had tried to pass themselves off as true space-age technology, with names like PactivAir 3000 Air Cushioning System and AIR Plus by Storopack. That's a bit much, I dare say.

Still, this wasn't an easy decision, and I almost saved them. But the limited storage space we now have (with the POD gone), let me to this drastic act. Fortunately, they are all labeled with that little recycling triangle, so I let the air out of them and placed them in the recycling bin.

Speaking of the POD, I can't close without showing off the PODzilla moving system, which I was lucky enough to witness in action as our container was taken away yesterday afternoon. I'll let the photos speak for themselves:

Cool, huh? I'm totally investing in that company.