organizing florida

Now, I realize that when I say "organizing florida" you might think this is a political commentary. That I'm rallying the democrats of Florida to work together so that what has happened before there won't happen again. That I have secret insights for Hillary and Barak and, um, Vilsak (ha!). Sadly, no. What I tackled over the weekend was much more difficult -- I helped my friend Lois organize her apartment.

Many several moons ago, I hired myself out as an efficiency consultant, coming into executives' offices and telling them why their filing system stunk and helping them come up with something better. That was great, and landed me a terrific job with Lois, both in her office, and periodically in her home as well. She moved to Florida a while ago, and now I visit her there and systematically attack her closet. (in a very friendly way, of course)

Now, I love Lois, and have no desire to embarrass her with before pictures, so instead, I'll just show you the lovely, glowing results of our weekend together:

First, what we discarded and sent off to the Salvation Army (or what we call "Sally Ann"):

Now, this photo is deceptive, as we lined the bags up against a mirror, so there are twice as many of them in the pic as in real life. However, if you were looking for any of the following, you would likely be able to find them in one of these bags

• Stretchy Pants (several pair)
• Too Short T-Shirts (multiples)
• Shirts Lois Thought She Would Like But Then Had Second Thoughts About
• One pair of shoes, which, when brought home, was actually comprised of two different sized shoes
• And a variety of items which, when I asked her "do you really think you'll wear this" the answer ranged from a shrug of the shoulders to an emphatically lemon-faced "GAH!"
  

I'd like to take a brief pause here and say how proud I am of Lois for purging all this. "You are here for sortation and purgation!" (and apparently vocabularization) she said, and that's exactly what we did.

Yielding this:

and this:
and this
Without the before pictures, these just look like clean closets. But believe me when I tell you, knowing what was in there makes these PRISTINE closets.

Oh, and it was Florida, so I swam in the pool, sat in the jacuzzi, ate fresh seafood and took my life into my own hands by getting in the car with Michael, a New York driver transplanted to the one state where the drivers are consistently older and worse than actual New Yorkers.

The view from the front of Lois's apartment (taken with my somewhat crappy cameraphone on an overcast morning):
Oh, and the pool, of course...
We also cleaned out underneath Lois' bathroom sinks, and let me tell you, that pesky 3oz liquid rule for the airplanes probably saved my life. Otherwise, everything that Lois got rid of would have found its way into my suitcase. As it was I came home with:

• an electronic toothbrush (which unfortunately doesn't work anymore)
• sixteen new toothbrush heads
• a bath scrubby
• a lovely porcelain bootie for my brother in law
• Christmas cards
• dental floss (mint!)
• burt's bees avocado hair gooey yum yum stuff (technical term, I think)
• four TASTY tangerines, still attached to leaves
• and a lightweight cellphone charger
  

Oh, and a belly so full of food I thought I might die.


All in all: Fantastic!