I’ve never really understood the concept of “spring cleaning” since most of my intensive house-cleaning and -organizing efforts get done in the fall & winter (when it’s not so pleasant to be outside). Last night I embarked upon the rather forboding task of intensively cleaning my computer room. I’m chagrined to admit that when we moved into the townhouse 13 months ago, I piled about a half-dozen boxes in the corner “to be sorted out later” — then promptly ignored them. Over the last year, assorted stuff “to be sorted out later” has been piled atop those boxes, until there was a very untidy small mountain of stuff. The cats (especially Michiko) have enjoyed using it as a jungle gym.

Currently that corner is completely empty!

The now-sorted stuff is currently in neatly-organized piles in my computer room, where later this evening I will find appropriate places for all of it. The trash from the sorting (3 large bags) was taken out last night, and the remainder of the goods is: 2 boxes of Geoffrey’s keepsakes & Alice Cooper collectibles, 1 small box of my castle & dragon miniatures, 2 photo albums & a whole lot of loose photos, a dozen or so books, a largish bag of old mail & outdated documents which need to be shredded, a good-sized pile of my old Wicca rituals & research papers (a lot of it from way back in ‘97!), a box of tax papers & bank statements & other legal documents which need to be saved, a pile of mementos belonging to my kids, a huge box of videotapes (most of which are unlabeled, so I’ll need to look at all of them & trash the stuff not worth keeping), a huge box of books that I don’t want (which I’ll take to Powell’s to trade for store credit), a huge box of books we’re keeping but for which we don’t currently have bookshelf space, assorted framed prints & an oil painting (of Multnomah Falls, painted by someone I used to know) to put up on the walls, and assorted jewelry & other small items that need to be dusted/cleaned and a place found for them.

And that was just the stuff on the floor! Also in the computer room are a couple of 8-foot wide wall shelves full of stuff (mostly board games) that need to be dusted & organized, plus 2 desks that need to be dusted & organized. When I’ve completed that (planned for later tonight), I’ll be moving the computer desk about 5 feet (which means dusting all the computer equipment & untangling all the various wires & cords) and rearranging the computer room somewhat. I’m beside myself with joy that Jenn has loaned me her brand-new vacuum to make the job easier.

I was up until 5 am doing all this, but that’s because I didn’t get started until midnight. Earlier in the evening, the great goddess Mari & her darling husband Doug took me & Lyse to the Hilton Family Skating & Gymnastics Spectacular at the Rose Quarter, which was taped for TV and will air on NBC on Dec. 24th. The company that Mari works for has a skybox suite, so we had very comfortable seats and a terrific view.

It was a really neat show combining ice skating and gymnastics exhibition routines — they had the ice rink set up with a balance beam, parallel bars, and rings on one end, and the gymnastics floor mat on the other end. For someone whose 2 favorite sports are gymnastics & ice skating, it was exquisitely wonderful!

The best part was that I didn’t know (until she was getting ready to introduce the show) that my very first idol, Nadia Comaneci, was one of the show’s hosts (along with her husband Bart Conner, and ice skater Rosalynn Sumners)! Mari & Lyse teased me because I was using the binoculars that come with the skybox seats to watch Nadia during the commentors speeches, despite the fact that her back was to the section where we were. I just love Nadia!

However, I did lose a bit of my innocence at the show. During the performances, a few of the skaters fell on jumps, and I thought that was sad since the show was being taped for TV broadcast. I thought that perhaps for the broadcast, they’d just skip the routines which had a lot of problems. Little did I suspect that, at the end of the show, they asked the audience to stay (and applaud at the correct moments) so the skaters could re-do the segments of their routines in which they fell, so they could edit the good jumps in for the broadcast! Also, the commentators’ opening speech must have had problems, because they made them run through it about 7 or 8 times after the skating re-takes were done (Bart Conner needs to stop ad-libbing and just read the fuq’ing teleprompter!). Aack! Now I know that every televised skating show that isn’t an actual competition has segments deliberately re-done if the skaters don’t get it right the first time! Somehow I find that awfully sad — like discovering that the Tooth Fairy isn’t real before you lose all your baby teeth, and not wanting to put any more of your teeth under your pillow because you know it’s just going to be your mom or dad sneaking in after you’re asleep to swap the tooth for money.

But my absolute favorite male skater, Rudy Galindo, did a picture-perfect routine — and the best part was that he skated to a Prince medley, wearing an all-purple velvet-looking costume (including a flashy cape) reminiscent of Prince’s “Purple Rain” fashion! I was beside myself with delight…okay, and not a little bit of lust. (Yes, I know Rudy Galindo is gay. That doesn’t stop plenty of women from lusting over Matthew McConaughey, does it?)

But all in all, it was a completely fabulous evening, and spent with some of my favorite people!