Disneysteve's Common Cents Blog

Periodically, I list a book or two on Half.com, usually something I got for free somewhere or something found while cleaning the house that we don't want or need. I've had mixed results, but since there's no cost for listing, I've got nothing to lose. I've sold quite a few over the years.

Lately, I've been getting these short online medical surveys that offer a selection of items to choose from as a reward. I don't want or need any of the items but one choice is a nice medical dictionary, so I've selected that. So far, I've gotten 3 of them. I sold the first one a few weeks back. The 2nd one sold today. I haven't listed the 3rd as I just received it yesterday, but I'll definitely list it now that I see how quickly the first 2 sold. And I think I have at least one more coming to me. I got $8.99 for the first and $7.98 for the second. I always make sure mine is the lowest priced listing for that item.

I also got a promotional set of diabetic cookbooks. I listed 2 of them yesterday and one sold today. I got $7.99 for that one.

So that's $25.00 for 3 books that cost me nothing. Not a bad deal at all. I'll take it.

The downside of keeping cars forever is that periodically the planets align just so and a bunch of things wear out or break at the same time.

Our van is a 2000 Toyota Sienna. I took it into the shop this morning for what I believe is a failing starter. The last time it was in for service, they also told me that the front brakes were due for replacing, the rear shocks were shot, the rear wheel cylinders were leaking and the tires were worn. I put off all that stuff at the time until we got past the Bat Mitzvah expenses, but today I told them to go ahead and fix everything. My wife has noticed the car slipping a bit on wet roads so I definitely wanted to get the tires done.

End result will be a nice big repair bill. Hopefully, though, this will hold us for a while. I don't mind spending $1,000 or so each year to maintain a good quality car.

It has been some time since I blogged about decluttering. You may remember that a few months ago I was on a mission to clean the house. I accomplished quite a bit but did eventually lose the motivation as other things took over my free time, particularly all the work we did getting ready for our daughter's Bat Mitzvah in September.

I decided even before that day that once that was past us and the synagogue retreat my wife and I run each year was over (it was last weekend), I was putting my wife and daughter on notice that it was time for ALL of us to seriously work on cleaning the house. I told them that I wanted ALL of us to start doing what I had been doing over the summer.

Every single day, each of us is to clean at least one thing. That might mean doing as little as throwing away an unneeded receipt sitting on your dresser or getting that pair of shoes that you wore last week out of the family room and back into your closet.

Of course, the hope is that most days each of us will do more than one thing. It has been a week so far and everyone is cooperating. My daughter gets annoyed when I ask if she has cleaned something each day, but she is doing it. My wife has been doing really well. I think knowing that all of us are working on it has helped motivate her.

I've certainly been doing my share. Friday I attacked a pile of stuff in the basement that has been there for ever and ever. My reason for going there was to gain access to the exam/manipulation table that was blocked by the stuff (I'm an osteopathic physician and wanted to be able to use the table to work on DW and DD's necks and backs). I threw out some stuff and put some stuff away in the storage closets and, for the first time in a few years, was actually able to use the table. In fact, it was the first time my daughter was ever on that table.

Today, I spent some time in the garage and cleared out a bunch of trash and packed the recycling bin full of boxes and papers.

I've also done a variety of things inside the house, on my desk, in the kitchen, etc.

I'm sure that if all of us keep at it, pretty soon this place will start looking a lot better.

As of 10/31, our Home Equity loan balance is $2,831.95. That is down $1,970.49 from last month.

My goal was to pay this off by the end of the year and I'm right on track. Even if the alloted percentage isn't quite enough, I have surplus funds to use to make up the difference.

So as of January 1, I will no longer have a $218.01 monthly HEL payment to make. Yeah!

I got away from blogging about my exercise routine but I didn't stop exercising. For the month of October, of the 28 days I was home (we were out of town for 3 days) I worked out on Wii Fit 9 times, so an average of about every 3 days. That's okay and far better than what I was usually doing before we got the Wii Fit program, but I still want to do better. I'd like to get up to 12-15 times/month. That's my goal for November.

We are really enjoying Wii Fit. All 3 of us use it regularly. I started doing 20 minutes or so and the past few times have done 30 minutes or more. For anyone looking for a relatively inexpensive way to get in shape and have fun doing it, I'd highly recommend it.

We went to the local casino today for a couple of hours. I had a great outing. I played video blackjack and video poker and ended up winning $343 total! I'm generally happy if I break even or don't lose too much. Coming home a big winner doesn't happen that often so it was very nice. DW lost $75, but that still works out to a nice profit on the day.

Our synagogue called yesterday and left a message for my wife that there was a check there for her. She did do some part-time work for them not long ago but she was already paid for that, so we didn't know what the check could have been for.

She picked it up last night. Turns out it was the $250 security deposit we paid to rent the room for our daughter's Bat Mitzvah a few weeks ago. Neither of us remembered that we had it coming to us. That was a nice little bonus.

I realized I haven't posted for a couple of weeks. Nothing particularly exciting has been going on but I figured I'd give some updates.

1. Even though I stopped doing the Exercise Log entries, I have not stopped exercising. I'm still working out with Wii Fit. I think I did 22 minutes tonite.

Now that I've had it for over a month, I would still highly recommend it for anyone looking for a home exercise regimen. Much more convenient than a gym, not dependent on the weather and you can exercise on your own schedule. It is even portable if you go out of town and want to pack it. As long as you have a TV to hook it to, you're all set.

Not only that, but the other night, the TV was in use so I just went upstairs and did several of the exercises I've learned from Wii in our bedroom. You can't do the balance games but can certainly do the yoga, strength training and aerobic ones.

2. My wife and I visited a local casino (Chester, PA) last week. I won $93 and she won about $12. We had a casual dinner at their sports bar and just had a nice evening out. We're planning to go again on Saturday morning while our daughter is at a school program. We'll play a little and maybe do an early lunch or snack.

3. Got the van fixed today. It had failed inspection for an emissions problem. Repairs came to almost $1,500. I know I could have had it done cheaper elsewhere but the dealership is so convenient. They provide excellent service, a free rental and I trust that they know what they're doing. They did recommend some other work be done (like front brakes and tires) but I decided to shop around for those things. Now I just have to get it back to DMV to get re-inspected.

4. We had to scrub our annual Disney World trip. My daughter was hand-picked for a special school program that meets every Saturday for 6 weeks and that conflicts with when we were going to go. We're all bummed since we have been going annually for a long time (my daughter just turned 13 and has been there 14 times). We're talking about going next summer instead. We'd love to go for more than a week so we could do that then. Can't do it during the school year.

5. Since we can't go to Disney, we may just go away for 2 days that week when my daughter has no school. We're deciding where to go. Lancaster, PA is always on our list so that's probably where we'll end up.

6. As I mentioned on the boards, I got 2 books for doing medical surveys. I put them on Half.com and sold one within 24 hours for $7.99. The other one is still listed but hasn't sold yet. Since I got them for nothing, anything I make is okay with me.

7. Watching my portfolio dissolve right along with everyone else but keeping my cool. 18 years until retirement and 6 until college so time for things to turn around. I'm sorry that I already maxed our Roths for the year. I would have liked to have been putting that $10,000 in now instead of earlier in the year like I did. Oh well.

Can't think of anything else to report at the moment.

Last night, I returned most of the unused alcohol we had bought to stock the bar for the Bat Mitzvah. We had originally spent just over $1,100 using the recommended list the caterer had given me.

We were able to return any unopened bottles of liquor or wine or unopened cases of beer. We kept 8 bottles of wine for ourselves. We also had to keep, I think, 3 12-packs of beer because we had written on the boxes. And, of course, we couldn't return any opened bottles, so we have quite a few of them at home now.

End result was I returned $554.00 worth of stuff which I was very happy about. That means we spent about $566 for alcohol including all the stuff we get to keep. Knock off the 8 bottles of wine, which really shouldn't count as a Bat Mitzvah expense, and the total was under $500. Had we gotten the liquor from the caterer instead of supplying it ourselves, the charge would have been $15/person. We had 106 people so we would have paid $1,590, meaning we saved over $1,000 doing it ourselves. Plus that way we wouldn't have gotten to keep the leftovers.

I think what really kept the liquor bill low was that I make my own homemade Lemoncello. A lot of our synagogue friends are familiar with it and many others became familiar with it that night. I brought about 4 liters of it to the affair and we used about 2.5 liters. That only cost me about $35 to make but a lot of people drank that instead of the other stuff.

The other money back came from the balloons. We had changed the original balloon order but I realized after the fact that when I picked them up on Saturday, they charged me for the original order, which was more. I went back with the receipt last night and explained the error and they credited me $54 for the overcharge.

So I got back a total of $608 dollars last night which was a nice little bit of change.

For the newbies, I'm a physician and have the opportunity to do various online surveys. These surveys are not available to the general public.

As expected, my survey income has been off sharply because I had pretty much stopped doing them, especially while I was doing all the work to prepare for our daughter's Bat Mitzvah.

Total survey income for September was only $160. Considering I was pulling in over $700/month before, that's pretty lousy.

Now that the Bat Mitzvah is behind us, I'm planning to get back on track and start doing them all again. Especially with current economic conditions, I can't afford to pass up hundreds of dollars each month in extra income.

I just redeemed $40 on my account and $20 on my wife's account for our Discover cards. We use them pretty much only to take advantage of the 5% cashback bonus offers. The past 3 months, that included gas stations so 5% back was helpful. I also signed up for the 4th quarter which is restaurants, grocery stores and movies. We won't use the movies but we'll definitely use the other two. Just have to remind DW to use the Discover card for those purchases.

As of today, our home equity loan balance is $4802.44.

That is down $1,409 from one month ago. The plan is to pay it off by the end of the year.

NOTE: Edited 9/30 to correct amounts.

I've mentioned it in various posts and we've been planning it for ages. Tomorrow is the day. Our daughter will celebrate her Bat Mitzvah tomorrow evening, 9/27. We've done so much to prepare. It will be great to finally get to enjoy the result of all the hard work. Also will be great to see all our friends and family.

I've logged scores of hours on the computer as we made the invitations, placecards, centerpieces, sign-in board and programs. My wife also did chocolate molds for favors.

When all of this is done, I'm going to try and post photos of everything we made for folks to see. I didn't want to do it in advance just in case anyone we knew checked the site. Didn't want to spoil any surprises.

I can't believe our little girl will be 13 on Sunday and I'll officially be the parent of a teenager.

I haven't posted but that doesn't mean I haven't exercised. The weekend was very hectic but I did do 10 minutes on the Wii Fit on 9/14.

I never exercise on Mondays because I work a 12-hour day.

Yesterday, it was so beautiful here I did a nice brisk 30 minute walk last night.

And I just did 16 pretty vigorous minutes on Wii Fit with a mix of aerobics, yoga, balance and strength training. I actually completed the push-ups and side planks!

Miserable rainy day today so no outside walk. I did 19 minutes on Wii Fit. I'm making it a point to do a couple of each type of exercise each time and not do the same ones either. I unlocked a new balance exercise, Bubble Balance, and did that a couple of times. Also did strength, aerobic and yoga.

I could have hopped on the treadmill (and still might) but right now I'm taking a break to do some work for the Bat Mitzvah. I have a lot of graphics and printing work to do and trying to do some every day so I'm not scrambling to finish it all the week before.

Today was a Wii Fit day. DW and I each did 16 minutes of exercises. I did an assortment of yoga, strength training, aerobics and balance. I gave my wife quite the laughing fit watching me attempt the push up/side plank strength training. I suck at push ups to begin with and trying to coordinate my movements with the on-screen trainer is tough. When you are in a push up position, you can't exactly see the TV, so I had my wife calling out when I should change positions. Then, the routine called for 6 reps. Well, I was shot after 3 and took my hands off the board. That prompted the computer to say, "Are you still there?" which my wife found quite hysterical.

We had to go out tonite so no walk got done today.

I'm starting a new category in my blog. No, it isn't money related directly but I do feel exercise is vitally important to your well being all around. You can have a vault full of money but if you aren't healthy enough to enjoy it, what's the point.

What really prompted this was my thread about us getting the Wii Fit unit this past Sunday. Someone suggested that in a month, it might be collecting dust like many others. I'm hoping that won't happen and figure that by posting here, I'm helping to make myself accountable to someone.

My wife and I started walking for 30 minutes almost every night about 2 weeks ago. Her reason, of course, had nothing to do with health. She just wanted to make sure she looked good for our daughter's Bat Mitzvah at the end of this month. I was happy to walk with her and we've only missed 3 or 4 days in the 2 weeks when we simply weren't home all day.

We got the Wii on Sunday 9/7 and I used it then, 9/8 and 9/9. I have not yet used it today. Not sure if I will or not. DW and DD are out tonight so I took the opportunity to take a solo bike ride, something I haven't done in ages. I did about a 45 minute ride, which was much farther, faster and harder than the rides I normally take with DD. She is an ok rider but doesn't yet have the confidence or endurance to do the kind of ride I did today. So if I don't get on the Wii tonight, I won't feel bad. Heck, I'll consider myself lucky if I can walk when I get up tomorrow.

So that's it for today. I'll keep you posted.

For the newbies, I'm a physician and have the opportunity to do various online surveys. These surveys are not available to the general public.

As expected (see last month's entry), August was a very slow month for survey income because I slacked off on doing them. No good reason. I just got tired of it.

So my total survey income for August was $243. Considering I earned almost $500 more than that in July, it is disappointing, but it is my own darned fault. I'm still not back in the groove of doing them. I really need to get off my butt and start doing them again. It is easy money and I'm just letting it fly out the window.

It hasn't been a full month since I posted a loan update, but I want to start doing it at the end of each month.

As of today, my home equity loan balance is $6,211.45.

In August, I made extra principal payments of $1,170.00 as well as the regularly scheduled payment of $218.01. My goal (which I'm quite sure I can meet) is to pay if off by the end of the year.

All 3 of us wear glasses. We keep the costs down by almost always going to For Eyes. They have a good selection, good service and reasonable prices. I usually get mine with their 2 pair for $99 offer, getting my regular glasses and my sunglasses. DW and DD also got their current glasses there.

DW has needed a new pair for quite a while now as hers got dropped and the lens chipped right in the center some time ago. We went to For Eyes and she couldn't find a frame that fit that she liked. She has to wear kids frames and it is sometimes hard to find a pair that looks okay on a 44-year-old woman. The bright blue ones with Spongebob on them just don't cut it. Also, many of them are too narrow for a bifocal lens.

We also looked at America's Best, another discount chain in the area, and didn't find anything there, either. So she put off getting new glasses. We didn't want to have to resort to the outrageous prices at LensCrafters or somewhere similar.

Well, yesterday, we broke down and went to Pearle. They advertise that AAA members get a 30% discount. I realize that the only reason they can give such a big discount is because their mark-up is sky high to begin with, but she was tired of looking through chipped glasses. She actually found a good frame quickly. It was priced at $120, 20% more than we pay for 2 complete pairs at For Eyes, but such is life. With lenses, the total was going to come to over $400. Fortunately, the frames happened to be on sale when the tech pulled it up in the computer, so they were "only" $80. That and the 30% discount for AAA brought the total down to just under $300. Still an obscene amount of money for a pair of glasses, but since the discount places didn't work out this time, we were kind of stuck. Yes, I know you can order glasses online, but there is no way that would work for her since she is so hard to fit and measure.

I think there may be a new financial goal in our future - a vacation home. In the past, we had considered buying a home in Florida to use for our Disney trips and to rent out the rest of the time. After looking into it, speaking with a realtor, a property management company and some other owners in the area, we decided against it.

Now, though, we are thinking about getting a place much closer to home in a location that we actually visit regularly, multiple times per year. It is close enough that we could use the place just for an overnight or weekend stay. We wouldn't be looking to rent it out, though we would consider offering it to a select group of friends and family for a modest charge (well below the going rates in the area) just to help defray our costs a bit.

I've just started to look into it and run numbers to figure out what we can afford, what places are going for in the area, and when we can seriously consider it - we can't at this point in time. Maybe in 5-10 years or so, though, we would be in a position where we could make it a reality. Just something to dream about right now.

Apparently a few of you would like to hear more details about our trip, so here is more info. I'll try to keep it brief, but I'm happy to elaborate on anything if you have questions.

Day 1: Freer Gallery of Art at the Smithsonian. We went there primarily for their Asian collection as my daughter has developed an interest in Japanese culture. Very nice museum right on the Mall.

After lunch, we went to the Museum of Natural History for a while and saw the Hope diamond, the dinosaurs, and a few other things before we ran out of steam and went back to the hotel.

That night, we went to the Arlington Fair that we had seen advertised on TV (and went online to get all the details - how did we live without the internet). That was fun and was a neat way to spend my birthday. We had dinner (carnival food - corn dogs, fries, funnel cake) and went on a bunch of rides.

Day 2: We drove out to Dulles Airport to see the satellite location of the Air and Space Museum. They have a huge building there where they display many aircraft that they simply don't have room for on the Mall. Some highlights are the Enola Gay, a Concorde jet, the space shuttle Enterprise and many others.

We had lunch at the McDonald's there, a place that we are very unaccustomed to eating (I know, it's un-American but we simply don't go there). I have to say we were very pleasantly surprised. I had the Asian salad which was really quite good - fresh veggies, tasty grilled chicken, mandarin oranges, slivered almonds and sesame dressing. I'd definitely recommend it.

That night, we had dinner at the Sunflower Vegetarian Restaurant in Falls Church. This was another place that we located on the internet. Very good food and service. After dinner, we stopped at Fashion Centre Mall at Pentagon City. We browsed the shops and we actually got my daughter a nice bracelet at one of the jewelry shops. My mom wanted to give her something for her upcoming Bat Mitzvah but wanted her to pick it out, so that was good.

Day 3: We had 11:00 tickets for the National Holocaust Museum. I knew that the Bureau of Engraving and Printing was next door and they give out timed tour tickets each morning. We headed over a little early and I went and got tickets for later in the day so we could see the tour after the museum.

Holocaust Museum is wonderful and does a great job telling the story of what led up to and what occurred during and after the Holocaust. My family and I are very well versed on the topic but still learned some new info while there. I found the early years of Hitler's career very interesting as I really didn't know much about his rise to power.

The one artifact that really got to me was the train car. I think that is because of seeing the movie "Paperclips." If you have any interest in the topic and haven't seen the movie, definitely rent it and watch it with a box of tissues handy.

We had lunch at the museum cafe. Food was fine but overpriced.

Then we got to learn all about printing money. It is always quite a sight to see stacks and stacks of sheets of $100 bills coming off the presses.

That night, we had dinner at a wonderful Italian restaurant near the hotel called Cafe Italia. My daughter had homemade gnocchi for the first time and absolutely loved them. I don't think I've ever seen her enjoy a meal quite that much.

Day 4: I had ordered tickets in advance for the International Spy Museum and their Operation: Spy program. Wow! This place is fantastic. I had no idea it was as large or as involved as it is. Operation: Spy is a 1-hour long interactive experience where about 15 people are taken into a totally themed area made to look like a foreign country and embark on a spy mission to retrieve a missing nuclear trigger device. You have to work together to solve puzzles, do surveillance, search an office, crack a safe and more. The theming is excellent and the whole program is well worth every penny.

Then you enter the museum itself (you can buy either admission separately or a combo ticket for both). The museum tells all about history of spying, famous spies over the years, lots of displays of spy equipment and pretty much everything you ever wanted to know about spies. Great place to visit.

We had dinner at a little Greek diner near the hotel. Quick, reasonable and good food cooked to order. I took DD to the pool after dinner for a little swim.

Day 5: Hopped the Metro to Old Town Alexandria, an old favorite of ours. King Street is filled with unique shops, galleries and restaurants. We found a nice Thai place for lunch. Food was excellent. Then we spent time browsing the shops. We visited the Torpedo Factory which is a working art studio for about 80 artists. We stopped for ice cream before heading back, just in time as a thunderstorm started when we were riding the trolley back to the Metro station.

Day 6: Checked out and headed toward home. We stopped at Inner Harbor in Baltimore for lunch and shopping. DW actually found jewelry to go with her dress for the Bat Mitzvah there - a necklace and matching earrings. She's been searching since she bought the dress and hadn't found anything, so now she's set.

And that's about it. Let me know if you have any questions.

We got back from D.C. yesterday. We had a very nice trip and saw lots of interesting stuff. It seems that no matter how many times you go to Washington, there is always something new and different to be seen or done.

Stuff we did that I've never done before:

Air and Space Museum at Dulles airport
Holocaust Museum
Freer Gallery (don't think I've been there)
Spy Museum

We also went to some places that have been renovated since our last visit or I hadn't been for many years, like the National Archives, the Museum of Natural History, the Bureau of Engraving and Printing, and Old Town Alexandria.

We found some great places to eat, both cheap casual things like the food court in the Ronald Reagan building just off the mall, and finer dining like a wonderful Italian place in Arlington called Cafe Italia. My daughter had her first taste of fresh homemade gnocchi and was in heaven. We'll see what she says the next time we make the packaged stuff at home.

We walked many, many miles. I'm sorry I didn't think to bring a pedometer. I'm sure we got our 10,000 steps in every day.

It was an all around great trip. Other than a few miscellaneous items (tolls, etc.) I figure the total cost for the trip was about $1,600. That was for 3 of us for 7 days/6 nights including everything. We splurged a little more than usual on food (and prices are on the high side in DC) but overall, I think the trip was very reasonable.

Today was my last day of work until 8/18. We are going to Washington, D.C. tomorrow for a week. We haven't been there for about 6 years. Our daughter doesn't really remember a whole lot about the last trip since she was only 6. We have tickets for the Holocaust Museum (DD and I have never been; DW was there once). We also have tickets for the Spy Museum and the interactive spy experience they have there. Other than that, we will make it up as we go along. We want to go to the Freer Gallery as DD is into both art and Asian culture, particularly Japanese, so we want to visit their collection.

I'll have the laptop so I'll still be checking in and reporting on our visit.

It's been a few weeks since I posted about the light at the end of the HEL tunnel. At that time, my balance was $8,419.51. I thought I would start posting regular updates as I work toward paying it off by year's end.

As of today, the balance is $6,903.59, so I've repaid $1,515.92 in the past month.

Quick recap - I'm a physician and get to do various online surveys that pay quite well. These are not available to the general public. I also do some regular surveys like PineCone and AOL Opinion Place.

For July, I earned $723.75 doing surveys which was very good. I'm expecting that August will be somewhat lower because I've actually slacked off a bit and neglected to do all of the ones I've been invited to do recently. Really no excuse as I've got plenty of time. Instead of chatting on the boards, I could be doing more of the surveys, but sometimes I just get burned out doing them.

As I've mentioned, I am currently making extra principal payments on our home equity loan. I originally anticipated paying it off by the end of 2009.

I saw last night, though, that the balance is down to $8,419.51. If the second half of the year works out about the same as the first half, at least $7,900 would go toward the loan. And I know how my mind works. Once I get close to being paid off, I'm not going to mess around with little payments. When it is down to a couple thousand, I'll just make one final payment and be done with it. So it looks like the loan will actually be gone by the end of 2008, not 2009!

Our scheduled payment is $218.01/month, so our disposable income will jump by that amount once the loan is gone. Of course, most of that will be directed into additional savings, but some, perhaps up to $50/mo, will likely go toward some new treat. When I paid off one loan, I hired someone to mow the lawn ($54/mo). When I paid off another, we got cable TV (limited basic for $11/mo). I don't really have anything in mind for a portion of this money but I'm sure we'll figure it out.

It is just nice to see that the end is near. Once the HEL is gone, we will have nothing left but our primary mortgage. That's where most of the $218 will go. An extra $150 or so per month toward that will ensure that it is paid off well before retirement.

In case anyone was wondering, I am still working on attacking clutter. It slowed down a bit but I'm still doing something every day.

The past few days, I moved to some less obvious clutter - in the filing drawers. I've cleaned out numerous folders and gotten rid of lots of unneeded papers. For example, I have a file of all my professional licenses and certifications. There is no reason why I need to have anything but the current licenses, but the file held everything going back 10 years - to the shredder. So stuff like that has been getting thinned out.

Although this doesn't make the house look less cluttered, it does help in a couple of ways. First, it makes it easier to find something when I need it because there isn't as much junk to sort through. Second, it creates more available space in the files so that I can add files to store and organize other things that currently are out in the open.

So I'll keep at it. How is everyone else doing?

For the newbies, I'm a family practice physician. I have the opportunity to do various online surveys (and occasionally in person or telephone surveys). These are for physicians only and can be quite long, involved and tedious, though some are fairly simple. They generally pay quite well, though.

For the month of June 2008, I collected payments totaling $760.50, a great month!

I also did surveys that will pay me another $675 in the coming weeks. There is usually a lag of 2-4 weeks between when the survey is done and when I get paid, so it looks like July will be another very good month.

I realized I haven't posted for a few days. I'm still doing the decluttering thing, though I have slacked off a bit. The beginning of the week is my long days at work, so not so much time (or energy) for anything else.

I've gotten a few things out of my closet. I cleared a bunch of stuff off of my desk at work. I went through the container where I keep magazines, saved articles, and other assorted stuff and got rid of a lot of that. And some other scattered cleaning here and there. Not as focused as it had been - more here and there kind of work whenever I see something that I can take care of.

Now that it is Thursday, I should get back to some more focused cleaning as I have more time free from now through Sunday, so I'll report back in a few days.