Man-Fridge update, and a place for everything

If you read my previous blog you know I have a new refrigerator, which lead to what is now known as the “man-fridge” in the garage.  (The old fridge living out its retirement near the bikes, the car-care products and the fishing gear.  Typical response from guys who’ve read it: “Now all you need is the old Lazy-boy and a cheap tv on top, and you’ll never go in the house again.”)

What I didn’t tell you is that the new shiny, black refrigerator with French doors and crushed ice dispenser did not fit in the space where the old one did.  It was literally 1/8 of an inch too wide.

So we called in some back-up.  Greg from Salem Custom Cabinets looked at it, cocked his head to the side, popped the counter-top off and slid the new shiny, black refrigerator with French doors and crushed ice dispenser into place.  It took less than 15 minutes.

But, when he popped the counter-top, it revealed an ugly Carlin household secret: The junk drawer.

I don’t know if you have one.  I thought everybody did, until I asked the previous owner which drawer they had used as the “junk” drawer.  To which she responded with rising intonation, “junk drawer?”

Ok so maybe you don’t have one. 

All I there was no way it was going back the way it came out.  I rolled up my sleeves.

The first item extracted was a Boba Fett Pez dispenser.  Next emerged a spool of white thread which had tangled itself with an old phone cord and a walkman headset. Then came batteries, paper clips, scotch tape, packing tape, keys from our neighbors house in Rocky Mount, (from when we fed their cats nine nears ago.), two empty rubber cement containers, a game piece from Battleship,  four non-functional flashlights and a bottle of liquid glitter. 

There’s a reason all this is in the junk drawer: There’s no place else to put it.  A lot went in the trash.  A collection of plastic doo-dads confused me, was it something important or just junk?  It all went in a zip-lock bag.  The old keys went on a hook in the basement, the new ones consolidated onto spare key chains – which were also in the drawer.  I took scissors to the thread/cord/headset, then threw half of it away anyhow.

In no time I actually had space in the drawer.  You could find stuff at a glance.  Need a C-battery?  No problem. Extra key to the mini-van? Right there.  Liquid Glitter? Piece of cake.

It’s hard to describe the satisfaction that comes from this process.  From chaos emerges order, which in our house is a rare commodity.  It’s so easy.  Yet it’s hard to devote two hours to cleaning a drawer. 

Even then it’s not perfect.  There is no other place for some things.  So after carrying it around the house for 10 minutes it goes back in the drawer.  At least I know where to find my Boba Fett Pez dispenser.