I Went To The Scary Places

Years ago I worked with a Taiwanese lady called Eunice*. Once upon a time Eunice and I were having a conversation about New Year celebrations, and she told me how it was traditional in her country to have a massive clean up before New Year. To make everything spic and span. I'm not sure if this was true, or she was just angling for me to clean up my desk, but that idea has stuck with me ever since.

It doesn't always mean that I apply that knowledge, but the idea did stick.

Anyhoo, I have time on my hands before I go back to work next week and it is, after all, almost New Year. So in the spirit of Eunice's teachings, I went to the scary places today and tamed them.

1. The garden down the side of my house. Narrow, bordered by my house on one side and my neighbour's fence on the other, and overgrown with noxious asthma weed, this space is roughly akin to the deep part of the forest, Shelob's Lair and the unlit staircase of a haunted house. (I'm fine with most living things, but I'm sorry I just don't do spiders. I'm happy to leave them be, and frankly I expect the same treatment in return.) So I put on my brave soldier face and got to it. We have bare soil, people! I know the friggin' asthma weed will be back in no time, but for the time being it is tamed.
   
   BTW, note to self. Despite loving the butchness of it all, don't do this in a singlet next time, a) sunburn and b) asthma weed brings me out in itchy red blotches where it touches skin, vile stuff.
   
   
2. The under sink cupboard. How did it get so gross? Really. Moist, dark and rarely visited. (Actually, that sounds familiar.) Populated by mis-matched plastic containers and lids, a rusty never-used wok, some ancient alcohol bottles (Mmmm, Parfait d'Amour anyone?) and... what is that?... blech... I think it's like roach droppings or something?!...
   
   Yes, I nearly did throw up in my mouth a little.
   
   Now, it's a thing of pristine beauty! Everything washed, matched or thrown away, disinfected and the Parfait d'Amour dusted. Well, you never know when it might come in handy, right?

It feels like I've got a head start on some resolutions.

[* Everytime I think of her I want to say Eunice? This is a person called "Eunice"?]