My Areas Of Slacktitude. And Yes, I Just Made Up A Word.
This is just a gratuitous First Day Of School photo.
In the last 2 years I’ve gathered quite a nice group of friends from book club, theatre. and boot camp. This has given me quite a large group of women to compare myself to and find myself FAILING MISERABLY. I’ve got single Mom friends who work full time. I’ve got friends who teach and still volunteer at their kid’s schools. I’ve got friends who are stay-at-home Moms who still find energy to exercise. I’ve got friends who work third shift with four kids in school during the day and friends who spend more hours in food prep for their kid’s dietary needs a day than I do a month. What about the friends who work MORE than 40 hours a week and still find time to go to Yoga. I look around at all of these women and think I wish I was more like them.
Then someone will say something to ME along those lines. And I guffaw. ME? You want to be more like me? And then I feel bad. Because…SERIOUSLY? Have you seen me? I haven’t showered in 72 hours. I have ketchup on my shirt. The hairballs along my baseboards are so big I thought one of them was a rat the other day. And don’t get me started about the toxic dump that is my vehicle. There are enough crumbs in my car to feed a starving nation. I AM NOT EXAGGERATING.
You do NOT want to be like me.
Here’s the thing – We are all truly awesome. Maybe we cook all the meals, or have spotless bathrooms. Maybe we balance the checkbook and volunteer for community groups. Perhaps we’re active in church or work 60 hours a week. WE ARE ALL AWESOME.
But we all ALSO have those things that we slack on. Yes! I volunteer a lot for my kid’s theatre program. But I also watch a lot of television. A LOT OF TELEVISION. I don’t always wear clean clothes. Some days I go to bed knowing there’s a used pullup on the floor of my kid’s bedroom I was too lazy to throw away.
I think that we are all awesome at many things, but I need to remember: No One Is Perfect.
So…I’ve come clean with my imperfections: bathing, cleaning, laundry, and an incredible weakness for teen television. What are your imperfections? What are the things in your life you slack on that will me me feel better about my own slacking?
A few weeks ago I read this line about if everyone but their stuff down on the table we’d all pick our own stuff back up.
Dog Hair – everywhere and my hatred for winding the vacuum cleaner cord even though I hate it even more all tangled up.
Hallmark movies – no plot, little talent, cheap productions. And yet, I get invested
Magazines – I love them – I have stacks of them – I look at them – realize that this story was recycled from 4 years ago and then I get irritated. And yet the Flatter Belly, Thinner Thighs cover shot has me whipping out my $.
Oh god, cleaning. I’m trying to be better about it since we just moved to a new place. I hate trying to dissuade people who want to stop by because the state of my floors (and bathroom, and kitchen…) is horrifying.
I watch entirely too many tv shows, I live for bad made-for-tv movies (especially of the Christmas nature), I will do laundry, but I detest FOLDING laundry, and if it requires more than 15 minutes of my time or effort, I probably won’t cook. (exception? Baking…I love to bake. Probably because I love to eat what I bake)
I am so with you Diana. I hate to fold and put away laundry. I can wash and dry laundry all day but it all gets laid out neatly in the laundry basket to be picked though as the week goes by.
The same two boxes of my in-laws stuff have been sitting in my hallway for 3 weeks now. It wouldn’t be so bad, except the boxes are blocking the hall closet where the vacuum is. Need I say more?
Laundry. Ugh. It takes every fiber of my being to get the clothes into the washer and finally taking them out of the dryer to “put away” is another story.
I like this post. We are all truly awesome.
This post has great timing for me
) Lately when I get caught in the vortex of Things I Am Not Doing Well my husband has been forcing me to list all the things I AM doing.
So – my house is a wreck, I haven’t scrubbed the bathrooms in about six weeks, the living room and bathroom desperately need to be painted, my DVR is 90% full, there are piles all over the master bedroom (clean clothes, mail, important papers that need to be filed away, donations that never made it into a box), I can’t remember the last time we saw the top of the dresser, I am five minutes late to work almost every day, I have all but abandoned the book I was trying to write.
BUT – I have taken the kids to the pool every Tuesday after work all summer long, I baked chocolate chip cookies from scratch for the baby’s first birthday last night, I coordinated all the contractors who had to replace our siding and roof after massive hail damage, I started running January and have completed two 5Ks and signed up for two more, I have been keeping up with my blog, I am planning a happy hour for my husband’s 40th bday.
You are doing great. We are ALL doing great.
)
Cleaning – or shall we say, NOT cleaning. I have clutter, and I have dirt. I procrastinate until the LAST possible second – usually this means either no clean plates or no clean underwear, or I have guests coming in like 15 minutes. Also, I’m terrrible about remembering to shred papers, so I tend to just let it pile up and then before I shred anything I have to go through the pile again because it’s so old I don’t even remember what’s in there!
What an adorable first day of school outfit!!!! She is so trendy!!!!!!
My house is a wreck right now….we have my stepson for the week and I am leaving this weekend with my son for a little mini vaca with my fam and decided to leave everything dirty until I get back…..my hubby and stepson will be there all weekend and we KNOW the house will be a mess anyways when I get home whether I clean now or not!!!!!
My house looks like a bomb containing laundry and dirty dishes exploded all over it. The mess is just everywhere, taking up everything. I feel bad, my mom comes over to watch the baby and cleans my house and does the baby laundry.
Baseboard hairballs? YES. Here too. The cat snuggles with them, thinking they are her friends.
I slack on cleaning bathrooms and changing sheets. I have a weakness for shows on ABC Family – currently Switched at Birth and Make It Or Break It and previously Greek and Huge.
I watch way too much tv. My house looks clean at quick glance but if you really got down adn looked at the floors, baseboards or my shower you would see it is just a lipstick job. Lastly, the one I feel the most guilt about is that my extreme social anxiety is really starting to have an affect on my social butterly son. He is always wanting to go places and be with other people but I’m content staying in my house where I don’t have to try and make small talk with other moms. I’m soo very akward at it.
I am SO good at keeping things uncluttered, but the actual scrubbing of things? Not so much. And I don’t even have kids so I can’t imagine how disgusting my house would be if more than 2 people lived in it!
THIS is so my cleaning issue too! I can declutter like nobody’s business. And if the “dirty” counts as clutter (ie: dirty dishes, piles of laundry, crumb piles on the counters) then I keep them pretty well in check. But scrub things? Not so much. We’re not going to talk about the sticky mess that my counters are or the cat puke that *still* needs to be cleaned up or how the counter in our bathroom looks. Those get tackled generally under two conditions (1)company is coming (2) the filth has reached such gross levels that is qualifies as clutter. Thank goodness for my hubby or it would be way worse than it is.
Lately, I’ve been sucking at cooking. I’m at rehearsal three nights a week and Bryan is building a set one night a week, so there’s never any adults home to cook for. We’ve been living on Easy Mac.
FRIENDS. Honey, that one dinner we had weeks ago? Has been my sole adult social interaction for probably the last six months. I just haven’t had time, and I worry that I’ve let so many friendships slide that there’s hurt feelings and my phone call isn’t welcome anymore.
YOU ROCK, BTW.
I totally have that hairballs on the base boards thing going on. I don’t know how we aren’t all bald the way those things pile up. Also, I realized I wore a shirt with a stain on it to work yesterday. You can only see it from some angles, but it is there.
And you’re right, it is important to remember that we are all awesome at some things.
I LOVE your honestly. And the fact you made up a word. I do that ALL of the time.
I also watch A LOT of tv. I just have to. I love it! Personally I hate folding laundry. I will wash it but folding it? UGH! Sometimes I leave a load in the dryer for a week because I just can’t fathom folding it. Also unloading the dishwasher. Such a pain. Loading it? Not so much. My fridge is also messy. I always want to organize it and clean it but it just gets messed up again a week later so I gave up on it.
I love you more than anything in the world. I would say I want to be more like you, except I think I am pretty much already like you… I don’t shower much either, and my dust bunnies have started families.
Oh my. My area of slacktitude is definitely my house. I do my very best, but I have never seen anyone but me with so much trouble in this area! I do blame it on the extreme amount of paperwork I have with the three children (two with more severe special needs), my school, disability papers we keep working on for my husband, and my general quick exhaustion I get due to being about 50 pounds overweight. I will keep striving – the weight is coming off slowly, and my sprained ankle is getting better, and I am trying to get ahead of it. But boy, what a losing battle, the piles that create themselves (?), the laundry, dishes, dirty bathroom s- ugh!
But I still don’t stop watching Degrassi every time it’s on, and American Idol in the winter! I also check on on FB daily, blog occasionally, and write my best friend every day on email (usually). These things keep us sane! And snuggling with the kids and doing things with them. That always comes before housework!
So glad to see the used pull-up thing.
I might have done that a few nights ago…..
Mine is usually leaving diapers laying on the floor. My poor husband usually picks them up for me.
I am such a “oh crap…someone is coming to visit….have to clean!!” type person it is terrible! I have to sweep up the huge fur tumbleweeds that hang out all over my house (3 huskies will do that to ya) every other day or so, but the rest of it…blah. I hate doing laundry…no one ever puts it away after I clean it and fold it. Can’t tell you the last time I cleaned a bathroom or changed the sheets on the beds.
You rock at parenting and what you share with all of us in blogland. It makes me realize that there are others out there in the world having the same issues that I am. Thanks!
OK, I’ve been beating myself up about this one for three years now: I totally park my preschool-aged kids in front of the tv all summer long, pretty much so I bum around on the internet or in the garden. And I am a teacher. I should totally know better. But you know what? They seem to be plenty smart anyway (honestly, my 4 year old is a total Hermione Granger and I don’t really know what I’d do with her if she was any smarter). But most of all, I am lazy and just not good at hanging out with small children all day. Just. Can’t. Take. It. The tv keeps us all friendly.
My office. The piles on top of piles that topple over before I can go through them. Random game pieces, small toys, “important” flyers and cards that live between my keyboard and screen. And bathrooms. You don’t want to use my bathrooms. 3 boys — enough said. Although the older two will now wipe down the toilets with Clorox wipes for a quarter each. I only dust when I know I have people coming over.
I have to comment on this one. I am completely surprised I don’t have rats and roaches. I probably do, I just can’t see them under the piles. True confession time: 12 pee pee pull ups found in one of my kids’ rooms in one angry clean up session. Mildew slicking the shower? Oh yeah. Kids bathrooms, tubs clogged for how long? and I didn’t even know it because if I looked I’d feel guilty for not doing anything about it. Cat litter so bad it makes my eyes sting. Yup. Clothes washed the night before or if passed the sniff test, not at all. 72 hours without showering? More times than I care to admit. At least now that I’m older, my hair doesn’t look greasy as fast. On this subject, I win of all the people I know except those people on realty shows and I hate watching those because I think, “Leave them alone. It’s their house and their stuff. Instead of TV, I read and I read a lot and now I play on my iPad a lot. Oh, and the library fines because we can’t find our books? Better off buying them.
But today? I will find my table under the piles. I will get at least 3 loads of laundry done. I will unclog the tubs. I will color my gray hair. I will have some kind of dinner ready for my family AND I will go see a movie and laugh with some of the BEST women in the world.
I guess you CAN reply to your own comment. I started thinking I should let your world know that I’m not a TOTAL slacker. I do work nearly full time and I think I’m good at my job. I have four kids and numerous pets that seem mostly healthy and happy and we usually like each other. And honestly? I don’t mind the clutter and the filth unless someone is coming to visit.
And Miss Zoot, the movie starts at 7 in case you didn’t double check your calendar. Tee hee. Can’t wait to see you.
Yes…I should say that YOU are the friend from here: “I’ve got friends who work third shift with four kids in school during the day” – I’m always totally amazed by you.
ALSO – you know what I love about you? You are one the friends that could just pop by unexpectedly and I wouldn’t care what condition my house was in because I know yours is the same.
I know you wouldn’t flinch at the kitty litter OR the hairballs!
Can’t wait to see you tonight either!
P.S. – My blog is supposed to email you if you get a “reply” to a comment so I like to think that you have an email telling you that “Janelle” replied to your comment. HA!
I feel housework is futile, it all needs to be done again so soon, so why rush? I love TV on Netflix so there are no commercials, or dvr’ed so I can speed through them – and really, watching TV while folding laundry is the perfect combination of slacktitude and actually getting something done
Mostly my house reflects the fact that I want to do the right thing, but not right now because I’m reading (insert that anywhere in my life, it works). There are two huge bags of #5 recycle plastic in the kitchen corner because they can’t go with the regular pick-up, I have to drive them somewhere. Papers that need to be sorted stack up, donations for the Goodwill have various piles in different closets. We have two dogs & two cats and two million fuzz-balls floating along the hardwood floor. But my yarden is bursting with Snow on the Mountain, Black-eyed Susans, Phlox, Spider flowers & lovely mounds of Artemesia. The sunflowers don’t look so hot because they are covered with ravenous Goldfinches, but the birds look good! And, I took the vegetarian option for dinner to high school band camp every night this past week. Pretty good for someone who hates to cook, eh? We ARE all awesome. Thanks for reminding me to look past the dusty surface 