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Why can't I throw anything away? AKA where is it when I need it?!

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JPSmit

JPSmit

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Working in the garage tonight. One problem with living in a cold clime is that I don't tend to put things away in the garage when I am done (OK this is a summer problem too but that's my story and I am sticking to it!) Truly though it has been a house repair winter and often I end up with tubs of tools/parts/nails/screws etc. etc. which need sorting.

As well, I am completing the transition into my father by buying one of those 64 drawer nail and screw units and am moving things over.

So what have I learned.

1. I hate throwing away screws bolts and nuts. This became apparent as I looked for place to store all the spare bolts and screws from the flat screen TV wall mount that I installed at the church. (They went in the same drawer as the extras from our house). If you haven't done this, they come with about 4 sets of bolts to suit many different TV models - and of course I can't throw away the surplus.

2. If I can't find it I buy it - so, something as basic as my tub of wire nuts or drawer of hose washers remind me that I need a central storage place.

3. I don't know what it is for - literally - and I still have two - and couldn't throw them away.

4. I will say I did downsize a bit of stuff - notably things like plumbing nuts - 4 is probably enough - not 20 and I think it is OK to get rid of every copper pipe end I ever cut.

sheesh :rolleyes:
 
5. The day after you throw something away that you have stored for years you find you need it and it is no longer available at the Big Box store.

I have tried the strategy of dividing my store of parts into at least 2 locations. That way I increase my chances of finding stuff when I need it. Does not always work out.
The more space you have the more stuff accumulates.

David
 
JPSmit said:
Working in the garage tonight. One problem with living in a cold clime is that I don't tend to put things away in the garage when I am done (OK this is a summer problem too but that's my story and I am sticking to it!) Truly though it has been a house repair winter and often I end up with tubs of tools/parts/nails/screws etc. etc. which need sorting.

As well, I am completing the transition into my father by buying one of those 64 drawer nail and screw units and am moving things over.

So what have I learned.

1. I hate throwing away screws bolts and nuts. This became apparent as I looked for place to store all the spare bolts and screws from the flat screen TV wall mount that I installed at the church. (They went in the same drawer as the extras from our house). If you haven't done this, they come with about 4 sets of bolts to suit many different TV models - and of course I can't throw away the surplus.

2. If I can't find it I buy it - so, something as basic as my tub of wire nuts or drawer of hose washers remind me that I need a central storage place.

3. I don't know what it is for - literally - and I still have two - and couldn't throw them away.

4. I will say I did downsize a bit of stuff - notably things like plumbing nuts - 4 is probably enough - not 20 and I think it is OK to get rid of every copper pipe end I ever cut.

sheesh :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

That sounds so familiar, I thought you were talking about me! My wife calls me a Pack Rat! :highly_amused: Never throw anything away. Have now decided, if I've never used it within 5 years, it's out of here! People say, why don't you put it on ebay or Craigs list, not my cup of tea! I'd rather give stuff to someone who can use it, rather than go on one of the bargain sites to sell it for penny's on a dollar and the shipping pain. :indecisiveness: PJ
 
5 years I narrowed it to 2 years
as you get older you have to tighten the PID
i don’t want my kids burdened with sorting thru my treasure
 
My name is Doug and I have a problem....

Not only can I not throw stuff out... I bring stuff home from dumpsters and strip whatever it is for parts and fasteners. I make no apologies. I have bought very few fasteners over the years but I admit... I have a couple of bins full of mixed parts that I have to sort at least annually.

I think this is a condition that goes hand-in-hand with owning British cars. I have all sorts of car parts in the attic. I tend to save everything that is not an old rubber hose or bit of burnt wiring. If I don't end up needing it, someone I know will. That said... I relate completely to finding when I do throw something out, I need it the next week.

Case in point: I found some online videos showing how to make a DIY spotwelder from an old microwave oven transformer. I have most of what I need but want to machine some different jaws than the DIY method used. I need to get off the pot and finish the project. It's been on hold for a year!
 
PAUL161 said:
That sounds so familiar, I thought you were talking about me! My wife calls me a Pack Rat! :highly_amused: Never throw anything away. Have now decided, if I've never used it within 5 years, it's out of here! People say, why don't you put it on ebay or Craigs list, not my cup of tea! I'd rather give stuff to someone who can use it, rather than go on one of the bargain sites to sell it for penny's on a dollar and the shipping pain. :indecisiveness: PJ
Click to expand...

We have a thing here called Freecycle - where you can post stuff for free. Ironically in my experience about 1/3 of the time people can't be sussed to actually show up to actually pick up what they said they would. This week was 100% pickup - last guy came and I was showing him something in the garage. He (naturally) asks what I am working on so I take the cover off the Epic GT. He looks at me, says "This is a GT right? The good one." (now we are currently speculating that about 300 cars in total ever came to Canada - so even the recognition is amazing.) He then starts to tell me how a friend drag raced his in the 70's (in stock form) even as he raced a Plymouth Fire Arrow (which I had forgotten about but now Nilsson's song is stuck in my head)

We had a lovely chat.
 
dklawson said:
Case in point: I found some online videos showing how to make a DIY spotwelder from an old microwave oven transformer. I have most of what I need but want to machine some different jaws than the DIY method used. I need to get off the pot and finish the project. It's been on hold for a year!
Click to expand...

I hate you Doug! I spent all last night walking around the dead microwave in the garage - off to garage to strip it for parts. :rolleyes:
 
I do occasionally go through stuff and toss junk out, but it seems I collect it faster than I can toss it!
 
The company I worked for rebuilt our machines. When they were being stripped down all the nuts and bolts went on the floor and were swept up into a box at the end of the day. Over time we filled large cardboard boxes of assorted metric screws. I acquired several boxes and was told "You will never use any of those" I sorted one or two boxes (about 60 lb+ of screws) into their respective sizes and have never bought a metric screw since.
One day when my parents were visiting I was going to the store with my Mother. My Father asked if there was anything he could be doing to help. So I got a box of screws and set him up with bowls for all the different size screws. Showed him how I sorted them. When we got home he said 'I am not sure what you wanted me to do"
He was in his mid 80's and I realized that he was aging. Not too long before it would not have been a problem for him.

David
 
DavidApp said:
The company I worked for rebuilt our machines. When they were being stripped down all the nuts and bolts went on the floor and were swept up into a box at the end of the day. Over time we filled large cardboard boxes of assorted metric screws. I acquired several boxes and was told "You will never use any of those" I sorted one or two boxes (about 60 lb+ of screws) into their respective sizes and have never bought a metric screw since.
One day when my parents were visiting I was going to the store with my Mother. My Father asked if there was anything he could be doing to help. So I got a box of screws and set him up with bowls for all the different size screws. Showed him how I sorted them. When we got home he said 'I am not sure what you wanted me to do"
He was in his mid 80's and I realized that he was aging. Not too long before it would not have been a problem for him.

David
Click to expand...

Glad to hear I am not alone for the first part - very sad to hear the second part.
 
Thank you.

It is tougher looking back on it now remembering the person you had looked up to for all those years was now relying on you for help. It was only as I looked back I could notice the deterioration in coordination and thought process. After some surgery he went down fast. I have heard that anesthesia can have really bad after effects on some older people.

David


JPSmit said:
Glad to hear I am not alone for the first part - very sad to hear the second part.
Click to expand...
 
DavidApp said:
Thank you.

It is tougher looking back on it now remembering the person you had looked up to for all those years was now relying on you for help. It was only as I looked back I could notice the deterioration in coordination and thought process. After some surgery he went down fast. I have heard that anesthesia can have really bad after effects on some older people.

David
Click to expand...

We were blessed with my father and my wife's parents - all went quickly and peacefully (they were blessed in this too!) My brother and Sister in Law are just dealing with this now - mother died and suddenly much much more apparant how great is the father's confusion. They are spending this month moving him into care. Never easy though at least he will be closer and safer.
 
When I was living in McKinney Texas it was easy
you could put just about anything at the end of the driveway
and elves or or what have you never seen one I think they are in cahoots with the tooth fairy
but they would make it magically disappear
im only guessing they needed it or they are even sicker than the rest of us and are actually squirreling it away in there garage.
soit putting that stuff out there make me a enabler ?
quick guys were is there a meeting
 
We have a convenience center for trash now but we use to only have dumpsters located around the county. It was not uncommon for me to return from a dumpster run with more than I took. Different stuff but more of it. Amazing what people dump. One time there were lengths of black iron pipe 1" up to 4" in good long lengths. Still using some of it.

David
 
When I started working on cars I did it because I had to fix the car to get to work, and could not afford to pay anyone to do the work for me. That and it was the last hurrah of the British sports car, and pre-internet, so we really didn't know if there would be any supply of parts In a few years. That coupled to the fact that I inherited the cheap Gene from my dad (we had a "push mower", no not a gas mower that wasn't self propelled, a reel mower that worked on one hp "human power").

So I kept everything. Used brake hoses, old distributor caps, etc. Old MGs and Triumphs were often sold with lots of spares. Those were kept too.

I did eBay many things when it first came out, was great, but still had many old parts too big to ship easily or not worth the trouble. But still might be needed someday, including many bits of a TR4a I got as a spare with a 4a purchase in college which was lugged about through at least two moves.

We bought a new house last year and I drug two pick up loads to the scrapper or dump. I can't say I really felt great about it. I didn't get the "liberating" euphoria some describe when finally getting rid of their stuff. But I don't really miss it all that much (I do a little, but l hadn't used most of it in 25 years and probably never will. I still have quite a bit, even pared down).

About the nuts, bolts and screws. I save them all if halfway decent. I am even semi-organized about it, but still make too many trips to the hardware store after digging through my many bins and probably thousands of fasteners, and not having what I need.
 
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Tools go back into their respective living quarters after being cleaned. Parts? Yeah, I got parts. Lotus parts, Alfa parts, MG parts, even some Porsche parts. Fasteners? yup. Metric and SAE, for the most part bagged and tagged.

But I do have a G.O.K. "pile" (God Only Knows). Sometimes called the Lucky Bucket. It may contain what you need, it may not. Go Fish.
 
DrEntropy said:
Tools go back into their respective living quarters after being cleaned. Parts? Yeah, I got parts. Lotus parts, Alfa parts, MG parts, even some Porsche parts. Fasteners? yup. Metric and SAE, for the most part bagged and tagged.
Click to expand...

That for me is the key Doc, I am not always good at the "respective" living quarters bit - especially in winter, I take a small tupperware bax to do the house job - plumbing/ electrical etc - and then just set it down on the workbench. then can't find. OTOH I am slowly improving. Yesterday I knew immediately where the gardening twine was that SWMBO needed - but about 5 minutes to find my nitrile gloves.
 
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