Different Perspectives

We're about to start work on my mother's condo so we can put it on the market early next month.
Having been through this once before I know moving a parent can be a big job, they come with a lot of stuff. Some of this stuff is interesting, important, of value either personal or actual, some is useful.
And then there is the rest: bad lamps that now live beside the furnace and haven't been used at all in four years (even when new in the 70s they were 'unfortunate'), weird lawn chairs with seats made out of a nylon/yarn looking fabric (it's weird and ugly and dirty), about 60 tea cups that I know for certain have not escaped the china cabinet more than three times in forty years and a cheap 5" TV-with-built-in-radio unit ordered from a catalogue (likely Publisher's Clearing House, we love that here) for my father about ten years ago, he never turned it on (currently it sits in my mother's 'craft room' caked in dust).....and that's just the tip of the iceberg.

We're combining two households so both parties will need to purge (though we, partner and I, did a fair bit of this when we put our household into storage). In the spirit of this my mother on occasion will say 'oh I should get to work, clear out some stuff', and today she did just that.

After spending 1.5 hours in her craft/sewing/storage room she called me in for the big reveal:

Eight small sized, unused sympathy cards (inexplicably she opted to keep the uniquely sized envelopes without the matching cards) and 5 pieces of construction paper each cut into a large circle intended to be used as signage for some association several years ago.
That's it. She felt it was good progress. 'I wanted to get rid of a few things'.
Really? OK then. At this rate we should be able to clear out a few things, pack and move by 2014.

She also wondered if any of my friends are into crafts. I do in fact have one crafty friend (you know who you are, you read this) and her craft 'donation' was going to be several popsicle sticks. Originally these sticks were to be used as handles on the aforementioned construction paper signs. Note to friend: don't worry, you are not getting the popsicle sticks.

We clearly have differing perspectives on what constitutes 'getting rid of stuff', maybe we can make a little more headway in coming days. It was a start!

You can't imagine the extra space after today  :)

Bordello Lamp: 35 years in existence, 4 years and counting unused in the furnace room