The Domino Theory

The Domino Theory originated back in the good old cold war days when I was just a kid. It was explained by President Eisenhower as: "...broader considerations that might follow what you would call the "falling domino" principle. You have a row of dominoes set up, you knock over the first one, and what will happen to the last one is the certainty that it will go over very quickly. So you could have a beginning of a disintegration that would have the most profound influences."

As we have all learned since those days, the Domino Theory applies to things other than politics and fascinating YouTube videos. A very expensive Domino Theory seems to be going on inside my mouth recently but you don't want to know about it and I don't want to talk about it.

However, something resembling Ike's 'most profound disintegration'  is also taking place in my condo. It all started with what seemed like an innocent plan to get rid of a very large stash of old magazines. There were two stacks of mags in a closet and about 20 mag storage boxes in the studio. It made sense to work on them while I wasted much of my weekends watching Premier League Football (British Soccer) so I started bringing them into my bedroom where I have a small table set up. Makes sense, right?

First domino falling...I keep a stash of magazine pages to make envelopes, I keep them sorted. So the single page stash came into my bedroom so I could sort and file as I went along.
Second domino falling...Some of the pages didn't fit in the storage boxes so I made them into envelopes as I went along, which meant I needed to bring in the box of envelopes (sorted, of course) to file as I went along.
Third domino falling...I kept finding pictures and articles that I thought certain friends and family would enjoy so I sorted them out into a couple stacks to be mailed in my handmade envelopes.
Fourth domino falling...So many wonderful photos I needed to save for reference, which needed cropping, sorting and filling in the two big bins of hanging files which - you guessed it - came into the bedroom.
Fifth....Sixth...Seventh...

It might still have ended safely if I hadn't reached the years of British travel & history mags. In addition to reference photo clippings, scrapbook photo clippings, reference travel articles, and bits for my Anglophile friends, I had to put aside articles pertaining to my upcoming travels.

I can still walk in my bedroom but just barely. The massive influx of clippings has necessitated the purchase of several additional storage bins waiting to be filled - I may be crazy, but I am organized crazy. I'll be lucky to finish going through the articles for the rapidly approaching trip, so I will come home to a bedroom filled with hours and hours of sorting and filing waiting for me. Oddly enough, this would be quite satisfying if not for one major problem...by then the EPL season will be finished and I'll have nothing to keep me stuck in my bedroom for hours each week.

The good news? I have dumped at least twenty big brown grocery bags of torn down magazines into the recycling dumpster.

I came across an interesting undocumented quote recently: "I keep records, if you don't keep records you're just a hoarder." Well, I keep records, and files, and folders...sorted by subject, color, or usage.

"I'm not crazy, my mother had me tested."