why, what do you do on your sick days?

Wednesday was Day Three of being home sick. Like, three days IN A ROW of being home sick.

With one tiiiny catch.

I wasn't sick.

Okay, that's not entirely true. I spent the end of last week/the whole weekend hacking up a lung, but otherwise felt mostly fine. I felt less awesome on Monday morning - still coughing, shivering in the shower, cloudy head, weeping eyes - but chalked it up to just wishing I had more weekend. I hauled my ass to work and had been there for almost an hour before my boss announced we had almost 20 kids and about five staff members home with the respiratory flu, aaand I was unceremoniously banished.

That first day, I succumbed to the crud and mostly napped while waiting for my Candy Crush Saga lives to regenerate. The second day, I woke up feeling crummy, but felt better as the day progressed. Good thing, because I was hosting a big information session for about 30 families that evening. Turns out I was more run-down than I realized, and I spent four dizzy hours at work in the late afternoon/evening, feeling like everyone was screaming (my head. So cloudy). I fairly collapsed onto the couch when I got home.

Wednesday, though, I felt pretty great after sleeping in a little. My boss had ordered another day of rest (actually, the University's Department of Occupational Safety and Environmental Health ordered another day of rest, but what do THEY know?). I texted her mid-morning to say I was feeling fine, and could I please come in and stop burning through my sick time? I promised I wouldn't even LOOK at children or co-workers, let alone breathe on them. I was told absolutely not, and this is literally the first sick time I've used since last January (other than random trips to the dermatologist for freaky rashes), so chill out and take advantage of it. Seriously. Awesome boss.

But what do I do when feeling 95% fine and stuck at home all day? Duh. Organize!

And now for a peek inside my hyper-anal brain. Please. Don't beat yourself up for not being as super totally awesome as I clearly am. You, too, could one day be this awesome and spend all your precious free time tackling exciting projects like this. (Kindly note the sarcasm here. I don't actually think most normal people get excited about ridiculousness like this.)

So. I already have all my bills and papers organized in our home office's filing cabinet.

There's a file in front labeled "TO PAY" where I shove all unpaid bills, receipts, etc., as they arrive. Once or twice a month, I go through and pay the bills, at which point I also file everything in the appropriate folder - Mortgage, Electricity, Cable, Phone, Credit Card, Car Payments, Car Repairs, Income Taxes, Bank Statements... 

When my friend Leonard happened upon my file drawer, he stared for a moment and then quietly said, "I hate you." But he really loves me, the way everyone on "Friends" loves Monica because she provides them with comic fodder organizes their lives for them so they can function. Haters gonna hate, but I don't know how people function without organized files! They come in especially handy when I need to dispute a charge or bargain for lower monthly payments. I was even allowed, after about four years of begging, to organize J.J.'s papers for him. Granted, he still doesn't file new papers regularly...but THAT'S WHAT MY SICK DAYS ARE FOR! 

(Maybe I am sick. A different kind of sick.)

I also keep files for all of our user manuals, receipts from major purchases, and the like. I store them in a single file box, which has been disorganized and bursting at the seams for, oh, a couple years. And we had a bunch of new papers to file away following the kitchen renovation, so yeah. It was time to re-organize the home files.

I scrounged up an empty file box from the basement and some unused file folders and tabs (people like me just have this shit lying around), and all the manuals, instructions, and receipts that had been piling up in different areas of the house. Then I got to work, spending a good GREAT hour combing through everything to re-group papers by room and ending up with some new categories.

Files in the first box:

• Entryway/Front Room
• Kitchen Appliances (manuals)
• Kitchen Receipts
• Kitchen Installation Instructions
• Downstairs Bathroom
• Family Room 

And files in the second box:

• Tools
• Basement
• Outside/Garage
• Upstairs Bedrooms
• Upstairs Bathroom

I also got rid of a stack of papers that belonged to appliances or items we've sold or gotten rid of - the old refrigerator and range, our dead washing machine, the first and second kitchen faucets we had before our current one...

Recycling everything in that stack in front!
Keeping everything in the file boxes.

I'm also hoping this will make our home inventory easier. Our insurance company has been after us since we bought the house to create a home inventory. Basically, you photograph everything in your home and either scan the corresponding receipt or link to a corresponding website. Then (in theory) you save all the info on a flash drive, which is stored not in your house (at the bank? At the insurance office? In the Cloud - which, btw, was totally my idea? Hell if I know). Should something awful happen - fire, robbery, zombie apocalypse - the insurance company can consult the home inventory to help you replace items. A fantastic idea, right? I've just never actually followed through on it. (Except for a partial kitchen inventory, that is.)

Which means...I've got PLANS for my next sick day (i.e., next January). Home inventory, baby! 

Again, try to contain your jealousy. Sometimes it's hard being this cool. (/End sarcasm font.)