Zpoc Practice Update – Maintenance and “Shoulds”

~ crossovercreativechaos

Friends and family reaction: “You cannot possibly still be at that.”

Ha ha ha. Yeah, I am.

Seriously, disaster prep in general is just a Good Idea. Even if the Undead Hordes never arise, wherever you are, Mother Nature is guaranteed to have at least two big ways to seriously screw with your day. Hurricanes. Tornadoes. Ice storms. Wildfires. Ragweed season.

…Hey, you have your disasters, I have mine. Allergies at least rate with day-long power outages on the annoying inconvenience level.

One of the interesting things about decluttering for a zpoc is finding things you haven’t looked at in a while. Reactions tend to fall into three main categories. Yay, I wanted this. Gah, I can get rid of this. And, huh.

Huh is the tricky one. Something that’s not so good you automatically want it as mine, all mine! Yet not so horrible that you can justify an immediate trip to the trash can. You can end up with a lot of huh, and when you’re trying to clear out space and cut down, that can be very frustrating.

There are, however, a few ways to help whittle it down.

First – is it something I’m not sure I want? Or something I think I should want?

Let’s only touch very lightly on the kinds of emotional minefields lurking here. Everybody’s got their own personal “but I ought to”s hanging around. And relatives. And relatives’ opinions. Eep.

Fortunately, some of these can be mollified by moving to a second question: If this is too good to throw out, and I’m not really using it, can I give it to someone who’d like it more? Or get use out of it?

(Because even the most scolding relatives can sometimes be put off by, “So I gave it to charity.”)

If neither of these seem to apply to whatever we’re huh-ing about, it might just be a case of having worn out the ability to decide for that day. Decluttering gives you more space, and helps clear out the mental junk as well, but it takes a lot of mental effort.

Which is why I’m doing it now, instead of during a zpoc. Because if the moaning hordes are in the streets, all energy should rightfully be focused on making sure we don’t become zombie munchies.

Remember, unless you’re in a Van Von Hunter comic, zombies don’t eat chocolate.

…Meaning there really is a fate worse than death!

 

 

17 thoughts on “Zpoc Practice Update – Maintenance and “Shoulds””

  1. Wait, there’s people who think being able to deal with a two week “you’re on your own” is a BAD idea?!?

    Good heavens, that’s a gov’t recognized standard expectation!

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    1. Most of my family is more… people persons. You know. “Oh, I love time to myself!” they say as they talk your ear off. The idea of “on your own” seems to hit something in their heads and hiccup.

      Which is odd, given they’re the first people to steal – ahem, borrow my survival books when I get them.

      (I tend to think borrowing is supposed to mean giving them back when asked, not making me go hunt them down. Silly me….)

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  2. Ah, my sister’s idea of borrowing books(Still missing the first half of a fair amount of series..)

    Amusingly enough, since 99% of my allergies are to man made things, a zpoc wouldn’t be quite that bad on the allergy front, though since the most likely emergency here involves a volcano finally deciding it’s had enough and going off, bandannas and eye protection are on my list. (There’s the earthquakes too, but I am thankfully behind a range of shield mountains that tsunamis won’t hit here.)

    Still, good luck with the huh and decluttering.

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    1. Ah volcanoes. Yeah, there are reasons I’m never going to Yellowstone….

      No, seriously. I have a history. When I go places, they get hit with “This hasn’t happened in X number of years/decades/centuries!”

      And given some say the Yellowstone hotspot is several thousand years overdue….

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  3. I’ve got at least hurricanes and severe thunderstorms – they don’t usually spawn tornadoes but they give off a lot of lightning.

    And the allergies. If it pollinates, it seems to annoy my system. Along with dust, mold, and mildew (good thing I don’t live in Florida where it rains a lot and it’s warm enough for plants to be growing all year . . . wait . . .).

    …Hey, you have your disasters, I have mine.

    I think only people without allergies, especially airborne allergies, don’t understand just how much teeny tiny plant gametes can mess up your day.

    Re: The Relatives

    Ah yes. Relatives. They are your family. You love them. Just sometimes . . . . arghh!

    Especially when said relative or relatives are an extroverts and you are an introvert.

    Re: The Borrowing of Books

    Yeah, have had that happen.

    Also had to remind borrowers of my rule that if they ruin the item borrowed from me, I do expect them to replace it. Or cough up the money for me to do so.

    I think I’ve only had one time where someone borrowed something, broke it, and then refused to replace it because it cost more than they expected. I never loaned anything of mine to that person again.

    And it was tempting to never loan my stuff out again. I don’t get why people do this. I always treat other people stuff that I’m borrowing very carefully.

    Usually between me and my Mom. We are the readers and like some of the same books and keep swapping them back and forth.

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    1. One of these days I plan to go to an allergist and say, “Okay, find out what it is so I can burn it to the ground….”

      As one person put it, relatives are people you may love and not necessarily like. Oof.

      Borrowing of books – I’ve almost never had them damaged. It’s just annoying to have to hunt them down, weeks or months later…..

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      1. Usually just trying to retrieve them that this is the bother.

        Thankfully, not too many have been destroyed. Largely because anyone I would loan a book to knows perfectly well that I have the same attitude toward my books that women stereotypically have toward their shoes. You don’t mess with the books.

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  4. So, do you think that Somewhere In Cheyenne Mountain there is a club that meets to discuss – “How to get my family on board with disaster prepping without breaking Blue Book OpSec”

    Something tells me it’s convened by Dr Jackson

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  5. So central ish texas….snow counts as a major disaster for the natives here. But on the more terrifying side are the poisonous snakes and tornadoes. I need to double check how prone we are to earthquakes because i don’t think we are on a faultline.

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