It's Clean Up Time

If you've been reading this blog for more than . . . a day . . . you know the state of my house.  It's dirty.  It's messy.  It's disorganized.  It's all over the place. 

This is the result of our family taking on chicken-keeping this year and building a beautiful coop out back all spring and summer, my not feeling well much of this year, and the usual this-and-that that keeps us all busy.

Well, that's all about to end.

My house must be cleaned.  Pronto.

I have company coming.

Monday.

To spend the night.

My father.

The giant sucking sound you hear is the whirlwind of cleaning activity that I have going in my house today and probably through the weekend.

There's nothing like overnight company to kick those cleaning routines into high gear . . . except, maybe, parental overnight guesthood.

I just got word of this visit last weekend.  It seems my father is sowing some of his retirement-wild oats by taking himself on a tour of Civil War battlefields in my area -- better that my father take this trip alone as his penchant for standing and staring at signs and their related open spaces is unmatched.  No one can stand and ponder longer than my father.  I'm telling ya.  And this can occur anywhere . . . long hours of my childhood were spent standing in hardware store aisles as my father pondered  . . . I still haven't figured out what.  So he's going by himself so he can ponder unrushed.  He plans to get around to us Monday evening.   

He'll arrive Monday evening and spend Tuesday with me.  He told me this sooo casually.  As if it wouldn't be noteworthy to me that he would be sleeping in this house a week from the moment we spoke.  As if the focus of my life was not about to be redirected for the next week.  No, it was up to me to detect the oh-so-subtle implication in his words -- that he intended to spend the night.  (My parents never stay here when they visit together.)  So.  Now I need to get the house clean AND select one of my kid's rooms and get that room cleaned myself.  I can't issue the usual edict to the kids and demand they clean their own rooms.  It has to be a good job this time.  Dusting and all.  Horseshoes picked up, even.  (A reference to the last time my son declared his room "all clean" despite having left a horseshoe lying in the middle of his floor.)

So off I go to finish putting out the Halloween decorations so I can put away the storage tub that has been in the hallway since this weekend.  Dog beds need laundering, floors need washing, rooms need straightening, everything needs dusting.

I mean it this time; no distractions . . .

Except maybe the few hundred blogs I have promised to visit and the many, many I have decided to follow . . .

Now be good friends and grab a mop and head over!