Bedside tables

I’ve just been reading in Anna’s blog, Self-winding, about the current Show and Tell on bedside tables. I wasn’t surprised to see that bloggers don’t have the neat sterile tables you see in display home bedrooms, where there is nothing but a designer lamp, a tasteful ornament and one presentable hard-back volume.

I had thought of photographing my table, but decided that a picture wouldn't do justice to the range of items hidden under the layers.  My table has only 6 books on it at present – two of them lying open, face-down to remind me that I want to get back to them soon. But under the table is a shelf bearing 14 others and I must admit that some of them have been there a mighty long time. I am determined that I DO want to read them though, and am not ready to relegate them yet to the living-room book-case. Among them is a dictionary because it is so maddening to have to get up to look up a particular word when you find it impossible to read on without doing so.

Among the books on top are an unopened bushwalking newsletter (I never seem to get time for walking these days) a half-read Organic Growers’ newsletter and a long letter from an overseas friend who steadfastly refuses to learn email. Then there is the weekend newspaper 'Arts and Culture' supplement – from 2 weekends ago – and the bunch of business papers my husband insists I should make time to peruse. A few days in bed with a dose of the 'flu would come in rather handy - or perhaps that should be a few WEEKS.

My reading lamp is one of the swinging-arm types that directs light down onto the page and reduces glare for the other bed occupant. Until recently I had one of those wonderful little ‘Itty Bitty’ bed-lights that plugged into the power and clipped onto the page, but something happened with the wiring and I don’t think it's repairable. Behind the lamp is a phone extension handpiece, a box of tissues and one of those pop-top sports bottles that you can drink from while still lying down.

No hand-cream for me – but there is lip balm and heel balm to heal the cracks and fissures that come from having bare feet in open sandals almost all the year round. There is also a set of those wireless headphones for watching late-night TV, or slotting in a favourite CD while drifting off to sleep - but I don’t seem to have been doing much of either lately, since I took to staying up late at the computer reading my ever-expanding list of favourite blogs.

In surveying my bedside table the nagging thought comes to me once again - about doing something drastic to clear some of the clutter that always seems to surround me.  I received an e-mailed ad. yesterday for the latest edition of Don Aslett’s Clutter's Last Stand -

When you can't find your way through your living room because too many things block your way; can't eat at the kitchen table because of the newspapers, books, car keys and canned goods piled on top; trip over shoes and clothing on the floor heading to bed, then you have a problem-you're a prisoner of clutter!

Things here are not quite that bad, but the book is an inspirational read and I think it’s time I read it again!

Comments

[Tjilpi]

Jude, Saw your comment on Elsewhere's site, and wondered how you got to find both of us in the Alice?

[Tjilpi]

Don't worry - I worked it out!

[Jude]

I wonder? Actually it's elementary dear tj - I found Elsie first at Typepad's Recent Updates site - and she linked to you. I was looking for people who were living off the beaten track and thinking a bit outside the square. As reading goes, you are rather a dead loss at present. Any plans to update?

[Tjilpi]

Sorry, the muse has taken a vacation...leaving me in a blue funk, and I refuse to commence taking antidepressants.

Ah, so El's Blog was the connecting link. I thought it might have been the other way around, and that you had read one of her comments on my blog, and used that link to hers.

By the way, I don't concur with your use of 'concur'...one does not concur, but two do.

That's about all I'm up to writing at the moment. Once again, my apologies, Tj.

PS Maybe I should blog about depression?

[Jude]

This is a bit of a worry. You bring to mind the text of the old punctuation exercise: 'woman without her man is nothing'. Which of course becomes: 'Woman - without her, man is nothing!'

A post on the subject of men's utter dependence upon women would be good.

BTW, thanks for the correction re 'concur'. I should have written 'conclude'.

Look after yourself - and don't go down any Rivkin tracks.