PURSE CLEANING AND PACKING

Getting ready for my trip, I knew it was time to tackle the chore I hate the most: packing and cleaning out my purse. I haven't cleaned out my suitcase entirely since my trip to Toronto in late September, and I got the purse shortly after, so it was time to get organized. God forbid I should get on the plane with a pair nail clippers tucked away in the lining of my purse or even worse some cosmetic item that either didn't fit the 3 oz or smaller category or was a liquid or a gel and not encased in a zip lock quart size baggie. Who knows was havoc that would wreak on the TSA??

The main reason for the purse cleaning was to find my W-2 form, which seemed to have vanished. All the places I "thought" I had put it--in my desk, alongside my printer, at home in that pile designated "tax items," in the bottom of my grocery carry tote, or intermingled in with some other papers that seemed necessary at the time I put them away but now had no meaning whatsoever. No such luck.

I started this task Monday night, sifting through papers that had piled up and up and up since at least Thanksgiving (but of course hidden out of sight from Thanksgiving and Christmas guests). The first go-through yielded nothing of what I was looking for but I did find a lot of other things I had forgotten about. The second time through was Tuesday night, a little more frantically, since a desk cleaning before leaving work had not turned up the missing document either. So much stuff even there I had forgotten about: a printout of race results from 2006; a race form from 2007; pictures sent through e-mail; etc.

Finally, last night, at about 10:30, 30 minutes after I would have liked to have been in bed, after not only sifting through the piles for a third time, but actually throwing enough stuff away to fill an entire wastebasket, I still had not found the W-2. I decided to give it one more day (today) before I asked for a reprint.

Sometime between going to bed and waking up this morning the simple idea of where to look came to me: my purse. Who would have thought??

But of course I didn't have time this morning before going to the gym and had intended "first thing" to get on that as soon as I got to work. Of course, that got pushed back and back and back, but finally I decided I had to stop working and start the digging out of my purse. I knew it was going to be a pretty big job, but I had no idea what a mess I had! Here's just a partial list of what was in my purse:

• 2 wallets (one has a cell phone holder so that's why I use it for my main ATM/credit cards and can carry that alone when wanting to go "light" when shopping. The other has the overflow);
• sun glasses (even though rarely used since October--just in case!);
• a nearly empty bottle of Advil;
• numerous assorted packets of ibuprofen and/or cold medicines from the office medicine chest;
• a bag of cough drops, with most of the cough drops loose in my purse;
• enough sticks of gum lying loose in the bottom of my purse to make up 3 more packs (where did all that gum go??);
• a pack of gum in its pack;
• 3 pens;
• 3 partially used gift cards (I've been wondering where they were);
• 1 unused gift card (I was hoping it was still there);
• 3 gloves, none of which match (one of which I've been looking for for a long time);
• synpathy cards my aunt gave me at my uncle's funeral a month ago from when my dad died 2 years ago (what is the need, I know);
• a sympathy card I had intended to mail out but couldn't find;
• several coupons, none expired yet fortunately;
• a Baker's chocolate recipe booklet;
• a chicken soup recipe;
• movie ticket stubs (Marley & Me; Benjamin Button; Gran Torino);
• my regular glasses;
• loose change;
• a change purse;
• my camera;
• extra batteries for camera;
• my Polar HR watch, in need of a new battery;
• warranty info for the Polar HR watch;
• a package of kleenex;
• a cell phone charger;
• checkbook;
• nail clippers;
• enough loose grocery receipts and other papers to half fill my wastebasket at work;
• and last but not least? the W-2 form. Yipee!

Mission accomplished, and it was absolutely the last thing I pulled out of the dark depths of that bag I drag around everywhere. But now I have to cram all this stuff back into the purse to get it home and sort through it again before boarding the plane! (I can't even dare complain about a sore shoulder!)