It's done. It's finally over.

After years of threatening, I finally did it. I cleaned the damn garage. The last time I recall doing this was some time in 2004 and boy did it get out of hand. Click on the pictures for the full view of what Fibber McGee's garage would look like if he'd had one.Boxes and crap piled crazily here and there, balancing precariously on top of other junk. Holiday decorations improperly stored.
I park on this side of the garage. Every time I opened my car door to get out, I'd smash it into some gardening tool which would then of course topple over, usually against the table, which would then set in motion more crap rolling off the table and onto the floor. I found a squished roll of duct tape under my tire one day.
What the hell is all this crap?

(the 'CASSA-D" license plate was on my old Toyota when I lived in Massachusetts in the late 80's. It's a tribute to Neal Cassady and also one of my fave Dead songs, "Cassidy").
Brian's work boots, last used at the end of the Clinton Administration.
After 5 hours of steady cleaning and purging on Saturday, another 2 hours on Sunday, frequently fogged up glasses from sweating, and many aches and pains later, I finished it. I finally assembled the garden tool holder. Now when I open my car door, it smashes against the holder, but at least nothing tips over or threatens to conk me in the head, like some slapstick comedy movie where the guy steps on a rake.
I swept a fir tree's worth of pine needles off the floor. I had to use the snow shovel to scoop them into the barrel.
Items properly stored. There's even room for the lawn mower this year!

We gave our new next door neighbors the unassembled weight bench and unassembled garden cart. The dream is over, ladies and gents. Brian ain't gonna be liftin' any weights any time soon, nor is it likely I'm going to be killing myself doing enough yardwork to warrant a cart, either. That's OK. The neighbors are a sweet, young couple just starting out. They have the energy for this crap. We don't. They were happy to get the stuff for free and we were happy that we didn't have to load them up and haul them somewhere. We gave the unused, 6 year old bikes to another neighbor for his kids. I took 2 huge carloads of stuff to the Goodwill on Monday & Tuesday, filled the recycling bin and 3 trash cans.

This corner was the worst of all. I'd cleaned the whole garage up to the freezer on Sat. and the last 2 hours on Sunday were devoted to this area. I think that "Weekly World News" would be interested to know that I found both Jimmy Hoffa AND Amelia Earhart in this part of the garage.
OMG I can finally BREATHE again! We can finally fit both our vehicles comfortably again! I can get to the freezer without stepping on all kinds of junk or knocking things over!!
Totally worth the aches n pains. Now I won't have to do it again till 2013. lol