SPRING CLEANING - OR WISHFUL THINKING?

I expect you've spent your Easter break with other people or by going out and having fun. Not me... Rob and I are off, very soon, to New England, USA, so I've spent the weekend trying to get the house into some form of cleanliness and tidiness - something I find almost impossible.

My problem is: 1. I hate housework 2. I am a hoarder 3. If I put things away I lose them and can't find them when I need them 4. I hate housework 5. I like buying stuff!

For two days I sorted through loads and loads of videos. I put every single one into the machine and checked what was on it before deciding whether it needed to be kept to be watched again before throwing, kept to be transferred to DVD or whether it should be consigned to the box for disposal. Now that is done I wonder how long the box (well, two boxes now) will sit in the living room until it is taken to the tip?

Today I concentrated on the top floor of the house - bathroom and our bedroom. At least the carpets and skirting boards, walls and light fittings are now dust free but the piles of everything are another matter entirely.

I do love to see other people's immaculate houses. They have a minimum of items on display, practically no ornaments, photos, etc. No books or DVDs sprawled over coffee tables - just lots of tasteful space. Would I like a house like that? Well in theory I would but to do that all the bears would have to go at the very least because at present they occupy the tops of the sofas, the dining room chairs, the long john dressing table mirror, the bed, the top of the bedroom TV, the conservatory settee not forgetting the Cloth Tag pottery bears on the shelf over the radiator.

Then there are the books which are piled two deep and eight high on the two bookshelves I currently own as well as on the floor by the bed and in the drawers under the divan.

The office is an even bigger tip; everything is piled on the floor on both sides of my chair which I can only move forward and backwards in order to sit at my desk which can't be seen under the plethora of notebooks, diaries, magic props, stationary items - and yes there is a computer which even has some shy speakers which peer shortsightedly from between the miniature paper tote bags which are there to hold all the pens, pencils, paper clips and other hardware needed for today's paperless society!

Oh I'd love a clear and open workspace, I'd love my office equipment to gleam at me in the joy of being easily accessible but I doubt this will ever happen. I did start today, in the bedroom, trying to be a bit ruthless. To put it more accurately I filled a small plastic bag with three items of clothing I have now decided I can live without for the rest of my days. I also demoted a couple from a vast collection of lipsticks and some almost empty tubes of makeup base as well as several dried out mascara wands. But I think that's it; I won't be throwing anything else away today as that was hard enough to contend with for a while.

So I'll continue to keep everything, I'll continue to buy when I'm away and the things I buy will live happily in their plastic bags with airport logos and the names of strange sounding shops written on them until the next time I clean up and find them full of 'new' toys ready to be oohed and ahhed over before they return to their little bit of floor space mecca unscathed and still unused but forever new!