Chronic's Research and Aeronautics Project (C.R.A.P.)

[TheChronicOne]

Yes! I have hit second wind and things are starting to shape up. I now have opened up barely enough room to start making new stacks. Vacuuming the whole time and actually cleaning and organizing other aspects of the entire room as I go so that's one reason why this is taking so long. Either way, I'm on the downhill slide now and it won't be long before I'm done.

I vastly under-estimated the amount of work and time this would take. Holy crap. Oh well... it'll be GREAT having this done. I like everything neat, clean, and organized so it will be like waking up in a new house tomorrow (or whenever I get this done).

Only found a few things I didn't realize I had.  I was hoping for more "eureka" moments but everything, for the most part, is not a surprise aside from a few things that don't amount to much like a 1/72 F/A-18 ( I was going to find one to buy, now I don't have to... ) and other things like that.


Still looks like a right disaster but compared to the two pictures I took before of the main piles, this is MUCH improved! 





Not much more will "come out of" these piles. Now it's really just a matter of re-stacking it all, neatly, and in a somewhat more organized fashion concerning like subject, like maker, etc.

[TheChronicOne]

I can see the light at the end of the tunnel now! In fact, one of my dogs just wandered in here and doesn't know what to think because of the extra space. 

I still have a pile of stuff behind where I sit at my desk containing a bunch of 1/72 civil air birds, Chinese AF stuff, and my Delfin/Albatros collection (and some others) but 95% of this stuff is done. I still need to finish vacuuming. I still need to sort supplies.

This first pile also contains some stuff I still need to manage and boxes of the supplies but it's mainly good to go:




This pile is probably good to go:



Much better. Much more space in here! Dog has already passed out and cutting Z's. 


  My Buddy.


The final phase of all of this will commence in a couple days. I will sort the last pile of kits I mentioned and also go through my scraps (box tops, instructions) and get that junk in a better state. Lastly, I'll go through this computer desk/work station and get it ship shape then it's back to building. 

[PR19_Kit]

That does look very tidy, but how will you ever know what the kits on the bottom row up against the wall are? 

[zenrat]

It's not so much what you find that you forgot you had, but what you find that you don't want.
Find anything to sell?

I was in my shed yesterday standing at the bench.  I was standing back from it so there was a gap between my belly and the front of the bench.  I was concentrating on whatever I was doing when in my peripheral vision I saw something run in front of my feet along the foot of the cabinet that I have under the bench.
This was either a big mouse, a rat or a really big spider.
I'm hoping it was a bush rat (rattus fuscipes) ^[1] because they don't breed as fast as brown rats (rattus norvegicus) ^[2] or black rats (rattus rattus) ^[3], nest underground and keep the other species of rats away (and lets face it, you are going to have rats so you might as well have the sort that do least damage).
However, because it could have been one of the bad rats or a mouse i'm going to have to pull out all of the model boxes to check that there isn't a nest in the back of any of the boxes made from chewed up box and instructions.

[NARSES2]

That does look very tidy, but how will you ever know what the kits on the bottom row up against the wall are? 

You keep notes. Yes I know it's sad, but that's what 40 years of office work teaches you 

[TheChronicOne]

That does look very tidy, but how will you ever know what the kits on the bottom row up against the wall are? 

  Good question. Answer is, I will vaguely know what's there based upon what's on top. They don't look organized but each of those stacks toward the back have a "theme" that ties them together. All the ones out front were the left-overs that didn't fit anywhere else and they'll be easier to look through. But anyway.... knowing what's on top will tell me what else is down below (within reason). I'll still have to move piles around to fish things out and actually get a closer look at something but at least this way I know where it's all at and don't have to dig through my entire kit stash to find something. It's still a bit of "work" but a large amount less than what I used to have to do to find something.

In a perfect world, I'd have a lot more space, for one, and shelves, for two. That's a long-off goal of mine anyway is to build some shelving  to hold things. I could just hit the lumba' sto' and buy a bunch of wood and make the things myself but this still costs money and more importantly it's WORK.

It's easy to just say, "oh, yeah, build a shelf."

But no one thinks of the logistics. Gotta FIND all the proper tools. Got to dig said tools out. Got to tote tools inside. Got to re-arrange half the damn house just to have a place to stand and work and kiss your wall hangins goodbye. May have to move a bunch of furniture. *Snap* damn, 100 pound TV is in the way... gotta move that... oh, but wait, gotta move the TV stand, too. Oh but wait the entertainment megaplex having 50 trillion miles of wires and they're all crossed up, knotted, and matted like a 3 year old child's hair after candy melted in it. Oh yeah, it'll take half a damn morning just messing with wires. Ain't even cut a slice of wood yet! Oh but wait, gotta make lunch and take care of the animals real quick. Ok.. nice! Time to cut wood. Oh damn, the power cord doesn't work any more. Gotta go find another one only to burn two hours to find another one that doesn't work. Time to go buy one so there's another $50 down the crapper unless you want some Taiwanese fire hazard. OK... good to go.... RRRRR RRR Oh damn, the saw blade is no good!!! Burn another half hour looking for one then back to the store to buy one. Go home then you realize you had better make sure to find the studs. Stud finder where is it??? Oh man.. I saw it laying around a year or two ago..... burn two more hours trying to find the stud finder but at least I found some old bombs from an A-10 Attacker while I was not finding the stud finder. Ok, back to the stupid store to re-buy something I already own. Now all of a sudden these cheap shelves are quite costly and it's midnight.




But yeah.....   Even if I just bought a couple hunks of wood and just did a a shelf here and there it would go a long ways for making the stash better and I'd build a couple to hold finished projects, too!     Hell, that might be a good idea to contemplate on NOW while this place is in a stately order.

[TheChronicOne]

It's not so much what you find that you forgot you had, but what you find that you don't want.
Find anything to sell?

I was in my shed yesterday standing at the bench.  I was standing back from it so there was a gap between my belly and the front of the bench.  I was concentrating on whatever I was doing when in my peripheral vision I saw something run in front of my feet along the foot of the cabinet that I have under the bench.
This was either a big mouse, a rat or a really big spider.
I'm hoping it was a bush rat (rattus fuscipes) ^[1] because they don't breed as fast as brown rats (rattus norvegicus) ^[2] or black rats (rattus rattus) ^[3], nest underground and keep the other species of rats away (and lets face it, you are going to have rats so you might as well have the sort that do least damage).
However, because it could have been one of the bad rats or a mouse i'm going to have to pull out all of the model boxes to check that there isn't a nest in the back of any of the boxes made from chewed up box and instructions.

Surprisingly, no! I'm still with the same pile of 1/48 kits I have and the 1/72 Boeing 707 that I have almost convinced myself to get rid of but I didn't find anything I had totally forgotten about or anything that I once liked and now do not. I think this may be because some odd months ago I did kind-of go through things just to pick out the stuff I didn't want so I got to skip that round of "eureka, but...eww" this time.

Nothing worse than a little vermin that just straight up EATS YOUR STUFF. Squirrels do it here....  Tore up all kinds of stuff in the out buildings. Get on that fast. And hey whadda ya know.. you can do a wee bit of the clean up and organize yourself since you have to pull out a bunch of stuff anyway!

[TheChronicOne]

That does look very tidy, but how will you ever know what the kits on the bottom row up against the wall are? 

You keep notes. Yes I know it's sad, but that's what 40 years of office work teaches you 

That's what I could do! Just put a sticky note on one of the top kits with a list of everything underneath it. Simple but effective.

[NARSES2]

Sticky notes become "unsticky" very quickly.

Jot it down on a bit of A4 and put that inside a clear plastic folder. Or simply get a cheap note book/pad from a $ Store or whatever. Don't trust the sticky, believe me I speak from experience 

[Rheged]

That does look very tidy, but how will you ever know what the kits on the bottom row up against the wall are? 

You keep notes. Yes I know it's sad, but that's what 40 years of office work teaches you 

I was taught "If you didn't write it down it never happened"  A cheap notebook and pencil can get you out of a great many elephant traps if you use them sensibly!

[scooter]

That does look very tidy, but how will you ever know what the kits on the bottom row up against the wall are? 

You keep notes. Yes I know it's sad, but that's what 40 years of office work teaches you 

I was taught "If you didn't write it down it never happened"  A cheap notebook and pencil can get you out of a great many elephant traps if you use them sensibly!

Yup.  Same thing applies in EMS.  If you did it, but didn't document it, it didn't happen.

[TheChronicOne]

For now simply moving a couple piles to see what is behind them is going to be less time consuming and labor intensive than writing/typing out a bunch of things (lots of kits, lots of writing/typing) so I'm just going to let it ride until the day my collection is so obese that I once again can't even get to parts of.  I'll move to a higher plane of model inventory once I "get my numbers up."   

This  much smaller sheer size was one nice feature of the re-organization. The way it was before I couldn't even get to piles of things because of other piles of things. That way it is now, I can easily reach and snag a pile and they are all within arms reach so the whole mystery of wondering where things are at and having to move 100 kits is gone.

The exception to this, for now, are all my bagged kits. I definitely do already have all of that stuff written down. No way in hell I'm trying to fight that beast.    I know when to choose my battles and that ain't gonna be it. 

[PR19_Kit]

All that organisation stuff is NO fun. 

Fun is when you're ploughing through a pile of kits looking for one particular one and you come across a Holy Grail kit that couldn't remember even buying! 

[zenrat]

I know it's satisfying building your own shelves but you can buy a plain pine flatpack bookcase for under $30 (which is prolly tax deductible as it is for the business paperwork isn't it).

That does look very tidy, but how will you ever know what the kits on the bottom row up against the wall are? 

You keep notes. Yes I know it's sad, but that's what 40 years of office work teaches you 

I was taught "If you didn't write it down it never happened"  A cheap notebook and pencil can get you out of a great many elephant traps if you use them sensibly!

Yup.  Same thing applies in EMS.  If you did it, but didn't document it, it didn't happen.

I used to be secretary at System Review Panel meetings.  There were times when I was specifically told NOT to write it down (Which I ignored - I just didn't put it in the official version.  You don't catch me that way).

[NARSES2]

All that organisation stuff is NO fun. 

Strangely I do sometimes enjoy sorting things out.  Weird I know, but true

I used to be secretary at System Review Panel meetings.  There were times when I was specifically told NOT to write it down (Which I ignored - I just didn't put it in the official version.  You don't catch me that way).

Attended a fair few meetings where there were "off the record" sessions, but only one where we were actually forbidden to even take personal notes and had to leave bags etc outside of the room. At the end of this session none of the attendees had any idea why this had been necessary as nothing contentious was discussed. And yes it did involve a EEC committee 

I was taught "If you didn't write it down it never happened"  A cheap notebook and pencil can get you out of a great many elephant traps if you use them sensibly!

Nearly always have one on me, cargo trousers are very useful 

I've also found over time that if I write something down, I remember it. Came in very useful when I was sitting at exams.