Paper Chase

if it's not obvious to anyone but me, let me tell you, this office remodel is going to take a while.  the first place to start in any redo, is to go through what you have & get rid of what you don't want/need.  in the kitchen, that was easy!  the office?  not so much! 

yesterday Nacho & i committed to spending 1-2 hours going through as much of the paper as we could (without losing our minds) & getting rid of unnecessary stuff.  how do we accumulate so much when we do so much online?  what you see above is an ordinary recycle bin, a typical office garbage can, and an 8-gallon bucket full of paper from mostly 2 places:  our investment notebook & our 1 file cabinet/box. 
we started going paperless years ago.  we've differed about what to keep & what to throw away & we know the prevailing guidelines out there but we battle one important concept that most households probably don't:  Nacho works in Environmental where they live "cradle to the grave".  that means he throws NOTHING away at work.  we've spent the last 2 years debating how to handle this at home - we considered buying an all-in-one scanner/printer/fax so we could scan it all. but i have convinced him that we can just box it up & store it.  no need to purchase yet 1 more piece of technology that (a) takes up space, (b) we won't use after that initial scanning job, and (c) i'll be responsible for throwing in the river after the 1st time it doesn't work - I HATE TROUBLESHOOTING PRINTING DEVICES!  word to the wise:  your printer doesn't work....get rid of it & commit to saving a tree.  it may save your marriage!
so that is round 1 of sorting through the paper clutter.  i'm pretty sure there will be a round 2 and 3 at the very least!  who knows?  there might be an office under all that paper!

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