A rather unfortunate series of events led me ending up in my basement with a task of cleaning it up. It was mildly put a mess, this photo was taken shortly after refactoring has begun. I was unable to even go inside and therefore forced to put half of the stuff in the hall.

Lessons learnt

• I had a reason to do it since I was unable to find part of Christmas decorations
• I managed to “forget” that I had duplication. (Two Christmas trees for example, two saws, countless other smaller things). Important thing is that I am (legally) sane. So I figure this forgetfulness is normal.
• There was a lot of junk that I didn’t need
  • I threw out lot of the junk
  • I did not throw out everything, although I was tempted
• Some of the junk was really heavy to carry and garbage container was far away
• Some of the stuff was borderline and I could not decide whether to throw it out or not
• It was beneficial to separate junk on one pile and throw it all out at once
• For I while I was in a hole and literally could not get out
• I’ve needed a lot of space while in the process
• There was a glass on the floor, so I was at risk to get cut on it the whole time
  • I never got cut before
  • I got cut when I tried to clean it up
• After I was done
  • It was not perfect
  • It was better than before
  • I’ve had a much better understanding of what was inside

Conclusion

I was amazed at how little I knew about the content I’ve found. Even if I vaguely knew I had something I was unable to locate it. For lots of stuff I was just amazed that I even have it.

After all the hard work decorations were retrieved and the basement was better than before.

I guess refactoring has a lot more in common with cleaning a basement than I thought it would.