Desk, Part 1

The desk. Another bane of my existence. Of course, at this point I have so many banes of my existence that maybe I just have an existence? I mean, if everything pisses me off, maybe I am the problem?

But I digress.

The desk. Christian and I made this magic happen a while ago. The drop leaf tale is an old family antique that has been everything from a dining room table to a kitchen island to a pain in the ass to store piece of wood that takes up space. In its current incarnation, it is the perfect desk to go under our flea market shelves.

You may (or may not) remember the story of the shelves. In a nutshell - four porch brackets for $32 + free chippy paint bead board paneling = Pure Awesomeness!

Since we made the shelves, the desk shelf area has been a dumping ground for anything remotely office like that comes in to my house. Junk mail? Toss it on Mom's desk. Old magazines? Toss them on Mom's desk. Random pens, pencils and markers? Toss them on Mom's desk. Dirty socks? Toss them on Mom's desk.

First, I started collecting empty storage containers I have stashed around the house, thinking that knowing what I had to work with would make it easier. Wrong! After a few minutes, I figured out that I was doing it backwards. Basically, I needed to know what we wanted out of a work space to know what to do with it.

A few months ago, I asked Marty to tell me what he wanted to use the desk for. He never gave me a straight answer, so I decided to take matter in to my own hands and started a list.

• Bill paying center (including a place to store receipts until I reconcile the checkbook)
• Family calendar 
• Bulletin board
• A way to deal with incoming mail and junk mail
• Mail center (stamps, envelopes, greeting cards, address labels, etc.)  
• Printer/printer paper storage
• Phone/iPod/Kindle charging station
• A place to store library books
• A place for all of those fiddly bits of crap that seems to accumulate (random pieces of paper, gift cards, etc.)
• A way to store ear buds and extra cords
• Trash can
• Lighting
• A place to spread out and work
• A comfy chair

Some of this stuff already exists, some of it just needs moved to the desk and some of it I will have to hunt down. The goal is to spend as little as possible, so it may take some time. I am willing to wait.

Seems like a tall order, but I think I am up to it. 

As of right now, the desk is cleaned off and I have a tote full of crud that needs to be dealt with. That will be tomorrow's project.