Laura has been rather sick the past few days, actually vomiting. It’s very scary for a parent… I remember an old boss once told me that, but now it’s really hitting home. Right now, she’s sleeping, and hopefully she’ll kick this bug in the next day or two and get back to her normal bouncy self.
In the meantime, I’m purging too — old papers and rubbish, that is. I’m making a concerted effort to clear out old crap that I’ve kept around due to my pack-rat gene. Some things are interesting, and I twinge a bit when I pass them into the recycling bin, but really, they’re memories past. Like the layoff packet from FizzyLab when that went down… it included the list of people laid off and retained. Some named I haven’t thought of in years. Also went through a ton of old Merrill Lynch and Prudential paperwork that was lying around… I’m no longer a customer of either, so I thought about just recycling the lot. Then I looked… and yes, MK’s and my SSN was on about half the papers. Sigh. So, into the shred / burn pile it goes.
I’m also trying to purge old software… I was going to throw a ton away, such as various copies of Microsoft Anything 97. But it turns out on eBay, people actually buy Office 97 and the ilk for like $35… so, we’ll see if it sells. Otherwise, maybe I can use them for skeet or something.
So… for those who read this (hi Meg!)… any idea where you can go to destroy a bunch of paper? I was thinking of burning it, but that’ll require me to dig a firepit in the yard (not a big deal) but put some kind of ash grate on top (so I’ll have to find one). Or perhaps just dump them in one of Microsoft’s big shredder boxes at work and let the shredder people take care of it. Might work. But I like burning things myself. 
Funny you mention that, we were heading off to Canadian Tire tonight to get one of those Mexican fireplaces you put on the back patio. We plan on burning our shred piles (and we have many!) in there instead of using the wee shredder we bought last year. It’s already on its last legs from overuse.
There’s also this place called Shred-It (?) but I don’t know if they’re local or international. They park in your laneway and you can watch them toss all your paperwork into their industrial shredder. The geek in me likes that idea.