How untidy is your house? Please select one of the following and give details of the type of rubbish etc. and whhether you think it’s OK to have an untidy house.
Very - Can’t move because it’s so untidy
Quite - Things in no particular order
Moderately - “Organised Disorganisation”
Not - No rubbish or untidyness
I’d like to add a new category, and place myself in it:
Unbeliavably - Need to move house simply because this one is full
I share an apartment with another adult male.
It is, therfore, a pit of unimaginable filth.
Just slightly below Moderately. The main areas aren’t too bad, except for the desk in the office. The bedrooms are less organized, but you can walk thru without tripping over too much stuff. The garage is a disaster.
Quite. Every once in a while (i.e. before company comes), we attempt to de-toddlerize the place. But for the most part it’s an amalgam of toys, clothes, toys, sippy cups, toys, and dirt.
Quite. We’re both extremely busy (Mrs. Arken works full time and is in grad school and I’m trying to run my own business) and so the place goes to hell. Doesn’t help that we have a dog who likes to shed.
I definitely qualify for the “very” category. Starting with the front room I have newspapers strewn all about as well as receipts from bills I have paid. I have lots of old papers and envelopes that I could probably get rid of and should. My packratitus condition developed after there were times when I threw things out only to wish later on that I had kept them. Stacks of CDs and videos are all around my stereo. Laundry that never gets folded is all over my couch. I can hardly eat at my kitchen table. The kitchen itself is a disaster. The countertops are full of groceries that I never bother to put away (except for refrigerated and frozen items, obviously) and leave out until they are ready to be used. The sink is full of dishes waiting to be washed. My bedroom is strewn with clothes and the room also serves as auxiliary storage space. My bathroom is a big mess and is long overdue for a good cleaning. The computer room is in just as much of a disarray as the rest of the house. I never invite people over and I greet unexpected visitors at the door because my place is such a mess. Each week I vow to do something about it each weekend but after working all week the last thing I want to do is spending my free days doing more work.
My house is in the ‘Not’ category. But only because it’s been for sale since October. I’ve had to keep the damn thing clean for SEVEN MONTHS now. It royally sucks.
Ours goes into the “not” category.
We just under went a major cleanout of the basement in order to make space for a possible new bathroom in some of the space that is now the utility room. I went through every box in there and either threw away stuff away or donated it to Goodwill. We also needed to clear out a dead washing machine (just left it in the basement after it died and was replaced) and a dead water heater.
This inspired me to clean out every junk drawer, closet and storage space in the entire house. We ended up with 10 huge trash bags filled with donated clothes, 5 boxes of books and 3 boxes of usable kitchen stuff which all went to Goodwill last month.
We also created the world’s largest trash pile next to the side of the house that consisted of the dead water heater and washing machine, two dead televisions, a dead mattress and box springs and various other assorted crap which just got hauled away last week.
How two human beings can collect so much crap is beyond me but I’m sure if you give us a year, we could do it all again. But for now, our house is very feng shui. 
Just a hair short of “very”.
dwc1970 has pretty much described our place, except for the laundry, grocery & dishes. Every available flat surface is piled with stuff that I need to organize. The only reason it’s not worse is that a friend comes in twice a week to help with laundry and housework. Things have been steadily going to hell ever since my wife’s health and eyesight deteriorated since I kept putting off cleaning up, thinking that we could catch up later. Occasionally I get a burst of energy and get some of the mess cleared up, but then things start to slide again.
Very. We just moved on Saturday, and what with two night baseball games since then, we’ve only gotten about halfway through the mess.
My room- “quite”. The rest of the house- “moderately/not”. Pretty tidy except for having too much stuff and a dog that likes to shed.
Moderately. My main problem is the toys and washing that comes with having three children.
The half of the house that is accessible to visitors – front room, kitchen, bathroom, spare bedroom – is “moderately” messy. Cluttered, but quick and easy to tidy up if, say, my mom were to stop by.
The half of the house that isn’t generally seen by visitors – master bedroom, office, basement – is between “quite” and “very.”
As far as whether or not it’s okay, per the OP, I don’t know that we have a choice. Half of our available storage and shelf space is taken up with books. If we had no books, we wouldn’t be able to make a mess, because we wouldn’t have enough stuff to make a mess with.
I vote for another category:
squallor. :eek:
Mine is about Moderate. Things are in place, but there’s also stuff on counters and dressers. There are toys lying around. We have waaaay too many books for neatness purposes (it is not possible to have too many books period) and the computer desk falls into Quite/Very.
I think it’s OK to have a fairly messy home, so the kids can play and not feel like they have to walk on eggshells o’ fear–but too much junky mess is a psychic weight on my shoulders.
Moderately, though the office is Very. I am pricing stuff for a garage sale and it’s strewn about, with the reject/Goodwill piles as well.
Generally, I can tidy the downstairs enough to have my folks over in about 15 minutes. The upstairs? Ha. With two kids who have way too many toys, it’s a pit. I am using the garage sale as a reason to reduce the toys by at least 1/2.
Moderately to Quite, thanks to my and my little sister’s sloppy bedroom habits. We try to keep the mess down to a minimum, but considering all the junk we have (we’re both packrats), it’s very, very difficult. Also, we both read a lot, so the floors are always littered with books of all sorts. Factor that in with a dislike of anything resembling work (especially housework), and you’d wonder why we aren’t up to Very or Unbelieveably yet…
Quite - Things in no particular order.
Lots of clutter. And it always seems more urgent to deal with the clutter then to do basic cleaning, so dusting, vacuuming and mopping are now overdue.
Lving Room and Kitchen: Moderate, only because the babies aren’t up yet. By mid-afternoon, we’ll be somewhere between “Very” and “F5 Tornado Debris.” I have a shabby chic/garage sale sort of decorating scheme, so I can get away with a lot.
Bedrooms: Moderate to Very. I’m still going through outgrown clothes, etc, so I’m making progress, but it’s slow. One bedroom belongs to the two older boys (11 and 15). The second belongs to Mrbodypoet, the two babies, and myself…two beds, two dressers, and scads of STUFF. Bedroom #3 is in transition–extra dressers, toddler bed, laundry baskets, etc. It’s a mess.
Basement/Garage: OMG. You ever watch Cops? Those episodes where the police break down a door, and then decide to call social services because it’s such a wreck? That’s my garage. I wouldn’t let firefighters down there if it was ablaze…they would just have to stand outside and run hoses in the windows.
To my slight credit, though, the entire HOUSE used to be in the OMG category, so I’m making a lot of progress.
karol