shreddin' it up

My dad works at a Country Club, so his hours are short in the winter months. Typically he works on the grounds crew and helps to winterize the place. This year, because of the economy, his hours have been significantly cut. So what does this mean?

This means that my dad has beaucoups time on his hands. He's been feverishly cleaning out apartment and throwing everything out.

I came home today at 2pm to my unshowered father cleaning out his desk. He borrowed a shredder from his friend Gus and was having the time of his life.

Dad is nothing if but thorough. He keeps everything. A small sampling of things he has discovered and shredded:

• a running journal from the summer of 1976
• the title to his first car
• a copy of his first speeding ticket (70 in a 55 -- $10 in 1979)
• a zippo lighter with his signature engraved in it (he never smoked)
• my mom's Indiana nursing license (we moved from Indiana 25 years ago)
• medication from 1964
• unactivated credit cards from the 1990's
• the title to every car that I remember us owning (1985 brown LTD Station Wagon, $12,000. 1989 Mustang, $10,000. 1998 Crown Victoria, $25,000)
• touch up paint to a car that died 6 years ago
• the contents of our junk drawer when we lived in Bay Village. (we moved 7 years ago)
• every paycheck stub for the last 15 years
• his college transcript. I was surprised to see that he had several D's, was only required to take 2 English classes, and graduated with a lower GPA than I had. Underachiever
• A newspaper clipping from when he won $166.66 in a competition (the prize was $500 but there was a three-way tie)
• the title to the house that I was born in
• a wooden plaque of a viking that my grandpa brought home from Norway in the 1960's
• a dictionary he recieved as a high school graduation gift

And the list goes on.

Earlier in the week he threw away our first computer. We got it when I was in the 6th grade. Before giving it the ol heeve-ho, dad looked through it to see if there was any important information that needed to be eliminated.

Unless you count my brother's sophomore English paper on To Kill a Mockingbird, we were fairly dull people.

And he wonders why I'm a pack rat.