Cyber Clutter

I was very disappointed in myself for not being able to pull off a yard sale today. My recent illness still had too much of a grip on me yesterday to allow me to go out to the storage unit and sort through box after dusty box of my past. In my office/spare bedroom I am surrounded by a roomful of items previously tagged and waiting for the sale. My clutterphobia is trying to claw its way to the surface and I keep trying to kick its neurotic ass back into submission but I am afraid I won't be able to control it for much longer. And God help my husband if that happens. I tend to get very testy and threaten to just throw everything away, then he gets very nervous and starts to stash his prized belongings, fearing I won't understand his need to have every electronic gadget known to man. And he would be right. With two computers, a desk phone, a cordless phone, a cell phone, a fax machine, and a whole array of gadgets that go with all that his home office is the poster child for Best Buy. Why exactly does one need not one, not two, but five speakers hooked up to his desktop computer? Because he can't hear the surround sound tv and stereo ready to entertain just down the hall from his office? Or the iPod sitting on the filing cabinet next to the desktop? Or the portable radio on top of the desk for listening to Bob and Tom in the mornings? Or the satellite radio catching the commercial-free music waves near the office window? Yesterday I had to crawl under his desk and trace the wires from all the speakers to the back of the computer so he could figure out why two of them weren't working. I know he suspected me as the cause simply because I was in the room and I surely must have done something because he didn't change anything and it was working the day before. (But that's another story!) Anyway, while under there I didn't solve the speaker problem but I did trace two random power plugs and an answering machine cord that were missing the components they once belonged to. They had become victims of the electronic kudzu growing under, around, and behind his desks. The mass of wires threatens to capture and choke any unwitting visitor and pull them into the tangled mess of cyber horror, never to be seen again. I feel responsible to at least attempt to hack it back occasionally lest it come creeping out into the hallway to overtake the rest of the house. I know I can't kill it but I can contain it. Goodnight Hal!