It was a quiet weekend around the Burrow.

On Friday night, Michael came across town for happy hour with John and Rudi and stayed so that he could go out for dinner with us. I had been feeling a bit on the crabby side, but Michael was in a genial mood and so his company and some pizza helped put things right. Rudi and I were home by ten and got to catch up on our online watching of Numb3rs before bed.

Saturday was the Help the Homeless Walkathon, which required this night person to get up before the sun was out of bed and be out the door before she normally leaves for work. Secretly, I was a bit glad that I missed meeting up with the people I was supposed to join, because I’m not much of a conversationalist when I’m still half-asleep. I am, however, a fast walker regardless of the hour, because I somehow managed to start behind but finish before the people I was looking for, who were fellow alumni of Connecticut College.

I did catch up to them for an early lunch, which ended up being quite nice. All three of them had graduated after Rudi and me, but one had been the housefellow of Blackstone his senior year, which was a nice connection. Another had been an RTC (an adult student returning to college), and she and her husband are recent transplants to the region.

After a stop at the library, I came home and the cats tricked me into lying down on the bed, where I promptly fell asleep. I dozed all afternoon.

This morning we slept in a bit, then headed to the farmers’ market for a few things, like milk and carrots. After a leisurely brunch of chai and French pastries, Rudi announced he’d work on cleaning the kitchen while I went down to shutter the garden for the season and get some sunlight.

We spent the evening shredding papers, listening to music, and watching the soccer championship game. Two bags of recycling and a bag of trash left the apartment and I’m already feeling lighter.

I can’t wait to see what the week ahead holds…

Nothing can possibly be more dull than a blog post on cleaning. Even one on dentistry has the potential to drift into the horror genre…

And, yet, here we are.

The cleaning/organizing/mass purging is going slowly. Far too slowly, in fact.

Under the best of circumstances I am deadline driven. This means that I work better — and faster — the closer we get to when things need to be done. The day of my tree trimming, I will be a model of efficiency. Two weeks out, though, and I’m having a hard time finding the motivation. All I want to do is sleep and knit and read.

Sorting through papers I’ve allowed to pile up and clothes and books I need to shift out of the house is not my idea of a fun way to spend a Saturday evening…

So, I turn to you, dear readers. What is your best tip for fall cleaning? Or your secret to staying motivated on mundane tasks? I’m desperate for suggestions because I really do know that procrastination and last minute efficiency are not my friends, at least in this instance.

Why can’t we fight large, societal problems at more reasonable hours — like noon … or midnight?

I’ve recently switched to a new cell phone plan. For years, Rudi and I were on the same family plan and I didn’t have to think about it one way or another so long as we paid the bill. But then Rudi got an iPhone and I didn’t. He switched over to AT&T, but I had enjoyed our days with Verizon and saw no reason to change with him.

However, this meant that it was now going to count against our minutes for me to call him. A plan where you can call x numbers for free seemed to make the most sense to negate the cross-carrier dialing I expected to do.

My plan went into effect last night and my phone prodded me to select myFave Five. I added Rudi’s cell and my folks’ landline and a friend with whom I can spend hours talking about all those important nothings that make up our daily lives.

Then, I was stymied. I decided to sleep on it. Clearly I would have my answer in the morning: Who were my other two “faves?”

In the morning, it was a bit clearer. One chatty friend usually calls me on my landline, but when I initiate the conversations I call from my cell. Clearly he’d be #4.

But still no clear-cut answer about my fifth slot.

My mother-in-law? Rudi and I talk to her once a week at least, but shouldn’t she go into Rudi’s list, rather than mine?

Someone here in D.C.? I send them lots of texts, but don’t actually spend a lot of time on the phone…

One of the friends I used to be able to spend hours with on the phone but who no longer seem to be around when I call … ? It could be a temporary situation caused by life changes or maybe it’s a portent of a change in our relationships….

A friend with whom I don’t talk very often but who can talk for hours when we do connect?

A friend I talk with on IM with practically every day? We don’t converse on the phone a lot, but might that change?

It shouldn’t be this hard. I should just pull up the last five phone bills and assign that fifth spot to whomever accounts for my largest chunk of minutes. But it’s the terminology that snags me: “myFaves.”

That suggests that there is an emotional hierarchy that I’m assigning here. These should be my five favorite people. The ones I want to talk to more than anyone else, irrespective of how — or whether — we converse.

That’s not, of course, what T-Mobile is expecting from me. (Or maybe they are. I don’t know.) They, I assume, figure this is just going to be an easy semantic-free decision.

It’s part of why I don’t join FaceBook. The term “friend” is bandied about there with such ease. Just because two people occupied the same space for a year or four or thirteen doesn’t make them friends. Acquaintances, sure. But friendship suggests more, and the FaceBook usage merely diminishes the value of the term.

I want certain words to mean something. Friend. Favorite. Love. These are words with big emotions behind them and to toss them about cavalierly suggests that they aren’t important to us. These should be words we use with care and caution and with only a few people. I’m not tossing those words out there to anyone I’ve ever met. I want you to understand that when I say that I love you or when I call you my friend there is a power behind those words.

Call me old-fashioned. Call me the English major I was.

Or just call me.

And then we can talk about who should have that fifth spot on my phone…

The apartment is a mess from this weekend’s attempts to make it cleaner. I am a mess — reasons unclear. I know I spent this afternoon in a foul mood. An evening nap did not help. Tea did no help. Dropping my dinner all over my skirt and the floor certainly did not help. Neither did two nighttime nap. I have brushed my teeth and am hoping actual sleep will help. Only time will tell.

Regular blogging will return tomorrow. I can’t wait to tell you about the Tweed Ride because it was a lot of fun.

Talk to you tomorrow.

Is it a bad sign when, on the very day you compose the housecleaning schedule that will allow you to have a party in three weeks without spending the hours leading up to it in tears, you disregard nearly every task scheduled for that day?

But… I do have an apple crisp in the oven, so it’s not all bad…