I did a limited clean up in my shop. Limited because I was looking for one item that I misplaced.(lost) While in the process of going thru an assortment of small drawers and bens, I discovered a few things that I had saved from other projects, that I may need for future projects. Then I had to stop and think what project I may have saved it for. I think that you know where I'm going with this because you probably do the same thing. I think my "one of these days I may need this" days are over. Not only am I running out of space in my shop, I am running out of memory in my brain. I find things for projects that I threw away or things I can't figure out. Some things are super confusing and then I find out that my wife stuck it there because she thought "I keep stuff like that.

 

Time to downsize storage, time to rethink my thinking,,,,,,,,,,,,,, again.

 

 

I know what you mean Ron, Believe me I know what you mean.

Everytime I make a jig, I keep it "in case I might make another.." . I can't even remember what half of them were for or how to use them!

Some things are super confusing and then I find out that my wife stuck it there because she thought "I keep stuff like that.

 

There's the extra that's screwing you up!!!!  Tell her to stop that!!!!!!

Some yellow tape and a marker to label stuff.   Of course now you have to read all the labels.  Which means find your glasses 1st.

 

43 minutes ago, lew said:

Everytime I make a jig, I keep it "in case I might make another.." . I can't even remember what half of them were for or how to use them!

I have some of those also. Can't find them until I make a new one

11 minutes ago, Gunny said:

Some yellow tape and a marker to label stuff.   Of course now you have to read all the labels.  Which means find your glasses 1st.

 

 I know what you mean, I guess we are all made in the same old mold

Hope that mold had not gone bad at the time.

 

I label my jogs with the source so I can go back to see how to use it. Ok 10 years ago may have done that twice.

 

Another ploy I just thought of is place a plan with those parts in ziplock. Ge I will I had done that at the time cause now I too have these parts with no inkling of what they were for. Add to that don't do hardly any flatwook anymore. All is geared to lathe.

Ron, just in case you have too many boxes of $20s hogging space in the work shop, you can send me what you do not want.

4 hours ago, Gunny said:

Some yellow tape and a marker to label stuff.   Of course now you have to read all the labels.  Which means find your glasses 1st.

 

Labels  

...I knew I forgot to do something! 

I'm sorting through boxes of stuff trying to remember which machine etc. the stuff belongs to. 

1 hour ago, Larry Buskirk said:

Labels  

AND a marker,  AND write what is in box, drawer etc etc ON IT. 

23 minutes ago, Gunny said:

AND a marker,  AND write what is in box, drawer etc etc ON IT. 

What!  And miss all of this fun! 

7 hours ago, Gunny said:

Some yellow tape and a marker to label stuff.   Of course now you have to read all the labels.  Which means find your glasses 1st.

 

There are two methods for helping remember stuff.   The first is to write it down.   I can't remember the second one.

 

I got tons of small drawers with little parts. I take my hot melt glue gun and glue one of each on the outside of the drawer.

 

I used to work with a guy who was completely worthless.  We transferred him out to another group.  I had to ask him a question once and to answer it, he pulled out his master notebook.  He'd look up the topic and it would direct him to notebook 23.  He'd put the master away, pull out #23, and the first page was a table of contents for #23.  Then he'd read down until he found the item was in tab #12, open that up and find the page in question.   I think he spent most of his time just organizing because he didn't have anything useful to do.   I've worked with several people like that over the years at different companies.

Another manager was very much into project management.   Filed estimates, progress reports, scope changes, etc.   When he left the company, the building crew cleaned out his office and a storage room he used.  They just dumped all the papers in a skip for recycling.   They donated several hundred three-ring binders for a charity for school kids' supplies.