The spouse used to have this room upstairs for his computer room several years ago, when he was purportedly writing a book. When it became too difficult for him to go up and down stairs easily, I inherited the room for my use and he set up a bedroom/office apartment downstairs. I get lots of exercise going up and down stairs when I'm at home.

Earlier he puffed and panted up the stairs and came in here asking for the flat screen monitor for the downstairs setup. I don't use the desktop and monitor and keyboard any more, just this laptop, so I agreed.

Now I'm sure that all of you out there have your cables and power plugs and cords all perfectly organized and laid out, with not a speck of dust to be seen. I, on the other hand, was horrified when I started unplugging the monitor and pulling out the cpu from its nest of cables to discover just how dusty and snarled everything was.

"Oh," he said, with a wave of his hand, "I used to have a couple of printers up here and a slower computer and when I took them downstairs I left all the cables and cords for you." Like I needed them for a laptop.

The result was that I tracked each cord from here to there, finding that it was plugged into nothing and connected to nothing else. One cable after another was determined to be an orphan, just sitting there collecting mega-dust.

And so much dust! I had no idea dust was so creative about finding places to settle and invite its brethren to join it. Instead of a sixty-second job to disconnect a monitor, I spent the better part of an afternoon cleaning and reorganizing my computer space, crawling underneath and reaching behind and tracing stuff from connector to connector.

I must say it looks better. I found all kinds of goodies, including a USB hub. Some things were so old, though, that they were more suited for a museum. Spouse cannot bear the thought of discarding anything, so he kept them all and is going to "install" them downstairs, incompatible, outdated or not. And then he'll wonder why they don't work, will call the tech support, get someone who has never heard of this model that was discontinued five years ago, many emails and phone calls will follow...it's a career, I tell you.

I'm probably at the other end of the spectrum. I have the laptop, a mouse and a printer. And now my USB hub, though I have no idea what I'll use it for. I've eliminated the unused cords and cables and put them in the "Extras" box. I've dusted and wiped and straightened, and it looks pretty good. There is actually unoccupied space on my work table.

Yes!