Well I guess it’s time to admit defeat and resolve myself to the fact that I need to find something else to do for a few months.  The diagnosis is in – I knew when I heard the snap, crackle and pop that something bad had happened; my ACL is torn.  For those of you who know sports you know how devastating that is.  For those of who don’t, I tore my anterior cruciate ligament which is an important stringy bit responsible for preventing your knee from rotating and giving out.  When that tears, it makes a horrible noise that is fortunately drowned out by the sound of your own screams.  I did this to my other knee 15 years ago and hoped to never experience it again; the good news is that surgery can fix it and hopefully within several months I’ll have a good-as-new stringy bit holding my knee together again.

Unfortunately this will be the last installment of Wannabe Runner and since I’m a working mom, I plan to blog about stuff I know – moms, kids, husbands, house, work, pets and how to juggle it all – some days a little faster than others – starting with my tasking of organizing the house.

As I start to purge my house of all unneeded things, I am coming across items that I have no idea what to do with.  You know…those things that aren’t really in good enough shape to give to charity but still have some life left in them?  Like my towels.  I still have towels that were given to me when I moved into my first house in 1996 when forest green and maroon where the ‘in’ colour scheme.  I haven’t bothered to replace them because they still do the job.  So while the kids have lovely towels that match their bathroom and my guest towels are nicely colour coordinated as well, the towels that my husband and I use are frightful.  They are all different colours (circa mid-90’s), most have frayed edges and some bleach spots, but they still work.  So when I do finally buy new ones  what do I do with these?  They are not good enough to give to charity.  I don’t need anymore rags.  The dog has her own towels (nicer ones than I use).  My question is to everyone out there – what do we do with items that have outlived their intended use but still have life?   I remember seeing an animal rescue asking for donations of old fur coats to use as comfort for injured and orphaned animals.   Yes –  I admit that I do have a couple of furs in a box downstairs.  I can’t stand the idea of fur coats, but these belonged to Great Grandmas and we didn’t know what to do with them.  I can’t and won’t ever wear one, but these are wasted in a box – someone somewhere must have a use for a ratty old fur.   BTW – the rescue group I mentioned doesn’t use them anymore.

I know that a lot of things like broken electronics can be recycled, but maybe some can have another life before they get broken down into scrap metal and melted plastic.  Are there schools or clubs looking for these for class projects?  So a question out to you…are there people or organizations that want old items that may be beyond sell-able in your local charity shop and not necessarily recyclable?    Does anyone need old coat hangers or busted wax crayons (I have buckets of those) for crafts?  Chipped dishes?  Tired feather pillows? Cracked aquariums? Kids clothes with forever stains?  If you can use the things that people might just be throwing out put a Wanted Ad on your local Used site.  Anyone looking for some old towels?