Day of Declaration

About a month ago, my Dad got on the computer and began typing away at something. When he was done, he printed out two different things, one paper that said, "The Day of Declaration is coming on 5/14/11", and the other said all the rules about the day and how it would be handled.
Now, for those of you who don't know, my Dad is a major cleaning-freak. For years, I thought he enjoyed cleaning, and I often still do. He's goes on about how my brother and I need to clean our rooms so he and Mom can walk into them all the time, but this time, he went a step further. This "Day of Declaration" had to do with my brother and I deep cleaning our rooms. That meant, throwing old toys and clothes out, going through our desks, sweeping/vacuuming our bedroom floors, dusting our shelves, giving everything a 'home'...
When he posted the signs up around the house that night a month ago, I immediately was filled with dread. Usually when I 'clean my room', I shove everything into a corner or something and let it all pile up the next day again. But I could see that this would be a major deal, especially when Mom kept saying that she was going to purposefully be gone that day (so as to avoid the stress spreading around our house like a virus. Although, with my brother and I alone at home most of today, a lot of stress was avoided anyway.). 
But, I had no idea to what extent it really would be difficult and how long a day it would be on April 14th.
I started off my cleaning before the date, so as to hopefully have free time when the date arrived. My nightstand was my first task, where all my journals, Bible's, CD cases, and what not, where all over the place. I knew Dad would have a cow if he knew what the inside of my nightstand looked like, and so I pulled everything out, got rid of some of the stuff I didn't need/want anymore, and then replaced it all in a much more, orderly sense. That took about 2 hours. And it was only two drawers.
 A few days later, now about three weeks from the declared date of doom, I began working on my desk, cluttered with old school papers, pens/pencils/markers/crayons, and other stuff that didn't belong in there. A lot of stuff ended up being thrown out, like old school papers, and now instead of all seven of my desk drawers being used, I'm using about five of 'em.
I finished my desk completely today, on the Day of Declaration. However, I had been foolish enough to believe, that maybe, just maybe, I'd be done at about 2 P.M. After all, my Dad had my brother and I up and going by 8 that morning, so how long could this possibly take?
Apparently, it would take about 9 hours, going none-stop except for lunch. The first few hours went pretty well; I had my music on, my cat (who refused to go outside today-read previous entry) was behaving himself, and I seemed to be getting a lot of work done. But then at about 2 P.M., my energy suddenly ran out. Rather then going at a nice, steady pace, I became a lot more lethargic as I tried finding a home for an old game I didn't even like anymore, but couldn't give up. The Goodwill pile outside of my room had grown from a few items to a huge pile, and the storage pile had grown from nothing to a lot of books in those five, short-feeling hours. Old stuffed animals were everywhere, and my poor cat had gotten tired of chasing random items I'd discover, but had instead decided taking a nap was more entertaining than watching me sort through old toys and clothes. By now, I'd gone through about five CD's of mine, and I wasn't feeling up to opening my nightstand to pick and choose a new CD.
Meanwhile, my brother began to crash about the same time I did. He had not had the whole month like me to prepare himself by cleaning out his desk, because unlike me he has schoolwork (aka, college), that forces him to do nothing but school projects, especially towards the end of the year. And so he hadn't even started picking up his room until today, and as of now he's still working on it... :/ Poor Mr. Tater (that's his nickname, for those of you who don't know).
At 5 P.M., I finally finished my room, completely drained. Both of my parents looked at it and seemed content, much to my relief, and after packing away all the Goodwill items in my brother's car, my brother and I went out to eat to award ourselves (our parents bought dinner for us xD).
It'll be weird going into my room later on tonight, and not only will I not trip over my trombone case, but I also won't trip over papers, or my backpack, or my baritone case, or a random book...I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm actually glad that my room's finally clean! Although it was definitely not my favorite activity, I didn't really mind it until my crash; I was entertained by all sorts of things, one of them being finding matching socks when I sorted through my sock drawer! Oh, and 'Raton' (Rootbeer) was great company-unless he sat on my school papers as I tried sorting them, that is, haha. =)
Anyway, so four hours later, I feel much better, meaning I can once again think clearly enough to not mumble my own words out. Supper was amazing, and this computer can be a life-saver when it comes to recuperating.
That's all for tonight! Thanks for reading. =)
~Kathy