I was looking for the power cord to my iPad keyboard Saturday. I pulled open the junk drawer and found the situation in the photo posted above. Uff da. After mining it during several attempts I did finally locate the cord in the drawer and managed to charge the keyboard. For some reason I looked at the mess with fresh eyes, and thought I could share this wonder with other Baboons in attempt to reduce my shame about having such a mess.
Somewhere in there is a vein of rubber bands, paper clips, and twist ties. The Scotch tape is the item most likely to walk off and disappear somewhere else in the house. The bright red, giant pizza rubber bands are an item I don’t throw away, because they end up being useful for holding puzzle boxes together after breaking the seal or for shooting them across the room at my husband just out of orneriness.
Which one? Like BiR, we have more than one . . . probably about six in all. Contents vary from pens, paper, various clips, etc. to tools, to clothing accessories like tie tacks, handkerchiefs, glasses cases, old pairs of glasses. And then there are the electronics junk drawers and bins, the kitchen utensils we rarely-if-ever-use drawer, the toys we used to have on hand for when little kids visited drawer, the old VCR and DVD drawer, etc. etc. etc.
Chris in Owatonna
(suddenly feeling a bit like Fred Sanford)
LOL. Here’s a few utensils my wife decided we NEED that I rarely if ever use: the spare citrus juicer, a bread-slicing knife for whole loaves that has a slicing “guide” attached to it for “perfect slices,” a cherry pitter, a melon baller, a nutcracker . . . need I go on? 🙂
OK, there’s the tool junk drawer in the buffet, and the one in the microwave cart in kitchen holds scotch tape (did you know this is sellotape in Britain?), post-its, and rubber bands. An antique desk has all the cords, light bulbs, and batteries, and a file cabinet drawer holds more office supplies.
Tape is not junk.
Flashlights are not junk.
Postage stamps are not junk.
Scissors are not junk
An old mouse may or may not be junk.
Where do you keep your real junk?
It’s not a true junk drawer unless it contains parts and accessories belonging to things you no longer own and possibly have not owned for a decade, bits and pieces you can’t identify but dare not throw out, maybe some tubes of glue that didn’t really work as well as advertised but are still almost full, keys to things but you don’t know what, maybe an odd shoelace or two, and perhaps a combination padlock that has become separated at present from its combination (you never know, it could turn up). What these things all have in common is their lack of immediate utility.
What keeps them in the drawer is their potential (however scant) utility.
Technically you’re right, tim. My personal definition would be “things that don’t go anywhere else that are probably still useful.”
Here’s a slang definition from urbandictionary.com : 1. Seemingly useless rubbish which sits around for months and is inevitably disposed of the day before it is needed.
I would replace “rubbish” with “stuff.”
My new apartment has only one junk kitchen drawer, and it’s rather small. Imagine a drawer with every kitchen device in it (a dozen knives, eight wood stirring paddles, three bottle openers, garlic press, lemon squeezer, instant thermometer . . . well, the list just goes on and on. The kitchens in this place were obviously designed for folks too old to mess with cooking.
We had a junk closet in my pink bungalow. I won’t describe it except to say it was where we kept extension chords, mittens, frisbees and boots. And one boomerang. A friend was looking for a scarf one day, so I directed him to that closet. He reported, “I didn’t see a scarf, but I found just about everything else, including Amelia Earhart’s flight plans.”
I have been dumpster diving for cardboard lately. (“Junk” = “Dumpster” so it connects in my head.)
We have three ‘misc drawers’ in the kitchen. One has all the electronic cords, one has stamps, old CD’s and cassette tapes, and one has all those bits of hardware and felt squares, nightlights, rulers, ect.
The real toolbox is under the sink.
Tape, pens, and scissors are in small baskets in a shelf unit mounted under the plates.
Then down in the mudroom I have a drawer with razor charger, soap, knives, left over bolts, screws and wire nuts.
In the shelves to the left are mis matched gloves, actual working gloves, the timer for the garden hose, an old trail cam box, and some shoe inserts I don’t wear anymore but I might someday.
When we remodeled the mudroom, the former junk drawer went downstairs and I think maybe I dug something out of there once and otherwise it’s still right where I put it. But you never know when I’ll need that random 3.75″ screw with metric threads or the green wire nut.
I can remember being in my best friend Sandy’s house at about age 7 or so), and seeing their kitchen junk drawer – I was fascinated, as I was not aware of a corresponding drawer at our house. We probably had all that stuff in a box somewhere, but in our tiny duplex, we had no extra drawer for all those utile items.
We have lots of drawers that are not organized, but only one that I’d classify as a junk drawer. This junk drawer is the shallow drawer in our microwave cart, a cart which at our house is referred to as the vegetable (pronounced veggie table). Yes, it has to do with how husband pronounced vegetable when I first met him, but that’s another story.
In addition to a retractable measuring tape, a needle-nose pliers, a screw driver, a twin-pack of multipurpose butane lighters, and a utility knife. There are also assorted washers and screws, loose keys to who knows what, one of those spirally lights bulbs, and what appears to be a bulb for some appliance. There’s also two identical key chains that appear to be souvenirs from London, and a ceramic Mexican sombrero refrigerator magnet. There’s a choke chain for a large dog, a small box of Swedish matches, and a box of pellets for a bb gun, plus a plastic ID tag for a plant that I must have saved for some now obscure reason. There, I fixed it! I can now rightfully call it a utility drawer.
Back home from our trip. We didn’t bring anything back that will go in a junk drawer or be stuffed in a closet and forgotten. I someday must go through the enormous number of loose keys to see if they still work on our doors.
Well, They are filled by category, for the most part. There is a smaller chest freezer that could qualify as a Junk Freezer. We try to be organized when we freeze things.
I’m with Bill. I don’t have anything that I think of it as junk drawers. I do have several drawers that have various odds and ends but I know what’s in each drawer and know where to find thing. I will admit that I have hammers and screwdrivers in four places in my world. Drawer upstairs, drawer on the first floor, in the basement and in the garage. This is because over the years I have realized that if I don’t have the correct tool on hand I will often use something else instead of go to another floor or to the basement to get the right tool.
Another option is promoting it from an item of utility to one of art, then you don’t need to justify it at all. Does that make me sound cynical about art? I’m afraid so, though that’s not my intent.
Trail Baboon 
Rise and Shine Baboons,
I was looking for the power cord to my iPad keyboard Saturday. I pulled open the junk drawer and found the situation in the photo posted above. Uff da. After mining it during several attempts I did finally locate the cord in the drawer and managed to charge the keyboard. For some reason I looked at the mess with fresh eyes, and thought I could share this wonder with other Baboons in attempt to reduce my shame about having such a mess.
Somewhere in there is a vein of rubber bands, paper clips, and twist ties. The Scotch tape is the item most likely to walk off and disappear somewhere else in the house. The bright red, giant pizza rubber bands are an item I don’t throw away, because they end up being useful for holding puzzle boxes together after breaking the seal or for shooting them across the room at my husband just out of orneriness.
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Oh dear, you only have ONE junk drawer?
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Well, there really are several, and then my entire art room which is really a collection of junk drawers. But this is The Primary Junk Drawer.
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Which one? Like BiR, we have more than one . . . probably about six in all. Contents vary from pens, paper, various clips, etc. to tools, to clothing accessories like tie tacks, handkerchiefs, glasses cases, old pairs of glasses. And then there are the electronics junk drawers and bins, the kitchen utensils we rarely-if-ever-use drawer, the toys we used to have on hand for when little kids visited drawer, the old VCR and DVD drawer, etc. etc. etc.
Chris in Owatonna
(suddenly feeling a bit like Fred Sanford)
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Rarely used kitchen utensils? I don’t recognize those words…
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LOL. Here’s a few utensils my wife decided we NEED that I rarely if ever use: the spare citrus juicer, a bread-slicing knife for whole loaves that has a slicing “guide” attached to it for “perfect slices,” a cherry pitter, a melon baller, a nutcracker . . . need I go on? 🙂
Chris
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OK, there’s the tool junk drawer in the buffet, and the one in the microwave cart in kitchen holds scotch tape (did you know this is sellotape in Britain?), post-its, and rubber bands. An antique desk has all the cords, light bulbs, and batteries, and a file cabinet drawer holds more office supplies.
Things are more findable, though, since I’ve been saving the see=through-top containers from Trader Joe’s Green Tea Mints:
https://www.bing.com/images/search?view=detailV2&id=8D4D10FE135B83BC60F8991F1E3BD25046168E59&thid=OIP.ZFSRNYmdrZ8LgqgDqnBmkgAAAA&mediaurl=http%3A%2F%2Fecx.images-amazon.com%2Fimages%2FI%2F51XUezHYFlL._SX300_.jpg&exph=272&expw=300&q=trader+joe%27s+green+tea+mints&selectedindex=0&qpvt=trader+joe%27s+green+tea+mints&ajaxhist=0&vt=0&eim=1,2,6
Now all manner of small stuff is visible at a glance, if you can find a place to put them.
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Tape is not junk.
Flashlights are not junk.
Postage stamps are not junk.
Scissors are not junk
An old mouse may or may not be junk.
Where do you keep your real junk?
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Surely you would not call this a “Collection of Valuables?”
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I would call it a utility drawer.
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It’s not a true junk drawer unless it contains parts and accessories belonging to things you no longer own and possibly have not owned for a decade, bits and pieces you can’t identify but dare not throw out, maybe some tubes of glue that didn’t really work as well as advertised but are still almost full, keys to things but you don’t know what, maybe an odd shoelace or two, and perhaps a combination padlock that has become separated at present from its combination (you never know, it could turn up). What these things all have in common is their lack of immediate utility.
What keeps them in the drawer is their potential (however scant) utility.
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Yes, I’m afraid this is also true, BILL.
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Technically you’re right, tim. My personal definition would be “things that don’t go anywhere else that are probably still useful.”
Here’s a slang definition from urbandictionary.com : 1. Seemingly useless rubbish which sits around for months and is inevitably disposed of the day before it is needed.
I would replace “rubbish” with “stuff.”
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Somehow I put “tim” in my comment where I should have put “Bill” – moving too fast, I guess…
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My new apartment has only one junk kitchen drawer, and it’s rather small. Imagine a drawer with every kitchen device in it (a dozen knives, eight wood stirring paddles, three bottle openers, garlic press, lemon squeezer, instant thermometer . . . well, the list just goes on and on. The kitchens in this place were obviously designed for folks too old to mess with cooking.
We had a junk closet in my pink bungalow. I won’t describe it except to say it was where we kept extension chords, mittens, frisbees and boots. And one boomerang. A friend was looking for a scarf one day, so I directed him to that closet. He reported, “I didn’t see a scarf, but I found just about everything else, including Amelia Earhart’s flight plans.”
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We have junk baskets in addition to junk drawers
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So do I.
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the world is my junk drawer
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I have been dumpster diving for cardboard lately. (“Junk” = “Dumpster” so it connects in my head.)
We have three ‘misc drawers’ in the kitchen. One has all the electronic cords, one has stamps, old CD’s and cassette tapes, and one has all those bits of hardware and felt squares, nightlights, rulers, ect.
The real toolbox is under the sink.
Tape, pens, and scissors are in small baskets in a shelf unit mounted under the plates.
Then down in the mudroom I have a drawer with razor charger, soap, knives, left over bolts, screws and wire nuts.
In the shelves to the left are mis matched gloves, actual working gloves, the timer for the garden hose, an old trail cam box, and some shoe inserts I don’t wear anymore but I might someday.
When we remodeled the mudroom, the former junk drawer went downstairs and I think maybe I dug something out of there once and otherwise it’s still right where I put it. But you never know when I’ll need that random 3.75″ screw with metric threads or the green wire nut.
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I can remember being in my best friend Sandy’s house at about age 7 or so), and seeing their kitchen junk drawer – I was fascinated, as I was not aware of a corresponding drawer at our house. We probably had all that stuff in a box somewhere, but in our tiny duplex, we had no extra drawer for all those utile items.
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We have lots of drawers that are not organized, but only one that I’d classify as a junk drawer. This junk drawer is the shallow drawer in our microwave cart, a cart which at our house is referred to as the vegetable (pronounced veggie table). Yes, it has to do with how husband pronounced vegetable when I first met him, but that’s another story.
In addition to a retractable measuring tape, a needle-nose pliers, a screw driver, a twin-pack of multipurpose butane lighters, and a utility knife. There are also assorted washers and screws, loose keys to who knows what, one of those spirally lights bulbs, and what appears to be a bulb for some appliance. There’s also two identical key chains that appear to be souvenirs from London, and a ceramic Mexican sombrero refrigerator magnet. There’s a choke chain for a large dog, a small box of Swedish matches, and a box of pellets for a bb gun, plus a plastic ID tag for a plant that I must have saved for some now obscure reason. There, I fixed it! I can now rightfully call it a utility drawer.
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Yes, I just love that reframe. From junk to Utility!
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Back home from our trip. We didn’t bring anything back that will go in a junk drawer or be stuffed in a closet and forgotten. I someday must go through the enormous number of loose keys to see if they still work on our doors.
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The question on my mind is: Do you have room in your freezers for all of that lard?
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I think so. They may need some rearranging.
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The question on my mind is, Do you have a junk freezer for miscellaneous foodstuffs?
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Well, They are filled by category, for the most part. There is a smaller chest freezer that could qualify as a Junk Freezer. We try to be organized when we freeze things.
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I’m with Bill. I don’t have anything that I think of it as junk drawers. I do have several drawers that have various odds and ends but I know what’s in each drawer and know where to find thing. I will admit that I have hammers and screwdrivers in four places in my world. Drawer upstairs, drawer on the first floor, in the basement and in the garage. This is because over the years I have realized that if I don’t have the correct tool on hand I will often use something else instead of go to another floor or to the basement to get the right tool.
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I aspire to getting it down to one junk drawer. I have a lot of broken stuff that might be reclassified as “utility” if I got around to fixing it.
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Another option is promoting it from an item of utility to one of art, then you don’t need to justify it at all. Does that make me sound cynical about art? I’m afraid so, though that’s not my intent.
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Yeah…that’s the ticket….those aren’t broken dishes, those are art materials….
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