Can you 'see' mess?

[UnquietDad]

Supposedly we can't, according to a lot of the "aren't men crap./my DH is a lazy sod" discussions on here.

Some people have suggested it is a Mars/Venus thing - that we genuinely look at it from different perspectives and have different needs when it comes to "tidying up". Others think we just don't "perceive" mess, as if it is at the infra-red end of the spectrum.

I make a distinction between dirt/dust and clutter. I hate the latter - am always moving piles of cups, papers, children's abandoned shoes, etc. - but I'm less likely than DW to clean cobwebs, brush up dust, hoover etc. as i don't think it matters as much.

Some people call this mess but I call it clutter.

Now this is mess!!

OrmIrian has it right. My Mum used to make me tidy and clean my bedroom (I had a washhandbasin in it as well) from about the age of 9.

I used to keep real straw under my bed for my Sindy horse to eat and she used to go on about it making so much mess.

TBH I had NO IDEA why I was cleaning my basin with ajax every so often,.

When I left home and went to Uni, I started to see mess.

What is this 'mess' you are talking about?

Neither of us bother that much about clutter or mess - our house isn't dirty or un-hygienic - it's just that we can't be bothered with it and would prefer to be doing something else. We have 'purges' once in a while.

There is a guy on our street who is out all weekend washing both his cars all day and the path, garden, etc.. I even saw him once wash THE BLOODY LAMPOST.

Every time we see this we think 'Please go inside and give your missus a good seeing to you sad ba*rd'.

We would prefer to lay in bed all morning having a cudddle and a wee fiddle than be tidying up obsessively.

I guess i don't see mess as much as the missus cos i am good at the general clutter clearing stuff, but not so good at seeing when things actually need 'cleaned'.

Apparently.