Housekeeping: uncluttered is boring

With out-of-town company arriving in several days, we're devoting scattered hours to housekeeping. Not routine stuff, but unique stuff, the stuff my mother and my wife's mother did every week, but when it came to us, we said to hell with it, so now it's all built up into a major task that includes washing windows and dusting blinds and brushing more of the cat hair off the chairs.

I've thrown out several leaf bags filled with clutter. Old catalogues, the envelopes Christmas cards came in, boxe...