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In the early weeks of November the Canards crew took on a very big job all the out in Mt Beauty. A man had passed away leaving behind a house he had re-purposed into a workshop for a variety of different hobbies. Model planes, model boats, radios, early computer tech, the odd satellite antenna array and the oddest considering the list, ski’s. Never has the Canards crew come across a house where quite literally every nook and cranny had been stuffed. This man was no hoarder, he simply had the mindset that everything serves a purpose.

After he had passed away his children combed the the house for months, trying their best to organize their fathers clutter. But as each month passed they found it increasingly difficult to know how to deal with the accumulated clutter. This is when they contacted Canards. With a team of five and two thirty meter skips we arrived at the property to tackle the clutter. The son lead us around the house which consisted of its own custom wiring running out and sprawling across the living room and extending its reach to the furthest parts of the house. Drawers and shelves filled with empty boxes that used to contain old model plane motors, plane wings, customizable paints and little pilots. In the shed it was more of the same, fully constructed planes, tools, buckets and jars of assorted nails, screws and bolts which funnily enough were far more organized than the living space. I like to think that he spent most of his time in the garage and every other room was subsequent to storage. Lastly the son showed us the room under the veranda. This room held an unbelievable treasure trove of old tech, radios, skis, spears, fishing gear, typewriters, tubing, copper rods, copper coils and the list goes on. Its only accurate to describe this man as a jack of all trades. It was interesting to see that while this house was messy it did not lack organization, everything oddly had a spot and as you went around you could almost see the projection of the late owners mind in the rooms he lived in.

Needless to say this job appeared daunting for a 3 day endeavor. Not only did we have to get this house cleared out, but we also had to carefully go through and categorize what had value, what had sentimental value and what we had to chuck. This was hard on us given that we cant value sentiment and we had strict restraints on how much we could throw out. Yes we had two thirty meter skips but to the size of the house and volume of stuff it definitely delivered an element of stress. Regardless the Canards crew took it on head first, starting with the garage and leaving it spotless. The planes were transported that very day for sale and we took the momentum from that straight to the toughest looking room of the job, the basement under the house. It took our crew the rest of the day forming a conveyor belt of hands to lug out the contents, finding that not only were the floor and shelves filled with things but the very rafters in the ceiling contained poles and parts for various projects. As it hit the end of a long day we realised that while we had made good headway, we had only cleared two rooms in total and the house itself was much larger and nearly, if not more cluttered.

Day 2 saw the Canards crew in a physically tired state, however an eagerness to get this done right overwrote this physical fatigue. We marched into the house and then sent two men right back out to get pies for the rest of us, while eagerness is good it serves as fumes when it comes to fuel. After they got back and we had a hearty meal and the crew was back to 100%, getting right back onto it. We formed a table for photo albums, medals and childhood artwork, things that were later taken by the children as reminders that their father loved them and always would. With a truck parked out front we loaded all the salable furniture and stuff for donation and it was filling up fast! Across the road emerged a saviour, an elderly woman who volunteered at the local Mt Beauty op shop. She was able to take some excess donation items which really helped us out. As we worked our way into the personal rooms of the house we found ourselves slowing down, not due to fatigue but pure interest. The items in this mans possession had become far too interesting and we ended up putting a lot aside to sell.

To the crews surprise they came to 5 o’clock and the rooms were empty. In a single day we had filled 2 skips and a trucks worth of stuff! We searched around thinking “surely theres something we missed”, but instead we found nothing, the place was spotless and we had turned a 3 day job into 2.

The son thanked us for the effort and gave a physical sigh of relief that the burden of this job had been taken out of his hands. His fathers planes and other oddities sold for a decent price seeing to him a reimbursement of around 700 dollars for the model planes alone.