What do you do when your “to do” list is empty?

We came back to the house from the boat on Monday, and as always there was a long list of jobs for me to do. I love a “to do” list. There is something very satisfying about ticking them off one by one.

The car has been washed, the shopping done, the garden has been pruned and tidied. I have been on some lovely walks, digitised my great uncle’s military records, paid my outstanding tax from last year (£1.80!) . I have spent too much money on things I needed from Amazon, drilled some holes with my new drill, deleted old clips from my dashcam. I knew I was scraping the barrel on my list when I even tidied the freezer.

As of today, there are just three things left – book a boiler service for the central heating, book a skiing holiday for January, and learn to fly my drone. The first of these can’t be done for a couple of weeks because I set up a service contract (it was on my list) and it does not start till 21st. The second is a problem because I think Mandy is not keen on going, and I am nervous of poor snow. Learning to fly my drone has been on the list since I was gifted it three years ago but the one time I tried I crashed it, so am not sure what to do.

The best solution is to add more to the list. I can even cheat by including things that require no work. For instance I am going to an outdoor play this evening at Lytham Hall. That can go on the list. We are going to Scotland next week, to spend time with our son Tiny and his family. That should generate multiple list entries.

I do love being retired. When I was working, my home “to do” list had too be squeezed into evenings and weekends. Now I have so much flexibility I can choose pretty much anything I want to do. My work “to do” list used to make me feel important. “Find half a million pounds of cost savings” sounds better than “tidy freezer” but in a strange way is not really more satisfying.

But I do still love my list. I think today I will start with “write my blog”.

What about you? Do you like to live by a list or is that just for weird people like me?