BIG SCREECHER: Carmine cleans out his filthy office

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By Carmine Santa Maria

Brooklyn Daily

I’m madder than Captain Caveman when he can’t find what he’s looking for because he’s got too much stuff over the fact that I never bought a paper shredder in my life and now I’m paying the price.

Look, you all know the ol’Screecher served proudly for Uncle Sam, and sometimes I’m required to prove that fact to government bureaucrats in order to make sure I can get my hard-earned services at the Fort Hamilton Veteran’s Administration hospital. But that’s hard for me to do because I’ve got a file structure that’s like Carla’s husband’s at the end of the movie “The Usual Suspects.”

Now I don’t need to tell you that I’ve saved every piece of paper handed to me over the years, just in case I have to prove to someone that I bought something with some of the stuff I keep in mattresses under the floorboards in the attic, but the problem is keeping track of not only all the things I bought, but the proof that I bought it in the first place. These days, the Zenith in the living room tells me that the young’ins can use some fancy machine that will make a mental image of your receipt and store it away nicely in some place in the clouds. But I’m too old and have way too many receipts to deal with that.

So here I am searching through 44 years of married stuff, plus prior early stuff from my swimming days, bank-teller days, dancing days, Army days, Post Office days, and all my community service antics. During this past month’s quest to find the documents, I blocked myself in my office leaving me no exit to escape, or more importantly, no access to the bathroom that’s just five feet away.

As a matter of fact, all the alleys in Micali’s ole Bowling Alleys on 86th Street wouldn’t have enough space to sort out the years of bills, receipts, and assorted filing that I failed to file in a fine fashion.

All the stuff removed from my office cluttered my entire living room, took up all the space on three (count’em, three!) couches, and crept into my dining room. And don’t even ask what’s on the table.

Of course, the cockeyed optimist in me always finds a bright side, and that was the historic treasures and memories found, as well as finding stuff that’s still missing in my office.

For instance, I found a receipt for a Nook I bought three years ago from QVC — and the useless Nook in an unopened box!

I also found my Zorro boots, sword, and whip.

But I still can’t find my office air conditioner remote control and battery tester. Of course, there are buckets, boxes, and bags of electronic stuff parts of telephones, cellphones, clocks, flashlights, and zillions of pens. So if you need a pen, call me.

Screech at you next week!

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