Vindicated against my guilty conscience

It's been two years since I last hauled all my shreddables to the industrial shredder.  I've had boxes of retired paper taking up space in my apartment throughout that time.  I probably should have gone last year, but, you know, bright shiny objects and all...

So everytime I passed those repurposed cardboard boxes filled with insurance solicitations, credit card statements, random coupon flyers, small racoons, thermal receipts, and assorted travel confirmations I could feel the growing stack of cardboard and packing tape mock me as I went out the door.  I let it grow and felt the metaphorical weight of it on my shoulders as my floor felt the physical weight on its carpet.

Last week things changed.

I got an email from the Accounts Payable department saying the couldn't find any record of the receipts for an expense report I submitted in April of 2009.  Granted, I would have appreciated it if they hadn't waited 15 months to let me know there was a problem, but these things happen. I searched my hard drive because I usually scan everything, but I couldn't find them either.  (So I guess the fault was mine rather than Accounts Payable.)

I pulled a box from the middle of the pile, cleared off the coffee table, fired up an episode of Eureka on the Tivo and dove into the layers of paperwork like the lamest archeologist ever.  Layer by layer I went -- August, July, June, May -- and finally April.  I slowed down and went through all those pages with a sieve. 

Finally, there they were -- all the receipts for that expense report, stuck in one fat envelope. 

I'm still not sure how they escaped my scanner the first go around, but once again, laziness and inaction proves victorious over ruthless efficiency.

And my conscience no longer feels guilty about the boxes.