I started with Ubuntu around 3 years ago and have been a dedicated user ever since. During that time I tried out lots of apps, themes, etc. And, I've updated every version as it has come along so now I'm running Lucid.

Basically, my system has gotten sort of "messy" and I'm planning a vigorous clean up and a fresh install. My /home is on a separate partition from everything else, so I can preserve that. I want to find and remove unused, unneeded apps (which I pretty much understand how to do). Also, I want to get back to the default desktop theme and build back up from there. And other messes surely exist.

So, my question is, What is a good, logical plan to clean up and freshly reinstall my system? (One note is that I have found many links in searches on this issue. There are many links on this topic and many are out of date. So, it's gotten rather confusing to say the least.)

Thanks.