Old List and Ideas

I’m a huge fan of notebooks. Most days I go around with a pocket sized one. There are larger ones kept at home. They are extremely handy for the way I live.

Note taking with electronic devices like tablets and smart phones just does not cut it for me. There’s something about putting pen to paper that activates my creativity. Of course, there’s also the fact that I have huge thumbs that don’t play well with a phone’s keyboard.

There was a technology that worked pretty well for me. Anybody remember Palm Pilots? Instead of a keyboard they had a stylus and a pad where you’d write in a simplified alphabet. Those devices had a learning curve, but I could rapidly take notes with one. There were programs that allowed for drawing and making sketches. The later ones even had color screens and wifi Internet connection. Too bad they went away when smart phones became popular. Smart phones just don’t have the same usability for a note taker like me, so it’s back to paper.

Every now and then I gather up all my scattered notebooks and consolidate things and arrange by category. For example: there’d be ideas for travel, boat improvements, house improvements and what not.

Another thing in those notebooks are “to do” lists. One thing that always amazes me is how many of those plans actually get accomplished. On a day to day basis, the list never seems to go down. Looking at the lists months or years later, a huge amount of stuff gets done.

-Sixbears