Not much to say

[cleolinda]

So I've started using this date planner thing. You get a fairly spacious column for each day, so I've started writing down what I did--after the fact, because my life isn't interesting enough for reminders of what I'm supposed to be doing--and observations on health, mental and physical, in case documentation should be useful later. So your average day might read something like, "[Sister Girl] came over. Walked dogs. Cranky. Headache. Garbage playlist. Worked most of day on [project.] Linkspam. Laundry. Weird dream about popsicles." I have a hard time remembering to actually journal (my private journal, I mean) in full sentences and all, so if I ever need to blow off steam, I've got a quick record of stuff I actually did for reference--or I can skip over that entirely and just ramble.

(And hey, I can also use it to document any new ideas I have--if I ever need to go back and say, "I came up with it on this date," I'll be able to.)

Here's the thing: for me, the real purpose of keeping a date book--a diary--is to help me keep the days from sliding by unused. I have this terrible habit of letting the days drift by in a haze of unproductivity; my current fear is that I'm going to open my eyes and discover that it's June. It's like mountain climbers with their stakes--I feel like I'm staking each day in place to make sure it doesn't slide away, and maybe it'll push me to do more so I'll have something to write down.

... Except for today, in which I am too tired to do linkspam. Maybe I'll do it late tonight, I don't know. It's just been one of those days.

ETA: Some quick pictures of my planner:

Comments

[girlalmighty]

I've been trying to do the same sort of thing with a paper journal - make sure I write down a little something each day, like that's proof I did something with it. I still feel like I'm not really getting much of anywhere, but February's almost over already and it feels like, if I don't record something, I'm even less likely to get things done. I think your version of it might be even more effective, so I just might have to give it a try. But yeah, the fear that it'll be June any day now? I'm definitely there.

[elisa0984.livejournal.com]

I have to say that's a lot better than my habit of writing done my to do list in my planner and then ignoring it to faff online.

Speaking of which: I am in the Alice is Awesome camp courtesy of your recaps, but have not gone to the tedious trouble of popping in the library and flipping through the books for Alice scenes. However, YouTubers, who never fail me, have put up clips from the movie.

Alice Dollen and her ballet-esque baseball pitching spritely all seeing self can not get here fast enough.

[cleolinda.livejournal.com]

And that's because Alice is Awesome.

[soleta-nf.livejournal.com]

I like that idea. I've recently taken an online workshop that suggested having a three-point to-do list each day. One thing is about taking care of you, and one thing is something to forward one of your long-term goals. It's small and so manageable. I like it because it makes me feel productive, and certainly after a few days or a few weeks, you can see that you're making progress on various things!

[cleolinda.livejournal.com]

Oh, that does sound like a good idea.

[soleta-nf.livejournal.com]

This (http://www.maketodaymatter.net/) is the website of the woman who hosted the workshop. It sounds like she has a few good books out on the subject. I also like her idea of a Catch-All Notebook (one notebook where you write everything down, so you don't lose all those little bits of paper you scribble on). She also has a good "power hour" idea (doing a bunch of related, small tasks in one hour), though I haven't mastered that yet. I keep choosing tasks that take an hour to do just by themselves.

[lookoutsunshine.livejournal.com]

I just started keeping a similar journal a few months ago. I like the idea of a journal, but if I write abstract thoughts or emotional stuff I just end up thinking it's stupid and ripping it up if I try to go back and read it later. So I just started making a list of what I did each day. I think it will be interesting to go back and look at if I ever ask myself things like, what kind of books was I reading that year? When was the last time I talked to so-and-so? etc. It's also a nice place for tidbits like interesting facts I learn during the day or jokes I make with my friends which would otherwise be lost in the sands of time.

[sunset-glow.livejournal.com]

Oh, I've had the same problem with unused days. When I was unemployed and house-sitting for my parents last winter, the days had a frightening ability to slide by. I remember one evening in March when I looked up and thought to myself, "This was a wasted day in my life." Talk about a scary thought. But I wasn't unhappy; I was thoroughly enjoying being able to relax with no demands on my time. I don't want to have anymore wasted days, though, when I don't even accomplish reading part of a book. I think a date planner is a good place to start, especially as I have the same issue with forgetting to keep a personal journal. I find myself using iCal on my Mac more to note when things happened as opposed to when they're going to happen. I like it; it's nice to have a record.

[laigaiem.livejournal.com]

You know, I think if you were thoroughly enjoying yourself... it wasn't wasted time. That was time you spent on yourself, and a certain amount of that is really important for personal development.

[sunset-glow.livejournal.com]

Yes, that's the way I thought of it as well! Life doesn't have to be a perfectly linear progression, high school then college then career. It's okay to take a break.

[dragonsblog.livejournal.com]

I have this terrible habit of letting the days drift by in a haze of unproductivity; my current fear is that I'm going to open my eyes and discover that it's June.
This is exactly how I feel! I remember it being October, what do you mean it's almost March? I am battling a long illness that has forced me to drop out of school. I'm only just beginning to feel better and try to figure out what to do with myself. Of course the pointless time between September and now makes me feel like a useless slug. If I could only be healthy and figure out what to do with my life.

[aysquid.livejournal.com]

I started keeping a similar record book a couple months ago. My diaries always fill up with repetitive whining, so I've found that only allowing myself to record events if they have a direct impact on my physical or mental state makes for much more interesting and useful reading.

[reticent-lass.livejournal.com]

I used to be really good about keeping a journal a couple times a week, but for the past few years I feel like I've had nothing interesting to say. I'm easing back into the habit. My grandma gave me a beautiful notebook with a tooled-leather cover that I originally used for recording homework assignments, but its prettiness just forced me to start writing something, anything, more interesting in it. What's your date planner look like? Nothing personal, but fiction, poetry, ideas, outlines, and 'notes-to-self' are a good start. I've promised myself that if/when I get a Dreamwidth account, I'm going to start keeping a journal there. It's all bits and scraps for now, but someday, if I ever finish that lady mobster screenplay or The Great American Robot War, I'm going to owe that notebook a lot.

[cleolinda.livejournal.com]

What's your date planner look like?

I took some quick pictures:

http://flickr.com/photos/cleolinda/tags/planner/

[scornedsaint.livejournal.com]

My mom did something like that back when I was a baby. She'd also include a few random world event/pop culture things. I get such a kick out of looking at it now.

[ftsor.livejournal.com]

So did mine!

[greedyskunk.livejournal.com]

I'd love to do this if I ever have a child. My mom started a baby book for me, but she wrote in it sporadically and the whole thing fizzled when I became a toddler. As the firstborn, at least I got a book (and two photo albums dedicated solely to me). My poor brothers weren't nearly as well-documented.

[kellyrfineman.livejournal.com]

I did that for two years, so I could document my writing progress. And then, quite abruptly, I forgot to keep up, and ceased doing it. But it was a good thing to do, the after-the-fact entry system!

[lovefromgirl.livejournal.com]

I started using one when I'd been out of school for a few months. It does make the days a little easier to hold on to. :-)

[mrs-bruin.livejournal.com]

I do that too. It started as sort of a food journal, to keep track of what I ate so I would stop mindlessley eating junk food. But I also had a seperate monthly calendar that I wrote what I did that day, and two calendars were too many, so I combined them. And in the beginning notes section, I wrote my big goals for the year, and in the montly "notes" sections I write lists of what I want to accomplish that month so I can check them off. Hm...this is making me sound a bit ocd.

[mrs-bruin.livejournal.com]

gah! *monthly

[cleolinda.livejournal.com]

Hey, whatever works.

[lilyofshalott]

Here's the thing: for me, the real purpose of keeping a date book--a diary--is to help me keep the days from sliding by unused. I have this terrible habit of letting the days drift by in a haze of unproductivity; my current fear is that I'm going to open my eyes and discover that it's June. It's like mountain climbers with their stakes--I feel like I'm staking each day in place to make sure it doesn't slide away

Oh, THIS. I kept a "journal" (it was technically a diary, really) all throughout high school until somewhere in my freshman year of college. I tried getting back into it when I would go somewhere (NCUR, UK, Boston for my grad school interview, etc), but always ended up getting behind at some point (e.g. I was doing really well for the first two weeks of my stay in the UK, but then got behind and then just stopped—v. bad—so now I have no account of my last week there other than pictures).

I really need to get back into journalling—otherwise it just seems like I've lost those days (as you were saying). I mean, I have no record of several very important things, like my college graduation (or entire senior year for that matter). Perhaps if I don't force myself to write in it *every* day at first . . . (And I really didn't mean to ramble for so long in your post. Sorry about that.)

[heathrow.livejournal.com]

I love that planner. Where did you find it?

[cleolinda.livejournal.com]

My uncle gave it to me--apparently the planners were freebies from the company that makes them? I have no idea what I'll do when 2010 rolls around (and I like it enough that I'm already concerned about this).

[heathrow.livejournal.com]

I am stuck pining for it from afar, then. It is gorgeous!

[tully-argyle.livejournal.com]

I love Garbage, and that is among my favorite songs. Hooray for Garbage playlists!

[jwdmeow.livejournal.com]

Hooray for a Garbage playlist!

I know what you mean about time passing. I just looked up and Feb is gone. When did that happen? I had sort of meant to do more.

[ftsor.livejournal.com]

That is one GORGEOUS journal. O_O Where did you get it?

But yeah, I do the same thing. I find it actually does sort of boost my productivity (and sometimes creativity), because it feels so good to write down things that I might want to look back at later. Then I can look at it and say, "Yes! I existed back then, too!" I have a tendency to live too much in the moment, I think. (And also a crap memory.)

[ftsor.livejournal.com]

Well, planner-journal. I'm sure you knew what I meant.

[eiki.livejournal.com]

I used to have something like this, but it was more like what I ate for the day since I was on a tight budget. So a normal day list would look something like:

Bread - RM1.50
Lunch - RM4.00
Dinner - RM0.50 (instant noodles)

And then one day I accidentally borrowed it to one of my guy friends since we were doing some acting and needed a book - and he saw the list and laughed and laughed.

Needless to say, I no longer have those lists.

o hai icon

[eiki.livejournal.com]

Errr... *borrowed is supposed to be lent *smashes head*

Let them eat Cake!

[thesarcasma.livejournal.com]

Just had to share this, although you've probably seen it. I don't recall it in linkspam. The best one is definitely the last!

http://www.newmoonmovie.org/2009/02/28-creative-and-amazing-twilight-cakes/

Re: Let them eat Cake!

[sirinde.livejournal.com]

"Say it!"
"icecream cake!"

[angelene.livejournal.com]

That's one lovely planner. I like the "monthly ideas/themes" and the design is also quite brilliant.

I have/keep a planner myself -- it's much smaller and very plain, and I use it both for work/business stuff and to scribble down what I did/achieved in the day or if something "special" happened (which usually goes like "found dead spider on the floor. removed dead spider from the floor" -- that kind of "special", you know). I sometimes file in also to-dos, but that tends to get discouraging way too quickly and way too often. Maybe I should file in more of the trifle/small things, because I also find it depressing when the daily space looks blank and as though I had barely lived through it. Uh.

Keeping a (separate?) notebook for story ideas and the such can be a good idea too. I tried to do that on a computer file, but you can't take that around at all times, eh.

[faded-ribbon.livejournal.com]

If you're ever bored, you should check out the LJ community "organizers" (they were spotlighted a little while back) -- I've been a member for a few months. Basically, the members upload pictures of their organizers/planners/journals and discuss the way they organize their lives. It can be very inspiring -- I've always been a wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am planner user, but now I've started to treat it almost as a scrapbook. It's very calming to sit down during the week and add in little drawings and quotes, and it helps me keep working with the planner because after so much effort I want to look at it and show it off, and keep adding to it.

There are some members who have combined planner/journals, so looking at something like that might interest you. My favorite idea was in a Moleskine weekly planner where there's a week on one side and a blank page on the other, and for each day on the blank page the girl wrote down what she did, and pasted in pictures and movie stubs. She lined up the small journal entries with the day opposite, where she wrote down basic scheduling needs.

Hope this helps!

[greedyskunk.livejournal.com]

I know what you mean about the days sliding by. I feel like high school was just yesterday, but then I try to think of what I've done since I left and then I realize that graduation was fourteen years ago. 0_0

I have great plans about the journals/scrapbooks I want to keep. I can never seem to actually motivate myself to do it. Part of the problem, I think, is because I'm back in school and I'm constantly thinking ahead to when the term will be over. It's hard for me to reconcile the part of me that wants to savor the present and the part that is looking forward to when this will all be done. I don't want to wake up and be 35 and wonder what the hell happened.

A little off topic

[tattooedginny87.livejournal.com]

Ok so I was just browsing the web and I found some info some of your readers might wanna see. Drew Barrymore is being considered to direct Eclipse. http://www.celebuzz.com/drew-barrymore-direct-eclipse-s89481/

[beaulieu-hill.livejournal.com]

Just stopping by to say that I put your blog on my Links List, because it is awesome. If it's not okay with you, I'll take it down.

[cleolinda.livejournal.com]

No, that's totally fine. : )

[shortie-3s5s.livejournal.com]

Hey there! Long-time reader/fan, first-time poster. Not sure if you knew this or not, but I saw your book at my local Half Price Books store (Berkeley, CA). I don't think there's any in Alabama. Their chain is mostly in TX. But yay for being able to buy your book in America (original '05 edition)!

[cleolinda.livejournal.com]

Aw, yay! At least someone has it. : )

Planners of love!

[jazzminarino.livejournal.com]

First off, your planner is simply lovely.

Second off, planners are like my personal version of crack. (Or heroin. Ha.) I always have kept a planner, and all sorts of fun things go into them, so I can look back and see what I've done for years at a time. In fact, while trying to find communities to organize my life, I found organizers, which is just a community about planners! And there's pictures! And people are awesome.

Apparently, I am also a fangirl of planners...

... oi.