Debating Migrating to a Pen and Paper Todo List

Reading these Lifehacker “How I Work” series posts about famous/successful internet people and the way they work (computers/phones/gadgets they use, where they work, what their home/office desk looks like, what tools/apps/tricks they couldn’t live without, etc) has me thinking about a few things considering the way I work.

For one, these people all make me feel and look super lazy and inconsequential. Being a nerd reading this stuff is what I have to assume current day writers feel when reading autobiographies of famous writers past and present. Its almost depressing honestly. Also, I’ve noticed that like 90% of them use the same combo for their day-to-day; MacBook laptop, iPhone, and paper/pen for their day-to-day todo list. Now, I could never use an Apple product as my everyday machine, not because they’re “stupid” but because they’re just too simple and “point-and-click” for me. I like to understand and be a part of my operating system and know what my computer is doing and how it works, as well as customize the hell out of it to my crazy dreams. In my experience, most Apple product users can’t tell you where the hard drive is in their laptop, they just know its the new 15 inch model and it has an iCloud.

The important and useful information I’ve taken away from reading these articles is that most successful people don’t rely upon a software-based todo list, which really surprised me, given that there’s so many out there nowadays. I’ve tried most of the big namers like RTM, Todoist, and my current one, Google Tasks. Google Tasks is great because there’s plenty of support for it and it syncs well since its, duh, a Google product (also it shows up in my Gmail so whenever I have a Gmail tab open I have my email, calendar, projects, tasks, contacts, and Gchat all in one tab). However, there’s this disconnection from what you have in your brain in a given moment and what you can type nicely formatted into a software-based todo list. For a little while I’ve been toying with the faint idea of going back to pen and paper for my todo list, but I can’t get past the idea of not having it synced online automatically with all my devices in case I need to modify it or add to it. On the contrary, using a pen and paper todo list makes editing and keeping track of a todo list much easier. No need to open an app or wait for signal to sync your todo list or fumble with an onscreen keyboard to type a quick sentence that would take just a few seconds to write with pen and paper.

What I think I’m going to compromise on is using one of the new project management systems (i.e. Basecamp, Wunderkit, etc) for my long-term projects and keep my short-term todos in my moleskine. I’ve actually been looking into Trello for awhile and been meaning to throw my projects in there (which are also at this point in Google Tasks) and give it a full-on test run. Here’s to hoping keeping my long-term projects in Trello goes well [and doesn’t bite me in the ass later].

my current screen setup

screenshot-screen, a photo by GeekyAdam on Flickr.

u r giving me ur golds

[1:Jujubeoya] whispers: i am the deliever of trading g with u before, howdy there?^_^
To [1:Jujubeoya]: hi i am no findings you name
[1:Jujubeoya] whispers: huh?
To [1:Jujubeoya]: WHAT YOU SAY.
[1:Jujubeoya] whispers:  can i know if u wanna order some wow money at moment?
To [1:Jujubeoya]: i can has golds from you?
[1:Jujubeoya] whispers: ys
[1:Jujubeoya] whispers: yes
[1:Jujubeoya] whispers:  how much u need
[1:Jujubeoya] whispers: ?
To [1:Jujubeoya]: OVER 9000!
[1:Jujubeoya] whispers: coz im in  the new site now, i can do the better deal than ur last deal. what is ur last deal u got?
[1:Jujubeoya] whispers: i will beat the last time’s price, and delievery will be in 5 mins only this time:P
To [1:Jujubeoya]: i want free gold
[1:Jujubeoya] whispers: sry, no
[1:Jujubeoya] whispers:  if u order some , i  will apply some free g for u ,
[1:Jujubeoya] whispers:  if u donnt wanna order some. sry , bye.
To [1:Jujubeoya]: WHAT YOU SAY.
[1:Jujubeoya] whispers: sry , bye.
To [1:Jujubeoya]: WHAT YOU SAY.

i smell a troll

13:01 < MystKid+> it dont talka bout CTRL-P
13:01 < Ignatius+> MystKid: do “/bind” on its own
13:01 < Ignatius+> for a list of different controls
13:02 < Ignatius+> s/controls/actions/
13:02 < MystKid+> exec -o /bind
13:02 < MystKid+> /bin/sh: /bind: No such file or directory
13:02 < mauke+> wtf?
13:02 < Ignatius+> in irssi
13:02 < mauke+> why are you doing /exec -o?
13:02 < MystKid+> i did
13:02 < Ignatius+> don’t do /exec
13:02 < MystKid+> oh
13:02 < Ignatius+> just /bind on its own
13:03 < MystKid+> bind
13:03 < Adom+> lawl
13:03 < Ignatius+> with the /
13:03 < Adom+> i smell a troll…
13:03 < billnye+> man, this is one dedicated troll to spoof an .it hostname
13:03 < billnye+> ;D

Wal-Mart is pirate friendly