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Keep Your Notes in Order with the Daily Scratchpad
Image courtesy of
London Permaculture
The following is a guest post by Gretchen Rubin of The Happiness Project
We’re all looking for ways to work both faster and calmer, and I recently hit on a trick that keeps my desk tidier and my thoughts clearer.
One of my most annoying habits is my tendency to scribble down important phone numbers, “Don’t forget!!!” notes, and helpful URLs on any piece of paper that happens to be cluttering up my desk.
An hour later, I throw away what appears to be trash, or I flip over a piece of paper —and the key info vanishes. Or even if the information was still there, I have no idea what it means. Sure, that phone number has a star by it, so it must be important—but I can’t remember whose number it is.
The Single Most Useful Contact on Your iPhone
Like most adults living in America today, I get many phone calls. Some from my wife, my mom, my brother, my friends. But sometimes, I get phone calls from the local health club, the local car dealership or somebody trying to get me to buy 5 pounds of veal.
Unsolicited phone calls. We all hate them with a raw purple passion, but - if you have a phone - they’re almost as certain as death and taxes. It sucks, but that’s the freakin’ reality of the situation.
This little gem occurred to me just a few days ago. This past weekend, I’d taken our car into the local Toyota dealership for it’s oil change/tire rotation/etc. maintenance visit. It went very well, no hiccups or accidental scratches, none of that. Then, the following Monday morning, I got an email from them asking to take a short survey about my service experience. Took less than 2 minutes and I was happy to do it.
Happy Monday: Odds, Ends and other Minutiae
I hope everybody had a fantastic weekend! I’ll start by apologizing (again - seems like I’m doing this an awful lot lately) for the slowdown in posting over the last week - some personal events had most of my attention during non-work hours. Thanks for hanging in there, I’ll be posting new and exciting crap this week, cross my heart. 
But this post is just to let you know about a couple other exciting things happening in the world of old CW. First, I’m honored to have been included in the Lifehacks section of Guy Kawasaki’s newest venture, Alltop.com. The idea is that it takes the last few headlines from all of the top blogs/personalities on the web and gives you a birds-eye view of what everybody is up to. Check it out at alltop.com, it’s pretty sweet.
I got a chance to chat with Dustin Wax of lifehack.org over Skype last week for their Lifehack Live podcast, which was released into the wild today! Though, I must warn you, I tend to ramble a little bit when I get nervous, thanks for understanding You can listen to the episode here, and I highly recommend adding the podcast to your favorite podcatcher - definitely some great stuff happening over there.
That’s all for today, kids. Have a happy St. Patrick’s Day, and we’ll meet again sometime this week for more fun, forest and fantasy. Cheers!
Bloggers: Show the World What You’re Up To
The following is a sponsored post. But that doesn’t mean that I don’t mean every word of it, because I really do.
Like it or not, the age of social networking is upon us. There is no escaping this reality, and if you’re looking to make your blog a success, there’s a myriad of sites where you can participate: Twitter, Flickr, Digg, Reddit, StumbleUpon and Last.fm spring to mind - and that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Describing Twitter in Plain English
I’m a big fan of Twitter (even though we’ve had our differences in the past - mostly due to my not “getting it”). While my updates may not be as fast, furious or incessant as some of the people whom I follow, I do try to pop on there as often as is feasible without completely kneecapping my productivity at work and home.
Whenever I mention Twitter to my non-techie friends and family, I’m often asked what it is and I can never quite articulate it without making it sound like some über-nerd service that only computer people use. It’s frustrating, because it’s such a fun service (and potential time sink - you’ve been warned, uninitiated readers) and I really wish more people used it.
Fortunately, I found this great video (via Twitter, oddly enough) that does a fantastic job of explaining just what Twitter actually is and why it’s so freakin’ cool.
How to Not Screw Up Your New Job
It’s one of the best feelings in the world, heading in for your first day at a new job. Everything feels fresh and new, you feel like you’re starting with a clean slate and that you’re really going to ace this one. You’re just so positive about everything, especially if it’s the kind of job you’ve been hoping for and working toward for a long time. You know, the kind you see on commercials for online employment sites where the dude in the tie is doing the arms-raised-high and both-feet-hitting-his-lower-back-type jump, fueled by that new job joy.
But, starting a new job can be especially difficult for some. Perhaps you just can’t seem to fit in, no matter where your career takes you (this happens a lot more often than people think, I assure you). Here are some things to avoid doing (many of which I’ve personally witnessed) that will go a long way in getting your ass on the outside curb quicker than you thought possible.
