June 23rd
In a recent review of our Texagenda planner, a reader from Des Moines, IA, wrote:
“I think it is unfortunate that you do NOT carry the refills at Barnes and Noble, where I purchased my textagenda. If I buy the refill online, it will cost me $4 more than buying a brand new cover AND planner at Barnes & Noble.”
To clear up any confusion, let me first explain that it’s Barnes & Noble who chooses which products they carry—not us. (If it were up to us, they would carry everything we sell!) If you shop there, and you don’t see what you’re looking for, you can always try asking the customer service department.
Secondly, we do take pricing seriously when it comes to our online vendors—though keep in mind that they shoulder an additional expense for the product’s shipping and handling. Nonetheless, we’re going to talk around and investigate rates and carriers…
June 20th
Looks like I’m not the only one who’s grown irrationally fond of Rhodia pencils. Blogger Michelle Krell Kydd recently posted her own ode to the quirky orange writing utensils: “a pencil for the senses,” as she put it.
As a side note, Michelle mentioned that she thinks “deleted words and phrases from my computer documents are sent to a hidden folder and rearranged to tell a tale I will be held accountable for in the future.” Oddly enough, a friend of mine, an artist, created a computer program that did just that for a piece he made last year—appropriately titled “Lost Words.”
Happy scribbling!
June 19th
“Packed Calendars Rule Over Executives” was the subject of Carol Hymowitz’s “In the Lead” column in the Wall Street Journal this week. Several executives, including Daniel Vasella, CEO of Novartis, share how they get free from a crammed agenda.
Vasella “keeps himself in check” by occasionally stepping back to evaluate his plans, questioning whether he could do his job differently.
Mark Hurd, CEO of Hewlett-Packard, makes sure he has some breathing space on his calendar. He leaves time every day for things that just come up.
Kathleen Murphy, CEO of ING US Wealth Management, believes that the single most crucial element for surviving a packed schedule is to have a competent team to which you can delegate important jobs.
“At my level you can’t get caught in the weeds,” she says, “you have to move back to a more strategic position.”
June 18th
In a recent “Talk of the Town,” playwright David Mamet revealed his dedication to Clairefontaine notebooks—and longhand composition: “I hate the computer… I hate their spell-check. I won’t ever do e-mail.”
(He does sometimes use a typewriter.)
“I’m afraid of only two things,” Mamet said, “Being lazy and being cowardly. I get up early in the morning and go to work.”
No writerly angst for him, thankyouverymuch…
June 17th
Don’t get me wrong: I like cats. I think they’re fine animals. It’s when they use my flower bed as a litterbox that I start to get annoyed. They love soft, loose soil, and they don’t seem to care what they have to step on or dig around in order to get to it. Plus, they’ve been here for longer than I have, and old habits are hard to change.
I started small: the smell of citrus will supposedly deter them, so I went out and bought a bag of lemons and scattered the juice and rinds all over the garden and shed. An hour later, my tender little cosmos seedlings (which I’d taken extra care to protect) were covered in dirt, with a pile of poop nearby.
I planted things that people’d said cats don’t like—lavender and rue. Didn’t help. Neither did my cedar mulch.
Then I went to my local garden center and bought some very strong-smelling herbal pellets—essence of clove, citrus, sesame, and God knows what else. No luck: the cats were absolutely unfazed.
Finally, I decided to get physical. On the advice of a different garden center, I bought a big package of kebab sticks from my local supermarket and stuck them all around the flowerbed, plugging the gaps between flowers and all around my youngest plants. It looks ridiculous, but it works! Last Sunday, I watched from the window as one of the neighborhood cats headed straight for his favorite patch. He stopped and stared for some time before giving up and leaving the yard, but leave the yard he soon did… it was so satisfying.
Once my plants are a bit better established, I figure I won’t need the sticks. In the meantime, I’m glad to say that the war is finally over!
June 16th
The sky can be its own calendar, but we often don’t read it as well as the ancients. More than any print calendar, seeing Orion in the sky heralds for me the coming of winter.
Growing up, my family used to spend summers in Vermont. There were no lights along our dirt road, so we got a clear view of all the stars and planets. My sister and I would lie on the lawn and look up at the night sky. We would take out our father’s binoculars for a closer look at the Milky Way, the craters on the moon, and pick out different constellations.
Dad taught us how to find Polaris - the North Star. He said mariners used to find their way using the star as a guide.
If I find a telescope at a yard sale this summer, I plan to set it up in my backyard out on Long Island. I’m far away enough from New York City and all the lights to really see the stars.
June 12th
Many thanks to everyone who wrote in with comments and questions about our new Habana notebooks…
By way of update, I’d like to announce that we will be importing the French Habana into the U.S. late this fall (rather than manufacturing it here with U.S.-made paper and French-made covers, as we’d initially planned). France, meanwhile, is going to start producing the Habana with 80gr ivory paper, instead of the 60gr they’re currently using. So there won’t be any difference between the notebooks you’d buy here in North America vs. the ones you’d find in Europe and the UK.
Please let us know if you have any further questions, of course!
June 11th
Â
Dumb Little Man is a site dedicated to providing “a handful of tips that will save you money, increase your productivity, or just keep you sane.”
Tired of dealing with endless emails every day? Does emailing back and forth seem to be most of your job now? This article will help you cut it back.
Here are a few other tips:
- Call instead of email.Â
- Check your email early in the morning, at noon, just before you leave the office. Try not to check during the rest of the day - leave it for work, meetings, socializing in person.
- Be brief in your email.
- If you use a Quo Vadis Agenda Planning Diary, you can note your priority emails for the week in the dashboard box or in Daily Notes. Take care of them first.
June 9th
In addition to more space for Sundays, a reader (and student) from New York City recently suggested that we add more time slots between 10-12 PM, when college students in particular are often still busy and scheduling plans. What do you think—could you use these extra hours? Let us know in the comments!
June 6th
Are you going on vacation this summer? Will your kids be traveling solo, or going away to camp? If so, you might want to check out Forms4Parents.com, a website created by New York based lawyer (and mom) Linda Kagan that can help you organize your child’s and your summer travel. Here, Linda talks about what you’ll need to get ready:
Summer is here. Our children will begin to travel with grandparents, on their own or with a teen travel organization, and likely to other countries.
To make the experience better for our children (and those daring enough to travel with them), it’s best to make sure the proper travel and medical forms are in place. That way, you’ll know that you won’t be called on suddenly to sign a medical authorization, and that your children won’t be stopped at the border because a notarized authorization is not in hand.
The key is having comprehensive information about your children’s doctors, allergies, medicines, special needs, insurance, etc. on the forms that will accompany your children as they (or you) travel. In addition, it always helps to have the family rules clearly outlined for your children and their brave caregivers to minimize the endless negotiations about which tv shows, computer games, bedtimes, chores they can watch and must do. You should also provide contact information for each parent.
To make it easier, I created a website that allows parents to create necessary travel, medical and other types of authorizations, as well as a Family Rules form, online in a matter of minutes. It’s called Forms4Parents.com, and it’s dedicated to helping you organize your child’s and your summer travel.
Happy travels!
