1. Would you consider yourself an organized person? Why or why not?
Not at all. I seem to have inherited my father’s clutter gene. He had a garage filled to the very top with useless gizmos. parts, tools and exotica all his life and it was scattered in a slapshod manner so that only he knew where anything was. And he could retrieve anything from the ominous pile in a matter of seconds. My life is much like that. Laundry doesn’t get folded, newspapers everywhere. CD’s aren’t stored in any real sense of order.
It works for me.
2. Do you keep some type of planner, organizer, calendar, etc. with you, and do you use it regularly?
I used to religiously carry around a Day Timer. I love those little books. Two pages a day set a side to write, scribble and remind. I dumped it recently for a PDA – a Handspring Visor with a collapsable keyboard. I find I am better organized with phone numbers, birthdays and appointments but I still miss the scribbling pad.
3. Would you say that your desk is organized right now?
At work, yes. A clean tidy monument. At home, no. My desk is in my bedroom which looks like a teenagers room.
4. Do you alphabetize CDs, books, and DVDs, or does it not matter?
I have my own method. I tend to sort more by artist/genre/mood then by some dictated alphabetical system. And the reason, I found, is that when stored alphabetically, you miss some CDs that never get listened to, that you seem to forget. So I tend to place those CDs with a similar genre (blues, jazz) together, or those of a particular mood (rocking out, car tunes or what have you) in the same area.
5. What’s the hardest thing you’ve ever had to organize?
When I was 14 our Boy Scout troop nearly fell apart. And I really wanted to be an Eagle Scout. And if the troop folded, I would have to join another troop hosted by the Mormon’s across town. I took up the reins, got some parents to all donate some time to keep the troop going and ran the meetings myself, organizing camping trips and summer camps and outings and insisting that my dad and his adhoc committee get folks together to support the endeavor. It turned out, but it was a lot of work.