Keeping House… and Words
I seem to write much like I keep house. And keeping house isn’t one of my strengths. I make a mess. I move piles around. For days, weeks, years. Or I spend three hours scrubbing the inside of the freezer (See? I can focus sometimes!), while the rest of the kitchen remains a mess. I seem to be the same way in writing, too.
I sometimes find myself reading five things at the same time (I mean within the same minute) or writing seven things at once (I mean within the same day).
I hate clutter on my computer and in my house. All this “stuff” gets to me, and you guys know how much I hate stuff. I’m a freak at throwing out clutter. And I almost deleted all the files to do with my WIP so I could start with a clear mind, but I stopped myself. (I’ve already tried 50K+ of that. It didn’t help, clearly.)
So I set myself to organizing the YA WIP and deleting only what I don’t need. SuperNotecard is awesome, and I have my ten projects tabbed open, and each project sorted and stacked and indexed, etc.
But of course I can’t write with all that clutter, so I have WriteMonkey, FocusWriter, and Q10 all open so I can full-screen focus on what I’m working on. And since I’m focusing on three things today…
(I should clarify that I would write all three in WriteMonkey, but as far as I know, it doesn’t let you open multiple documents at once, like Word does. It’s kinda geared towards focused work, LOL!)
Then there’s Windows Live Writer to write this blog post.
And Microsoft Word to read through an old story and write a blurb for its ebook release. (Make that four things today… blogging doesn’t count, as it’s a fun thing, not a work thing.)
All this drives me so crazy, that I started writing in a notebook to get away from the clutter on my computer, but this only ended up making more unorganized stuff that I had to organize.
I was going to tell you guys that my ADD issues have improved with Fish Oil and No Doz, and I really think they have. Really. I mean it. I swear. A bit. A little bit. Any little bit helps!
But somedays? I seriously drive myself crazy.
How do you deal with the clutter and stuff in your own mind? In your house? In your writing? On your computer?
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Natasha Fondren is an eBook developer, writer, and classical pianist. After a fifteen-year piano teaching career, she moved to Arizona and built a book design business. She enjoys the lizards and desert heat in Arizona with her Border Collie, Padfoot, and her cat, Dixie Doodle.
I’m a clutter person. When I clean, things start piling up again within a day. It never stays clean. So I guess I get used to it. But all those things you use to write would be too much for me. I write my blogs on my blog and my WIP on my Word Doc. That’s it. If I used all the stuff you do it would seriously drive me crazy too.
I hear you, Edie! Drives me crazy!
I just edited my post… I’d write all my stuff in WriteMonkey, but it doesn’t let you open multiple instances.
I stopped writing in Word when they took away the blue screen writing. It’s too bright and big and clunky for me; I just like me and the text.
I let things pile up and then I clean them up. I’m pretty good at having a few messes around me and still being able to focus on my writing but if I’m doing a revision and have a bunch of written notes I need them organized. And, I do all my writing in Word.
Good luck with your organizing:-)
Not that I know, but you strike me as a calm, focused person, Paul.
I envy you!
Except the Word thing. *shudder* LOL!
It might just be ignorance that I write in Word. I’ve never used anything else. All those programs you named, I’ve never heard of. And yes, I am pretty calm. I think it comes from years of working with at risk teens. There was always ten things going on at once and I was often the one that had to deal with all of them.
Pretty sure I’ve said this before, but long ago I got into clutter problems. I mean, I had something like 25,000 record albums (remember them? Bigger than CDs) and 30,000 books. Then I came up with the perfect solution to clutter. Divorce. I was left with about 10 books to put on the bookshelf I didn’t possess. However, it was all for the best.
LOL, Eric! Yeah. Moving into a camper got rid of most of my clutter. I still have some, but we have a teensy-tiny camper. We don’t have that many things anymore, which is great. I don’t miss anything.
I’m having a hard time getting orgazined right now. I have a million thoughts on things I want to do to my wip, but I can’t figure out how to piece it all together. Maybe I should try one of these programs.
I’m thinking about tackling my outline and updating that so I can at least get everything in one place, but I can’t print anything right now — and that’s very annoying,
Awww, Melanie! SuperNotecard might fit your needs really well. The others are stripped-down text editors. Just simple, full screen things, with progress markers for words written that day, stuff like that.
I’ve lived without a printer for year. It’s not bad. If you have Microsoft OneNote, it’s easier. (You can print to OneNote.)
I’m only slightly cluttery. It’s certainly nothing unmanageable. If anything, I’m a bit of an over-organizer, which is probably why working at the library’s such a good fit for me. I’m constantly shelf reading to make sure no items are out of order!
OMG, Lana, can I tell you?! I’m cluttery and messy, but I’m also sort of OCD about some things. So my local Borders? OMG, you should SEE it! It’s SO unalphabetized, that if I take a book off the shelves, I either have to rearrange the whole section (which would be sorta stupid since I don’t work there), or put it in the wrong place. I’ve never seen anything like it. I want to find the manager and say, Hey, can I work here a couple hours a week, just putting your books back in order?
Writemonkey is single document app indeed, but one can simply toggle between files using CTRL+TAB combination. You can also set “Remember caret position” setting for really seamless toggling.
And secondly –> you can actually open multiple instances of wm and edit multiple documents at once …
wm
OMG, that rocks! I love it!
I don’t do clutter. It makes me crazier than I already am, and disorganization upsets my energy flow. Like Edie, I write my blog at my blog and use MSW for everything else.
Less is more.
Clutter makes me crazy, too. Although, there’s a magic to blogging. As soon as I whined, I got a million things done and off my plate. Love that!
Gadgets may be fun, but I agree with Kath–less is more.
LOL… the less is more concept is why I don’t write in Word!
Well, sounds like you, Edie and I should start a “clutterers anonymous” group.
Like Edie, it seems no matter how much I clean, it all looks just like it did before within a few minutes.
So, I’ve basically given up and just perfected the art of “hear doorbell ring, frantically throw everything into the bedroom and shut the door” method of cleaning.
As for writing – blog on blog (or use notepad), Word at home or Alphasmart for writing on the road. I’ve also started using the Marshall Plan Software for Novel Writing and am liking it a lot.
I’m just impressed you know about all these tools, let alone use them!
I am ashamed to say this, but I like clutter. My house certainly reflects that sad fact. I buy the dumbest stuff wherever I go. I’m sitting here next to a carved jade ball called “the happy family” that we got in China, and there’s a clay duck I found in some rumage sale in front of me on the coffee table. Hey! That didn’t sound so awful! That’s because I’m leaving out the little china animals my Uncle Milton gave me when I was 5, a gold print of Alex’s hand when he was 3, and the clay gnome some person I don’t even remember got us for our wedding.
I’ve become fond of purging. (That doesn’t sound right)
When I need to get out early in the morning, I set out my clothes the night before. My wife just laughs. The big decision is what shirt to wear. Everything else is a no-choice thing. I like keeping it simple.
I don’t do clutter. Right now there’s a pencil and a jump drive on my desk and they’re both driving me crazy. I can sense hidden clutter, too. It’s one of my incredibly useless super powers (the other is being able to guess the exact year a movie was released just by watching one scene), so I can’t just sweep things into a drawer. Everything has to be organized. Everything. It gets limiting, at times.
I don’t do multitasking well, either. My focus is an unwavering pinpoint. Great for what I’m focusing on, but nothing outside of that pinpoint gets accomplished. Also kind of limiting.
I love that Carlin act. Although, I call my stuff “shit” as well as everyone else’s.