At what point is a quest to save time a big waste of time?
For the past year I have been searching to find the best life management system for managing my life and my household. When it comes to planning and organization, I’m a simple and visual person. For thirteen years I’ve used a Franklin Planner; however, in the past year I’ve also used Microsoft Outlook. Six years ago my husband, an engineer, got me a Treo 650 for my cell phone; however, I did not have Microsoft Office at the time and I still required so many paper copies of things that it just didn’t work for me. I ended up giving the phone back to my husband to use. He loves it! He doesn’t have a data plan and says he doesn’t need it since he works primarily in his office with internet access.
When I received Microsoft Office with my laptop a year ago, I just used Outlook to receive all my email in one place. Later, when I needed to buy new planner page refills but didn’t have the money in the budget, I decided to try setting up the Flylady system electronically using Outlook. In some ways the electronic version is easier: I can mark off recurring tasks quickly, have calendar and appointment reminders pop up, and can print tasks and calendar pages to go into my paper planner binder. I’ve also been sending copies of appointments via Outlook email to my chronically absent-minded husband…so now he has no excuse for forgetting events and tasks. The appointment opens for him in his Outlook email and he can accept it into his calendar/task list and sync to his Palm phone.
So, what didn’t work for me five years ago might just possibly work for me now: I have Microsoft Office and a laptop, and the features of Palms and cell phones and other devices are significantly more sophisticated. So I went to investigate the prices and functions of Blackberrys and Palms…and found that you cannot buy the phone without a data plan. Apparently my husband, who has had the treo for five years, has been “grandfathered” and “allowed” to have just his phone with no data plan. The cheapest plan I found is thirty dollars a month, the exact same price as my monthly internet service bill. I could buy paper planner pages for the price of one month of a data plan. And, truthfully, do I really want to have immediate access to the web and email? Can’t anything wait anymore? Can’t I just blog and email from home?
It figures that, upon lamenting to my geek engineer husband, my love-of-my-life would remember that he has an unopened, never used, eight-year-old Palm Vx just sitting on his bookshelf. The thing is definitely out-of-date but free. I like free! So I pull out the equipment, insert the installation disk, and get ready to sync with Outlook.
The entire process crashed my computer for a week and took probably sixteen hours to resolve.
This morning I got my laptop back online and have finally been able to sync this dinosaur by using a Microsoft-supported software program on a seven-day free trial basis…but will cost $69 to buy.
My plan is, of course, to spend the next seven days evaluating if a Palm device synced to Outlook is the system for me. After all this work and pain this device is going to be glued to my hip!
But then, if I decide this works after seven days, do I:
- Keep this Palm Vx and buy the $69 software?
- Buy a newer Palm Z22 on Ebay for that price and hope it works and doesn’t also need the $69 software?
- Just buy a new Palm and never let it have access to the internet?
And, then, if I decide this doesn’t work for me…then what next? I love using Outlook but then I have to at least print the calendars and still have to remember to enter calendar items and tasks when I get home. I’m using paper and ink to print the calendars plus my task list when I’m on the road.
What is the right answer?
And when am I wasting so much time trying to save time that it’s better to give up the pursuit and just use the multiple systems I have?
I’m not looking for perfect…just efficient and practical. Is that too much to expect?
Popularity: 6% [?]
