The Place For My Writers Notes

Original posting 9 September 2008

I was looking at my lists of things to work on, and got to wondering. I keep lots of lists, but the key ones are my "To Do's" and "Scheduled Tasks." But maybe I should add a "Round Tuit" list . . .

At one time, I was involved in discussions about whether people were developers, operators, or help desk. The difference was that help desk people, for example, really liked very short-term problems, dropped on them with little or no warning. They also didn't seem to mind repetitiveness -- having people ask the same questions repeatedly wasn't really irritating. Operators, on the other hand, preferred midterm problems. Things that took a day or a week to take care of. They also really seem to like procedures.

That leaves the crazy people -- the developers. No interruptions please -- and I'm going to wrestle with this issue for a week, a month, a year. And you know, I am really one of these.

I've also seen discussions of deadline or process -- milestone or river? Some people really seem to enjoy having deadlines set, and do their best work as the clock ticks down. Others set themselves quotas and work steadily at it, grinding away and covering everything in time.

I know I tend to be obsessive -- I'm going to do a little bit Monday morning or Friday evening, again and again. Deadlines -- I usually turn them into weekly or daily assignments and get things done early. I really dislike the last minute rush. And as for emergencies? I really subscribe to that notion that your lack of planning does not constitute an emergency for me. Even though I know too many people who believe that Mike is a great handler of crises, just because I often can come in and take care of their messes at the last minute. I think they don't understand that the quiet manner covers some real anger when they pull that, but . . .  I get the job done first, then walk off in disgust.

Today's puzzlement, though, is the list of really low priority stuff that I would dearly love to get to sometime. I've noticed that they tend to sink to that list, and then just sit there until I get tired of seeing them and wipe them out, unfinished.

But I'm thinking that a round tuit might do the job better. Beside my "today's work" and "regular jobs," add another list that gets picked at once in a while (probably Friday afternoons -- pick a regular time, anyway). And whenever I pick it up, do a dab at the first job on the list, then slide it to the end of the list? So they rotate around, getting at least a little time every now and then?

I suppose the other part of this is the scrap sheets that I do my thinking on. Scribble down an idea, expand it into a plan, add outlines, worksheets, little bits and pieces -- and then turn it into PowerPoint, article, or whatever.

There's lots of different ways to slice work into manageable chunks and start chewing on them. But sometimes you need to stop and think about what's falling off the edges. A round tuit, now, maybe that's the way to keep those longterm jobs inching along. I think I'll put that on my todos list for tomorrow :-)

(taking a break from the stuff on the list for today -- don't tell anyone, okay?)

Original posting: Sat, 7 Mar 1998 11:19:10 EST

At 07:57 AM 3/5/98 -0500, Faith wrote:
:)
:) What do you do when it's the day before you were supposed to have written
:) something (*anything*), and you still haven't written a word?
:)

Somewhat too late to solve this time, but perhaps these will help:

"quick" organizers:

1. Try taking the question or problem apart. Then put it back together, along with some information. Often this will be enough to do the job.

2. Take whatever information you may have about the answer or response, and build an answer based on the natural "partitions" or "areas" of the information. I.e., there is some kind of structure to the information--talk about that structure. Put it into a nice, easily remembered metaphor/analogy. Point out the areas that aren't included, or the ones that haven't been as thoroughly explored as others.

3. Tell 'em what you are going to tell them, tell it to 'em, then tell 'em what you told them. I often write the middle (in chunks, without much attention to order, with a computer). Then write an intro: I'm going to talk about 1, 2, 3... Arrange the points to make sense, then rearrange the middle blocks (and remove the extra pieces that usually collect when freewriting--I find it marginally easier to cut those golden phrases that really don't belong in this piece if I put them in a "bits" file for later use. Of course, I have "bits" files everywhere that will never be used, but the mental trick works). Now, write a closing that explains the important point(s) you have just made.

4. Try building a set of relations. E.g., what does this (whatever the topic or problem is) mean for me, my family, my community, my nation, the world? Or what did it mean in the past, mean now, and will it mean in the future? This can be a very nice way to structure your response...

5. Build a set of questions about the topic, problem, etc. What would you like to know about it? What would your friends like to know about it? How about your reader(s)--what should they know about it? What's interesting about it? What's boring?

"been there, done that, don't want to keep doing it":

6. Learn the lesson and start planning ahead next time. If you can easily write 1,000 words a day, a 5,000 word paper will probably take at least 10 days to write (allowing for the inevitable slippage, interruptions, and other problems). Depending on what else is going on, you may want to start working on it even earlier, instead of waiting for the last possible minute to begin.

Setting yourself little "deadlines" within the larger period may seem silly, but it really does work--and builds some good skills/practices for bigger jobs (*like that novel--200,000 words? Say 100 days at 2,000 words per day, plus editing/rewrite time. Work out the "little deadlines" along the way and celebrate reaching them--and the "big deadline" will be easy!*).

Perhaps others will contribute their "instant organizers" and ways to avoid getting stuck in "deadline panics?" Although, looking around MIT, there is a certain fascination among the students with the adrenaline rush of "last minute crises" (even when self-induced).

hope this helps