New Year = New Calendar Lust

What is it about a new year that makes me lust after paper-based calendars, planners, and notebooks? I've long-since established that my Treo and electronic planning works best for me, but that doesn't keep all those shiny, bright white calendars from belting out their siren songs.

My old Franklin planner training cries out "Keep only one calendar!" and "Have your calendar always with you." Well, the only one that's always with me is my Treo. And it is nice to be able to enter something once and see it in day, week, or monthly views all at the tap of a stylus. And to-dos? Well, they rarely get done on the day that I hope that they'll get done, especially since the baby came to be, so two-tap or drag-and-drop task forwarding keeps the productivity guilt at bay. You can't do any of that with a paper planner.

Still, at this time of year I start cruising the calendar clearance sales. This one will look good on my cubicle wall at work. That one will help the whole family keep track of each other, especially if it's on the fridge. And, gee, wouldn't it be nice to have a fresh sudoku puzzle and/or knitting pattern each and every day? (As if I had the time!)

Maybe it's part of the whole New Year's resolutions craze. Sometimes it's nice to erase all the old undone stuff and start fresh. I find it very liberating sometimes to look at something that's been on my list for eons, and to say "I'm not going to do that." But it's also really hard to do -- to actively delete something. It's much easier to start with a fresh book and just neglect to transfer a task, project, or goal. You can't do that with a planner that operates on electrons. You actually have to take action and delete it.

Over the years I've bought plenty of calendars and planners that did nothing for me but go quickly out of date. I always gravitate back toward electronic planning. Especially now that it's meshed with my cell phone, my PDA is always with me, and a paper planner just adds bulk to an already stuffed purse (which, these days, is more like a backpack!).

I still don't know what I'm going to do this year, but I do know that there's a sale running over at Caledars.com...