(Dis)Organization FAIL

Another "What was I thinking?" moment from Sarah Ballance

Ever had your good intentions backfire? Yeah, we're going there. I decided to get organized, and I don't think I'll ever be so foolish again. Yes, I said it. Organization FAIL.

It all started last weekend. I had one scene left to write in my Noble Authors Blog Tour short story. One scene. I still had weeks before the actual deadline, but I wanted it done so I decided not to do anything else until it was finished. Simple, right?

Yep … until the list of stuff I could be doing started to nag me. After an hour of fighting to get words on the page without thinking of anything and everything else, I gave in to distraction long enough to make an actual to-do list. Organization—yes!

The first task into which I fell was to make a list of all the books I needed to read and/or review. (Hey, I didn't say these were pressing issues … just persistent ones!) By the time I went through my GoodReads, my Kindle, and my inbox, I had over 50 titles. (A week later, that figure now sits at 82.) Then I had the bright idea to go ahead and get the PDFs on my Kindle. The first one went willingly. The rest, not so much. After several attempts, and while in the midst of another headbanging fail, I noticed the files were already on the Kindle. Great. Mission accomplished (and I don't even know how), but now I have dozens and dozens of titles on Kindle. All dreadfully unorganized.

Well, fortunately or otherwise, in the midst of my "Why the EFF won't these PDFs go to Kindle?" googling, I realized I could create folders on the ereader. This sounded promising. So I made a few folders: read, unread, Kindlegraph, etc. Then (you saw this coming, right?) I spent another hour moving titles to various folders. To this day I'm nowhere near finished with that particular task, but at least it all fits in the palm of my hand. Better, right?

Momentarily satisfied, I went back to my Noble Blog Tour short. Less than a paragraph later, I realized I needed to get all of the blog tour info downloaded and—you guessed it—organized. So I created a folder on my desktop, downloaded all of the files, and renamed them by date of appearance and designation. But that wasn't good enough. Nope, back to the to-do list to add those dates (which previously existed as one lump "November: NABT") and their respective "finish by" dates. I'm feeling really good. Organization is awesome.

I hauled that feeling of accomplishment back to the short. But, um, wait. Another plot idea was brewing, and I worried I'd forget before I could expand upon it. Clearly now was not the time, but I've thought for a while I needed to make a list of the books destined to become WIPs. To that end, I've emailed frequent notes to myself, but my inbox is currently full to the tune of 6,306 emails ("only" 4177 are new) so who can find those? So back to the to-do list. A few oft-interrupted hours later (I do have six young children, you'll recall) I had my titles all listed by series and estimated completion dates.

Then, while looking at my meticulously organized list of future WIPs, it occurred to me I needed to update my website (something I try to do weekly). And when I went to cross-reference my blog and my website, I noticed there were a few things I needed to update and reorganize on the blog as well. Don't even ask me how that can turn into hours, but it does.

So let's look at the big picture. I started the weekend with one scene left to write. Just one scene. And now I have 82 books to read and/or review. And five novels to write. And 13 interviews to complete.

Oh, and half a scene left in my short. But no worries. I've cleared the weekend to finish it.

Again.

Want cash? (Well, electronic cash, but it still spends. And enough with the heckling, mkay?) Sarah is celebrating her next Noble release with a BIG e-cash (ahem) prize and there's only ONE way to enter: go to her blog and subscribe by e-mail. Early subscribers will be the first to learn the details of the aforementioned big prize, but there's more: they'll also get the worm. Er... so to speak. Just trust me, it pays. Go.

To learn more about Sarah's Noble Romance titles, click here.