Matthew Lang

I've been carrying a pocket notebook with me everywhere I go for the last few years but it hasn't been until this year that I really started to use it on a daily basis.

The idea is simple. You keep a pocket notebook on you to capture ideas, thoughts and anything else that you'll need to remember at a later date.

No matter what profession you find yourself in, the most essential function of the pocket notebook is to provide a place to capture the ideas that spring to mind throughout the day.

— The Manly Tradition of the Pocket Notebook by The Art of Manliness

You might think it's a little over the top but how many times have you tried to remember something that came to you a few hours before but you couldn't? Unless you already have a place for these then I imagine that for most of you it's quite a lot.

It used to happen to me all the time. I started using email to capture moments like this in Todoist, but that was the wrong place to capture them.

Instead I took the advice of Patrick Rhone and started using a notebook to capture all these little loose ends that come to me through the day.

It's been a decision I haven't regretted and become such an engrained habit in my day that my notebook goes with me everywhere.

At the moment I'm still working through a couple of pocket Moleskine notebooks, but I'll be using the Field Notes notebooks when my first subscription arrives in a few weeks.

I keep my notebook in a Nock Hightower with a few index cards if I need to hand some information out. It also has space for a couple of pens and I also keep my headphones in here as well. Seems as good a place as any and it means all I need to lift if I'm going out is my keys, wallet, phone and Nock. I rarely go anywhere without all four.

A pocket notebook might get you stares and a few questions about it, but for capturing those bits of info you might need to remember later on, it can't be beat.

I'm glad to see that the much hyped part of the retail year, Black Friday, is falling out of favour with buyers.

But there’s something else happening. In this moment of profound innovation on the back of e-commerce and technology, new and old brands are working hard to gain our business. In doing so, they have created a virtual “series” of “Black Fridays” throughout the season. These are cause-driven moments or limited-edition collections that add value in a way more relevant to today’s informed consumer; it’s not about false discounts.

— Black Friday isn’t dead. It’s just irrelevant. by Recode

I've always shunned purchasing anything during this time and in particular any product that is highlighted as a "bargain" during this event.

Can't wait until it's completely gone.

Not a month goes by now without criticism of Twitter and it's walled garden network.

I really don’t like that we are all putting our content, including those golden joke tweets, into someone else’s silo. You’re giving Twitter full control over all of your content. That’s a huge price to pay for the exposure, especially in the light of the fact that there are user-controlled alternatives.

— Let’s replace Twitter with something much better by Charl Botha

I don't think Twitter needs to be replaced, but it certainly needs to be improved and Twitter is actively doing that. It's a long-term goal so we the people should be patient.

So, should we replace Twitter? I don't think so.

While I agree that Twitter isn't considered an open part of the Internet, you only have to sacrifice a few privileges to use it. I say a few privileges because you can still create and run your own blog and focus on hosting your more premium content there rather than on Twitter.

Twitter is many things to many people, but if you're a blogger it should be thought of as a delivery platform for your blog. Share your blogs posts on Twitter and have people come to your blog to read the rest of your content.

Twitter doesn't need to be replaced it just needs to be used in a way that makes your life easier.

The Rogue One movie is coming out soon and so is the last expansion pack for Star Wars Battlefront.

For the first time an expansion pack will feature content not from the original trilogy. Of course Rogue One is set just before the beginning of A New Hope so it's as close as you'll get to the original trilogy.

Star Wars Battlefront has been a real joy to play over the last year. Enough game play variety to keep you interested, great graphics and source, and lastly of course it's Star Wars.

Games like this don't come along very often but when they do you find yourself playing for hours at a time. Great fun. I can't wait for the new expansion pack to come out.

via Electronic Arts

A few weeks ago I decided to take the plunge and stop using Todoist as my task manager. As you know I'm a big fan of Todoist and it wasn't easy making that decision. My frustrations came from the fact that I needed something more intentional than another app on my phone, another task list in the ether of the Internet. I need something that requires a bit more work to manage than just bashing in a few words with my keyboard or frantically clicking my mouse.

CJ Chilvers' post about ditching your to do list had been on my mind for a few days before making the decision to stop using Todoist.

I've slowly become a convert to the idea that we need to concentrate on our calendars a whole lot more to achieve what we want in work and life. If you want it done, it must be scheduled. If it's not scheduled, it's just another item on your wishlist that will never be completed.

— Kill Your To Do List by CJ Chilvers

Investing time in the task manager isn't the priority, it's investing the time in the calendar that makes the difference.

So, do I need Todoist? Well, I've been without it for over a month now and I'm still working, still busy and still making an income. Clearly working from your calendar is a good thing.

However, that leaves me without some form of tracking and managing tasks. I wanted something that didn't have me sitting on my phone first thing in the morning, something that required a bit more effort to use and finally something that I could just pick up and start using regardless of where I am.

I've been using pocket notebooks to capture stuff through the day like notes, messages, tasks, ideas, books to read and so on. Being able to stop, write, and then carry on working gives me a little break from the screen through the day but it also got me thinking about using more notebooks to manage my tasks.

I might have killed my to do list on Todoist, but I still needed some form of task management. And that's what this week's posts are about. So tune in tomorrow for the first post on the humble pocket notebook.

And here's her setup.

For Thanksgiving Day on Thursday.

I've got the planner, next is the calendar (and of course being able to speak Japanese).

via SwissMiss

comes from two simple realisations. NB explains.

Todoist has just anounced a new feature to their task management platform, Smart Schedule.

Smart Schedule uses predictive modeling to help you easily plan out your tasks for the day and week to come. It learns your personal productive habits, and takes into account patterns across all Todoist users, to predict the best possible due dates for your tasks.

That means those 50+ overdue tasks you have hanging around can be quickly rescheduled en masse, while new and unscheduled tasks can be easily assigned to the best due dates. In this way, Smart Schedule makes it much easier to stay on top of your to-do list and roll with the punches when your day doesn’t go as planned.

— Introducing Smart Schedule, a more intelligent way to plan your day

I stopped using Todoist a number of weeks ago due to the fact that I was just going through the motions of ticking off boxes. It got to the stage where I was micro-managing myself.

This is an interesting move in the market of task managers and no doubt there will be a few other task managers following down this road.

Great to see the city officials in San Francisco and Seattle responding positively to the need for more bike lines.

When two cyclists were tragically killed in hit-and-run accidents this past summer, a group of anonymous urban activists known as the San Francisco Transformation Agency erected a set of protected bike lanes using traffic cones. Usually such guerrilla interventions are temporary. They raise awareness but ultimately get taken down by municipal authorities. But when the same group recently (and illegally) installed a set of soft-hit posts alongside Golden Gate Park, the city reacted by moving to make the change official.

— Guerrilla Bike Lanes: San Francisco Makes Illicit Infrastructure Permanent by Kurt Kohlstedt

Great advice by Curtis McHale and at a great time too. 2017 is just around the corner.

Mike Vardy shares his thoughts on Medium on why he uses notebooks.

Ultimately, however, I use notebooks to connect with the things that are most important to me on a daily basis. I keep them handy because I don’t want to lose sight of what I really want to accomplish.

— How I Use Notebooks by Mike Vardy

via The Cramped

A fair argument about abolishing timezones and the whole planet using Coordinated Universal Time. I like this reason the most though for ditching timezones.

Perhaps you’re asking why the Greenwich meridian gets to define earth time. Why should only England keep the traditional hours? Yes, it’s unfair, but that ship has sailed. The French don’t like it either. “The U.K. would turn into a time theme park,” suggested an English Twitter user, John Powers, “where you could experience 9 o’clock as your grandparents knew it.”

— Time to Dump Time Zones by James Gleick for The New York Times

The pilot is coming folks. I can't wait.

Another nifty kickstarter idea. A calendar for building habits.

via Swiss Miss