I’m further behind in the journey than this author. I’ve gone from paper logbooks to personal wiki to Evernote to Filofax to paper logbooks written with a livescribe pen that get saved in Evernote to Remarkable and I’m now at the beginning of the next iteration of paper logbooks. I find that, like this author, I get on best with mostly chronological notes, though I do have a small portable notebook in a bag that’s always on me and a large spacious notebook that’s usually at my desk.
Two places where my scheme differs:
I’m sufficiently aesthetic to use a fountain pen, very specific choice of ink (Diamante Dark Chocolate) and Moleskine notebooks. I enjoy the experience of that enough that it makes me want to write notes, which helps me to write notes (and is a reason that the Evernote/Remarkable ideas haven’t stuck fast)
My archival system is a shoebox. In practice my need to revisit old notes falls off exponentially with age (of note).
I started using loose half-letter (similar to the size of A5) sheets w/ an appropriately sized clipboard, and it has been great. I’m able to lay out multiple pages in front of me, regardless of written order. Plus, I have several common templates I often use, since these sheets are loose I can run them through my printer to get the template imprinted. I typically do this in batches, that way I have a supply of template and blank sheets to pull from. When done, I number each page to xref it in later pages, and pull them out of the clipboard once there are enough pages to warrant removal (usually every other week). Then I scan the pages, append them to a PDF I keep on my phone and laptop, and put the pages in an archival box. I’m only a few months into this system, but I have to say, it’s felt like a game changer. I note that several elements the author describes in the article share some commonalities with my approach, which is neat.
I stopped keeping paper notebooks when I realized I never referenced them again. I recently switched to an eink device that recognized handwriting. Now I have an append-only daily journal that can also be searched via grep.
As much as I like the idea of a paper notebook, I just have to accept it’s not how I work.
Indeed, only chronological ordering works for paper notes. I still prefer Moleskine used in a bullet journal like style though. Partly because Field Notes are expensive to send to Europe.
I’m further behind in the journey than this author. I’ve gone from paper logbooks to personal wiki to Evernote to Filofax to paper logbooks written with a livescribe pen that get saved in Evernote to Remarkable and I’m now at the beginning of the next iteration of paper logbooks. I find that, like this author, I get on best with mostly chronological notes, though I do have a small portable notebook in a bag that’s always on me and a large spacious notebook that’s usually at my desk.
Two places where my scheme differs:
I started using loose half-letter (similar to the size of A5) sheets w/ an appropriately sized clipboard, and it has been great. I’m able to lay out multiple pages in front of me, regardless of written order. Plus, I have several common templates I often use, since these sheets are loose I can run them through my printer to get the template imprinted. I typically do this in batches, that way I have a supply of template and blank sheets to pull from. When done, I number each page to xref it in later pages, and pull them out of the clipboard once there are enough pages to warrant removal (usually every other week). Then I scan the pages, append them to a PDF I keep on my phone and laptop, and put the pages in an archival box. I’m only a few months into this system, but I have to say, it’s felt like a game changer. I note that several elements the author describes in the article share some commonalities with my approach, which is neat.
I stopped keeping paper notebooks when I realized I never referenced them again. I recently switched to an eink device that recognized handwriting. Now I have an append-only daily journal that can also be searched via
grep.As much as I like the idea of a paper notebook, I just have to accept it’s not how I work.
Indeed, only chronological ordering works for paper notes. I still prefer Moleskine used in a bullet journal like style though. Partly because Field Notes are expensive to send to Europe.