January Organization Project (JOP): Computers

Credit: Allison Trentelman, her shop at Etsy

Like most people I am also organizing my surroundings this month. While I feel sad about not having the lights on the house anymore and the tree out of the living room, I am enjoying the open space. I will tell you in all honesty that my room is one giant pit, my Christmas presents are piled on top of things (as they are no longer safe on the ground... oh I have a story on that, cat in a "mood" = messed up new boots) and drawers are a mess. I also have clothes piled on the end of my bed and my overnight bag from the wedding is not unpacked. Yes folks, it is time to dig out and get a fresh start!

I didn't get as much accomplished as I would have liked but at least I had motivation. One of my cousins was helpful in getting me revved up, she was "Johnny on the spot" in starting her clean-up project, she got some storage tubs on sale at good ol' Fred Meyer this morning. While I did not tackle through my closet like she did, I decided to sift through an often overlooked area: my computer(s).

As of this moment, I still have two computers but that will change by the end of this week. When I bought my laptop I decided that I would give my desktop to Dad. His computer is old and one step away from being as useful as rusted over garbage. He is constantly complaining about it and tired of dealing with its sluggish behavior. Since getting my laptop I have been transferring files and needed data from the desktop. I wanted to get my desktop cleaned up and ready by Christmas but that just didn't happen.

This afternoon I finally got my bookmarks moved from my browser and imported on the laptop (super easy too!). After I transferred the bookmarks I went through them to see if I still wanted all the sites I had been saving. I ended up deleting quite a few folders, renaming other categories, and making a couple of new bookmark folders. Just doing this simple organization helps me to not feel bombarded with added "stuff." Like many people, I spend lots of time on my computer so I like having my folders to make sense. I feel more efficient and overall pleased when items are in the right folders.

I deleted all my photos, documents, music, and unused programs from my desktop in efforts to help it function even better. In the process, I made sure to run CCCleaner a few times(formally known as Crap Cleaner but they changed it to be politically correct), Registry Repair and the virus software to remove any potential harmful bugs. These programs should be run more frequently so I am lucky that my computer didn't give me too many negative messages. Ideally I would get my hard drive wiped out and reinstalled again (makes a computer so much faster), but I am not going to deal with that now. Perhaps at some other point. I think Dad will be quite happy with the quality of this computer, it is a good one and will be way faster than what he has right now.

Cleaning up my blog was the third part of my technology cleanup today. This might sound funny but it has driven me NUTS to have some labels start with lowercase and others with capitals. I also have had way too many labels and ones that aren't specific. I have condensed the label list and made most of them start with a capital (though now I am starting to wonder... does the label 'Natural living' look better as Natural Living'? Maybe I am more OCD than I thought! haha And seriously if you want to tell me your opinion on this, I would love it!). I need to fix a few more but I made good progress today. Almost there!

I think there's lots of value in organizing computer files and even things like blogs. I feel productive/efficient when I don't have to look all over for something. I also just love the aesthetic piece of seeing labels ordered how I want them, smaller condensed lists, and specific categories. This type of organization really could stand to be two-days worth; as I write this I am thinking about my picture folders. For the most part they are pretty good, but that is the area where I "pile" (as in make several folders of pictures for Christmas 2011 due to different uploads and then forget to compile them into one place). Sometimes that picture folder looks like a messy bed. You can deal with it for only so long.

My J.O.P. goal for tomorrow is to straighten up my stationary drawers and to get note cards in sensible order, and to actually get birthday cards ready for the year. Each year I send out more and more birthday cards so I would like to have a better system for all of that.

We'll see what else I tackle tomorrow-- I will probably make some effort in shoveling out my room. The drawers are a good small start, usually once I get going on cleaning it is hard to stop (though once the sun goes down I am done with my productiveness for the day, I am like a bird in that regard).

If you're organizing right now, good luck! If not, join in on the fun!!