For several months now I’ve been meaning to write about my notebook journey. Today the stars finally aligned and I just sat down to tell you about how I’ve been managing my TODOs for almost a year now.

It all started when I created myself a little leather cover for my A5 sized solo RPG journal:

Gina Häußge (@foosel@chaos.social)

Currently learning how to play #Starforged and as I apparently enjoy the journaling part of it I just built myself a traveler's notebook 😊 Apart from two notebook inserts, this also has an insert for holding my character sheet and my assets, plus a move cheat sheet.

#making #leatherwork #solo_rpg #ttrpg

March 19, 2025, 21:05 (UTC)

I quickly realized that I quite liked writing down things by hand on the 100gsm dot grid paper of the notebook I got, and that I also liked the look and functionality of what I had created there.

That lead to an idea. At this point I was still managing my TODOs in Todoist, but also often ended up writing down the weekly tasks on the whiteboard in my office as I had learned that checking them off physically with an actual pen gave me way more dopamine than clicking a checkbox in an app. And the whiteboard approach quickly fell apart when I was not at my desk - I often ended up taking a picture of my whiteboard before having to work from somewhere else, or putting things into Todoist that felt a bit like they didn’t belong there (small chores).

So I thought that maybe I should just try to go fully analogue with my tasks, in a portable form factor. The A5 size I had used for the RPG journal didn’t fit that portability requirement fully, but A6 would be something that I could easily fit into my cargo pockets. I thus ordered a stack of A6 notebooks¹ and built another leather cover for that size.

Gina Häußge (@foosel@chaos.social)

After really enjoying using the traveler's notebook I built for #solorpg use recently*, I've just now built a smaller version for regular note taking. While I'm a huge fan of @obsidian, not everything needs to be digital and I want to try some analog brainstorming and possibly journaling again.

* see https://chaos.social/@foosel/114191126595846444

#leatherworking

March 28, 2025, 18:13 (UTC)

Once more I went with a Midori style “Traveler’s Notebook” approach - a simple leather cover with a bungie cord in the middle, acting as both a place where to hang in one notebook from its spine, and a loop on the outside to keep the journal closed. To hang more than one book, additional bungie cord loops can be used to attach two or more books together.

Just like with my RPG journal, I also built myself an insert out of craft cardboard, to hold some of my cards and a slim tracker module, allow storing flat things on the front and back (receipts, tickets, my x-ray passport & dentist bonus log…) and attach a pen loop and some bookmark ribbons to as well.

Then I sat down and thought a lot on how to best go about organising things. I of course had heard about the Bullet Journal method, so I looked up details on that. I quickly learned two things: 1) contrary to what images I found online and what I saw my mom doing made me believe, at its core bullet journalling is way less about fancy hand lettering and page designs but rather about rapidly logging down stuff and b) it’s not actually about TODO lists but rather an approach for helping with self reflection and reaching your goals.

What I got from a) actually helped me a lot, but b) didn’t work for me at all. I do call my little notebook my Bullet Journal, but it is in fact mostly a TODO list combined with some personal tracking, and of course note taking.

I did adopt the symbols however: Tasks that are planned but not yet started get a • in front of them. I can cross that off with an X to turn it into “done”. If a task takes longer or spans across multiple days, I can cross it off halfway / to mark it as started or in progress. With < or > I can signify that a task was rescheduled (forwards or backwards). All of these symbols can just be drawn over the initial • and I find that an amazing way to keep track of more than two possible task states.

Additionally I also use ° for events, - to mark notes, = for mental and physical health related things and » for quotes.

So, how do I use all of this to organise my life now?

My journal contains two 30 sheet/60 page A5 books.

The first one is focused on the current month. I use it to keep track of my running tasks, logging my days, monitoring my vertigo symptoms and mood. It helps me a ton each day to see that I actually did get stuff done (even if it often doesn’t feel like it).

Each month I create an overview of tasks I should get done sometime this month in my Monthly Log, and an overview of the next month and anything later than that in my Future Log.

My Daily Log is combined with my mood tracker. I jot down one positive thing about each day (to combat the constant doom and gloom caused by living in this reality - it helps reading through what I write here at the end of each month). Even if it is just about taking an amazing nap that day, it counts.

Then follows a spread with my Vertigo Log. It’s a monthly log again with columns for the various symptoms and possible triggers I’m tracking, with some space for daily notes as well. Sorry, but I’m not including a picture here as all of that is a bit too personal to share publicly.

The rest of the notebook is organised by week. Each week I start with an overview of my repeating chores in the shape of an Alastair matrix. I have columns for all days of the week. Each task gets its own line, with a • in the column(s) of the day(s) where I need or want to take care of it, and another • right in front of the task that I get to cross off when it’s done.

On the second page of the spread I have my running list of things I need to take care of next week.

The next spread is my running tasks list for the week. I put everything here as it comes up. Like the chores list it’s a matrix allowing me to schedule each task for one or more specific days.

As you can see, I also color code tasks with markers, which allows me to easily filter the list at a glance. Green is work related, light blue are household chores, dark blue are health related tasks and pink are event related things.

I pre-fill the chores and tasks list based on the things I scheduled for this week over the course of last week, the monthly log & the weekly repeated chores.

On the next pages then follows my running log of the week. Each morning I jot down the current date and weekday, take note of the weather (and also keep that updated throughout the day - it’s a vertigo trigger) and then copy over all tasks scheduled for the day from the list of chores or tasks. Whatever comes up during the day gets added too, and also put on the running task list (I want that as a full overview of the week). If something comes up that doesn’t need to get done this week, I throw it on the list for next week, or next month or later, whatever fits.

What I also log into each day’s header are various symbols for habit tracking, and an overall mood indicator - I use that for the mood graph in the daily log.

That’s basically the day to day with the notebook: Jot down tasks as they come, get an overview each day, get sweet sweet dopamine every time I cross something off.

But what about the second book? That is for longer term tracking.

I have an overview of (recurring) tasks throughout the year here that I need to take care of. I use that at the start of each month to prefill the monthly log.

I also use the second notebook for long term work stuff, e.g. here is how I keep track of what I needed to take care of for each bugfix release for OctoPrint 1.11.x that wasn’t already logged in the shape of public issues, PRs or commits, e.g. things I need to mention in the changelog, or not yet published security advisories.

What else goes in there are ideas for various projects, what things I have borrowed to or from friends (and when and whether it was returned yet), what books I read, vacation plans, quick notes, notes about talks I’ve seen … In short, basically everything else. I have a ton of lists (the Bullet Journal Method calls those “collections”), some of which are getting constantly updated, some of which only act as reference.

Some things from the second book get copied over to my personal knowledge base that I keep in Obsidian (synced to my own NextCloud). As an example, I used the notebook last year during two PyCon Italia and EuroPython to take notes during the talks I attended, and those have now gone into my knowledge base (or turned into tasks long taken care of).

Really long term tasks - e.g. future vaccinations, check-ups and such - I still keep digitally in tasks.org (also synced to my own NextCloud). At some point they’ll trigger a reminder on my phone, and then they’ll get schedule in my regular task list.

At this point I can say that basically everything gets managed with the help of this tiny self built journal for almost a year now and that works amazingly well for me.

Needless to say I’ve cancelled my Todoist subscription. 😉 #iDIDit.

For a couple of years now I’ve had the sneaking suspicion that I’m neurodivergent. And while I still don’t have a diagnosis, there are several things I use to cope with my brain constantly going BRRRRRR, thinking (and worrying) about everything while forgetting important things, and I thought some of those might also be helpful to others.

Thus, here are five of my favourite lifehacks that I’ve been using to cope with the weirdness that is my brain. Some of them I’ve used for years before I ever suspected something, some of them I only discovered after reading up on neurodiversity. Maybe you find something interesting for yourself!

Waterproof post-its in the shower

My daily morning shower is a time I really do enjoy. It’s also a time where I seem to get quite creative from time to time, getting great ideas on how to solve existing problems in my life, or just remembering stuff I need to take care of. Of course, after getting out of the shower, once I’ve toweled off, most of that stuff is forgotten again.

A solution that has worked amazingly well for me here are waterproof post-its and a pencil that I just have stored high up in my shower! So when I get an idea or remember something important, I now just note it down on a post-it and immediately glue that post-it to the shower door. That last step is very important, because that way I have it basically right in my face while toweling myself off, and don’t forget to take it with me when I’m done with my morning routine to take care of it or note it down somewhere else (either my Obsidian knowledge base for ideas, or Todoist for TODOs).

That approach has been working well for me now for quite some years! Before I came across the waterproof post-its though, I tried the same approach with a diver writing panel. But with that I had the problem that I then either forgot that I had written something on it (as it hung inside the shower, not immediately visible while toweling off), or I forgot to clear it again (as I didn’t have an eraser right on hand) and so found it already full with notes when I needed to write something new on it. The post-it approach solves both points, as the notes are way more mobile that way, and taking one off the stack immediately gives me a fresh one.

Something that doesn’t get a post-it though is when my shower gel runs out - in that case I just throw the empty bottle out of the shower right away so I will stumble over it when I get out and remember to put it on the grocery list 😆

Visual timers

I have a problem with timers (e.g. for the laundry) going off when I’m right in the middle of something at work, not immediately able to react to it, and then promptly forgetting about it. And I have a problem with noticing time run by in general when I’m in the flow.

For the longest time this was causing me a ton of stress and cases of “Oh no, not again”, but these days I have that pretty well under control after putting a visual timer on my work desk and one in the living room. And that’s a trick I only discovered after reading up on neurodiversity and learning about time blindness.

Laundry timer just went off but I’m deep in some code, hunting a bug? My hand now automatically just reaches to the visual timer and sets up something like 30min on it. I only want to work on this work item for an hour (time box, follow-up appointment, it’s already 5pm and I really should call it a day soon, …)? Hand out, timer on 60min. I have to wait 10min to check my COVID test? Hand out, timer on 10min.

All of that would of course also work with a timer on my phone, but this works better for me: There’s a physical timer right in front of me, with a physical wheel I can turn to set a time, and I don’t have to parse the numbers on the front either, the amount of time is clearly visible by how much red I see.

Where my phone does come in though is when I know I have an appointment sometime in the day. This causes me a ton of stress for the whole day until the appointment because I know there’s something coming up that I must not miss, and then I’m scared of forgetting all about time again and missing it, causing me to not be able to concentrate on anything else very well. What has helped me here is putting one to several alarms on my phone before the actual appointment, giving me an early warning that the time is coming close, and allowing me to relax until that happens.

Physical callbacks

Another problem I often encounter is having to remember to do something at some point in the near future. My forgetfulness is becoming a bit of a pattern here I guess 😅

Some examples:

• I have a bunch of envelopes I need to bring to the next mailbox the next time I’m out. (Hello OctoPrint Patreons at $10+ 👋)
• We just had a BBQ on the balcony and now the grill has to cool down before I can close and cover it again.
• There are dinner left-overs that need to go into the fridge or freezer, but currently they are still too warm for that.
• I need to remember to do something come monday when I’m back at my desk, which I can only do at my desk, e.g. ordering a new prescription.

For things like that I usually use a quick physical callback.

Something I still have to do before going to sleep, e.g. take care of the grill or the left-overs? I put something in the hallway that doesn’t belong there. Usually that’s my rolled up yoga mat, as that’s a quick and easy thing to do given its usual place. I have to remember to take care of something while out? I put it on top of my shoes or throw it into a bag I hang from the apartment door’s handle. Something I need to take care off at my desk? A note stuck into my keyboard or the empty prescription thrown on my desk work wonders.

Large water bottle at my desk

I tend to not drink enough when I don’t have water immediately in reach. So now I always keep a large refillable water bottle on my desk that I can drink from directly and that can stay open without a big risk of spilling. Currently that’s a 1l or 1.5l Nalgene wide mouth with an OTF cap.

Bottle + glass never worked well for me - constantly having to refill the glass is something that annoys me greatly, plus I tend to forget it (of course…). Smaller bottle also doesn’t work, constantly empty. And a larger bottle than 1.5l poses the issue that I have to take it to the kitchen to refill from the tap, vs just being able to take care of that during the regular bathroom break (which is WAY faster).

The goal here is to make it as easy as possible for me to - often absentmindedly - drink water, and that’s achieved with that approach, allowing me to reach my daily 2-3l of fluid intake.

Sleep headphones & audio books

My brain doesn’t shut up fscking ever, and it interferes with my nightly rest. Imagine trying to fall asleep when your brain is constantly thinking about the latest bug in your code, code architecture, what groceries you need to buy, upcoming elections, that discussion in that issue you had this morning, that email you still have to write tomorrow, …

It’s only when I’m completely and utterly exhausted that I can fall asleep right away, otherwise it’s a long struggle of trying to ignore my brain and coming down from the day before it works.

Thankfully, I discovered sleep headphones for myself a long time ago, so headphones in the shape of a headband with some really flat speakers inside and a bluetooth module or wired connection to your phone or mp3 player.

Those allow me to listen to things without disturbing my partner. And those things for me usually are audio versions of books I already happen to know. The latter is extremely important, as with books I don’t know yet, my curiousity into how the story continues might keep me from falling asleep. I have the same issue I with most podcasts. But audio books of books I’ve already read work amazingly well. I set the sleep timer in my audio player to something like 30min and then just close my eyes and listen. My brain shuts up as I’m keeping it busy with listening and imagining what’s going on in the book, and I often manage to drift off in less than 10min.

So there you are, five lifehacks that make my daily life easier for me!