The Sunday Review

I’ve decided that I am going to do a review every Sunday because not only do I want to look at new books and audio programs that I’m reading or have just read, but also review some of the ones that have influenced me in the past.

If you read my blog and enjoy it I guess you must have least a passing liking for my sense of humor. It’s not normal I admit, but it keeps me chuckling to myself for hours on end and if a few other kindred spirits can chuckle along with me, then so much the better.

I read a number of other self-development sites a few of which are excellent, but they seldom make me laugh. I know that’s not always the point and on the whole they are there to provide information to help people make beneficial changes should they so wish, and not necessarily to have people rolling around clutching their sides in fits of hysterical guffawing. Having said that. I like to laugh a lot, so when I do occasionally find a blog that not only offers great advice, but also allows me to titter, snicker and belly laugh too boot, I like to tell others.

So here I am today not only telling you about a very funny and interesting blog but also about an e-book that stemmed from that blog.

Putting Things Off is a productivity/tech blog for people that might not normally read productivity/tech blogs. It blends latest news, trends and information with a highly amusing delivery that will have you wetting yourself. You’ll not laugh, you’ll just wet yourself. I’m not going to review the site as such because now I’ve told you it’s brilliant you can click through and check it out for yourself

I do want to look at an e-book that Nick from Putting Things Off has published called ‘todoodlist’ If you are a David Allen devotee and think Getting Things Done is the bible of productivity then you may not like this particular style of approach. GTD as it has rather absurdly become known (just wait till my book is called DASQTANSQ – then I’ll know I’ve made it) is a very useful book, but it was about as entertaining a read as ‘Concrete Weekly incorporating The Gravel Digest’ It was written for a certain type of person, a boring one I’d like to say, but that would be unfair and probably not even true but it was dry, very dry.
‘todoodlist’ is not like that at all; in fact it is highly amusing. Nick went back to basics, right back to basics. In fact, if he’d gone any further back he’s have been chiseling away inside a cave without the use of a pre-frontal cortex.

He passed up on his pc, palm pilot, and planner and in their place introduced a pencil and piece of paper. He then got Peter Piper to pick a peck of pickled pepper and probably poked Peter Pipers plucky, poorly, portly parrot for pleasure. I’m not 100% sure of the last bit, I’m reading between the lines, but I do know he definitely reverted to a pen and paper.

The whole premise of the book is that we have a tendency to overcomplicate matters and just because some electrical device comes along and claims to be the answer to all our productivity woes, doesn’t necessarily make it so. The reason why we used pencils and paper (or some form of them) for hundreds of years wasn’t simply because we were all sat around waiting for somebody to invent the iPhone, it was because they worked.

As a man that has to juggle 3 things: Am I supposed to be seeing a client? I supposed to be writing? Or am I good to lounge around doing neither of the first two things? Then any more streamlining of my life would be somewhat superfluous. As I read the book though, it did become apparent to me that if I were to need a quick and easy way to see what projects and work I had on the go at any one time, then Nicks idea was cunning in it’s simplicity.

Nick wasn’t satisfied with simply revamping the to do list, he took on other aspects that we come to expect from PDA’s such as the calendar, notes and even using a banana as a reminder. I’d like to say the last one was a metaphor, but he really did use a banana to write reminders on.

The book is a clever blend of new and old technology. I did feel a little like I was reading an amalgam of some of the best bits of The 4 Hour Work Week and Getting Things Done for the last chapter, but that’s a minor quibble because it was a damn fine read

Just in case you were in any doubt, this is NOT a paid review. I do not do paid reviews and only review stuff that I actually like.

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