It was a good idea, I suspect, at the time, but now, I suspect, it’s not and have decided to stop.

Two years ago, in a fit of something-or-other (a technical term) I decided to keep daily log in which I tracked, at various points during the day, where I was, what I was doing, and how I was feeling. I drew pictures of key events as if I was looking over my own shoulder and also tracked the weather and, eventually, my meals by drawing pictures of them. It was an excuse to use up notebooks and ink and test pens.

The first year, I carried the log around with me which, quite frankly, is exactly the point of the log. Stopping to record what I was doing was fun, but it was a lot of dead weight. The second year I changed notebooks but left it at home, turning it into more of a diary.

The second year, I would fill out the morning weather and offer a summary of how I was feeling in the morning. When I got home after my day job I would summarize the day at that point and then record my lunch and the weather. Later, reasonably close to bed, I would summarize the evening and the day and, as I had in the first year, draw a few key events as if I was looking over my own shoulder.

After a couple weeks, I started adding color to the events and, a few days later, to the food and started keeping track of what I was wearing. Sort of.

The first color picture in the log.

A couple weeks later, I wore my Kansas State University sweatshirt and was still adding color to the events. Note: those are beans flying at my head, not bullets. Also, those are costume ogre horns, not my natural, undisguised appearance.

Although I kept up the daily habit of keeping up the log, I missed the immediacy of having it with me. I also felt as if my entire system had a lot of moving parts, even if one of those parts stayed on my desk. By the end of the year, the log felt more like the annoying paperwork in a job than a fun activity.

As such, I’ve started carrying a different kind of planner and, knowing me, will probably turn it into a portable mini-log. I did find it was interesting to see what I was wearing from day to day, especially on work days. A friend of mine used to plan out his entire wardrobe for the semester based on the theory that students change their opinion of you if they see you wearing the same outfit.

I’ll also probably keep track of the weather and maybe my wardrobe, but I’m more interested in recording what I accomplish during the day versus what I planned.

This will probably be ugly, though. Interesting, but ugly (more on all this in a future post).