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How to avoid losing items? Holding pens

blog.alexwendland.com

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Re: How to avoid losing items? Holding pens

#31

Post by treetalker »

My approach is to have separate “take-off” points near the entrance/exit of each room.

Example: If I’m in my home office and find that some things need to go to the living room and some to the kitchen, I simply queue them to take off instead of taking a trip every time I realize an item needs to go. Then when I take a coffee break, I’ll grab all the items; drop the living-room items off on the way to the kitchen, and drop the kitchen items off when I arrive. I get my coffee; grab anything queued up on the kitchen take-off point that can be dropped off on the way, and drop them off on my way back.

As it works out, everything is almost always where it ought to be; and when it’s not, I know where it will be instead.

The key is that I always check the take-off point every time I leave a room.

Re: How to avoid losing items? Holding pens

#32

Post by jeffparsons »

tombert wrote: post #21

I just end up buying enough of the item to be within arms reach of nearly anywhere I'm likely to use it. I used to never be able to find a screwdriver when I needed it, so now I have seven screwdrivers: three regular ratcheting, three stubby ratcheting, and a ratcheting one that lives in my pocket. I keep a regular ratcheting on my desk, in my living room, and in my bedroom, which are the only places I would realisti…

I applied this rule to tape measures, because I found I never had one when I needed one, e.g., out in the car. So my new rule became: if you can't easily find a tape measure when you need one, buy another one at your earliest convenience.

Now I have one in my work bag, at least one in the car, one in my main toolbox, a few hiding around other places in the garage, one in the kitchen, probably one upstairs, on in my desk drawer, etc.

No regrets. Life is better now.

Re: How to avoid losing items? Holding pens

#33

Post by treetalker »

tonymet wrote: post #3

Best cleaning / organizational tip I’ve learned : everything out of place goes into a tote. Every day shuttle the tote around the house to deposit the items in their rightful place. This reduces reorganizing to linear time

Yeah, but where does the tote live? It’s mobile and might not be where I need it when I need it. Then I go looking for it, and all of a sudden I have two problems and have difficulty getting back to what I was doing in the first place. :-)

Re: How to avoid losing items? Holding pens

#34

Post by tombert »

ghaff wrote: post #24
tombert wrote: post #21

I just end up buying enough of the item to be within arms reach of nearly anywhere I'm likely to use it. I used to never be able to find a screwdriver when I needed it, so now I have seven screwdrivers: three regular ratcheting, three stubby ratcheting, and a ratcheting one that lives in my pocket. I keep a regular ratcheting on my desk, in my living room, and in my bedroom, which are the only places I would realisti…

Yeah. You can't do it with everything but, for example, I tend to have a stocked travel kit that I don't need to raid (for the most part) for everyday charging gear. My laptops live where they live and I'll bring their chargers with them; they basically don't move unless I'm traveling. My office has some tools and my garage has some tools. I may need to raid one or the other but not for routine stuff. I certainly don…

Yep, I keep a laptop USB-C charger in my backpack, so I don’t have to unplug things and move things.

As you said, you can’t do this for everything; some things are too expensive or take too much room to have a million duplicates of, but I don’t feel like I lose those things as much.

The things I feel like I loose are generally relatively inexpensive, like pens or scissors or screwdrivers. I got lasik so I don’t need them anymore, but i used to have 10 of the $7.95 pairs of glasses spread out everywhere as well, in case I lost a contact lens at work or something.

Aliexpress is kind of a godsend for me. A lot of tools on there in particular are shockingly good.

Re: How to avoid losing items? Holding pens

#35

Post by tombert »

fnord77 wrote: post #26
tombert wrote: post #21

I just end up buying enough of the item to be within arms reach of nearly anywhere I'm likely to use it. I used to never be able to find a screwdriver when I needed it, so now I have seven screwdrivers: three regular ratcheting, three stubby ratcheting, and a ratcheting one that lives in my pocket. I keep a regular ratcheting on my desk, in my living room, and in my bedroom, which are the only places I would realisti…

my car keys cost $350 each

Yeah I mentioned in a sibling comment that there are things that are too expensive to have a bunch of, so you can’t do it for everything, just relatively cheap “I can never seem to find X when I need it…” stuff.

Re: How to avoid losing items? Holding pens

#38

Post by tombert »

jeffparsons wrote: post #32
tombert wrote: post #21

I just end up buying enough of the item to be within arms reach of nearly anywhere I'm likely to use it. I used to never be able to find a screwdriver when I needed it, so now I have seven screwdrivers: three regular ratcheting, three stubby ratcheting, and a ratcheting one that lives in my pocket. I keep a regular ratcheting on my desk, in my living room, and in my bedroom, which are the only places I would realisti…

I applied this rule to tape measures, because I found I never had one when I needed one, e.g., out in the car. So my new rule became: if you can't easily find a tape measure when you need one, buy another one at your earliest convenience. Now I have one in my work bag, at least one in the car, one in my main toolbox, a few hiding around other places in the garage, one in the kitchen, probably one upstairs, on in my d…

I did the same thing when Dollar Tree started stocking tape measures for $1.25. I figured that they’ll be accurate enough and I do need to measure stuff a lot, so I have ended up buying four.

I also have a keychain one that lives on my house keys, which has come in handy a few times (even if it is limited to 6 feet).

Re: How to avoid losing items? Holding pens

#40

Post by refurb »

My solution, from years of living out of a suitcase traveling for work, was “everything has a place”.

Need a pen? It’s in the first pocket of the backpack. When done, it goes back there. Need a charging cable, in the zipper pouch on the outside. When I unplug it, it only goes back there - no where else.

The other that helps when it comes to leaving stuff behind in a hotel room is a designated space - say on the desk. Anything removed from baggage - clothes, pens, computer, passport - doesn’t go anywhere but the desk. Then when you need to leave the room, you don’t need to search the room, only clear the desk.

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