This week, I was going to write about band names, but, I got sidetracked while looking for unlined yellow pads (I remember reading somewhere that Elmore Leonard admitted to writing on these with his Mont Blanc).
I didn’t find those – do they exist?
Instead, I found 43folders.com – “a bunch of tricks, hacks and stuff.”

First, the name. Turns out ‘43’ is the number of manila folders in a tickler file. In his FAQs, Merlin Mann, the guy who runs the site, mentions that there are a number of other sites with 43 in their name, but they are about losing weight or kicking crystal. This is only site – the only brand – that I know of that uses 43 in its name.
The name is a winner.

Second, when I read the Hipster PDA entry, I was hooked. I’m longtime user of filecards and binder clips to stay organized. Merlin goes into some detail on how to use these as opposed to a PDA. (I eBayed my Palm Pilot years ago after it crashed and lost all my addresses, went old school, and now use the 3×5s, a binder clip and a 2005 Moleskine Pocket Diary. Merlin, BTW, is a huge Moleskine fan as well.)

Third, there is actually a lot of useful stuff here if you’re obsessed with personal productivity without wanting to resort to using Franklin Covey or the trend du jour. Merlin is a disciple of Getting Things Done and his intro to the book is damn funny. Especially why GTD appeals to geek nerds.

But 43folders isn’t just about personal productivity. There are a bunch of useful creativity and productivity hacks (=life hacks), an obsession with Moleskines (which we share) (plus it’s the only place I’ve ever seen that mentions the bright orange cover Engineer Notebook).

Thanks to 43Folders, I learned about and downloaded Quicksilver and am finding out that it is a useful tool for Mac users. (More on this later).
Kudos to Merlin for a great and useful site.