Calendar Killed the Filo-Star

In the not so distant past, I was an ardent fan of pocket organisers, carrying my various filofaxes and most recently, a BREE diary everywhere I went. It was a yearly ritual to get a new calendar refill and to leaf through the old one to copy important dates. Back in the days when I did not own a smartphone which invites me to download fancy applications, I would get a kick out of buying overpriced "add-ons" for my filofax: a London map, transparent business-card holders, tiny sticky notes - you name it, I had it. My whole life was in my filofax - all addresses, PINs and passwords (well hidden and "encoded"), everyone's birthdays, the first ever euro banknote I got out of an ATM on January 1, 2002, photos with friends taken in photo booths. At every book club meeting, each and every one of us would get their respective organisers out of their handbags and decide on the dates for the following sessions. These days we use Doodle, a very handy online calendar/survey tool, by the way.

Then I started working for the Firm where everyone used an electronic calendar and gradually became quite fond of that application (I've told you about my stalker tendencies before...). For some months, I continued to my organiser with me until it became too time-consuming to always make two entries, one electronic, one handwritten. Calendar won and I acknowledged its victory by not buying the 2009 filofax refill. Occasionally, my little green friend gives me a reproachful look from the shelf next to my desk, but I assure him that I won't puthim on eBay.