A cluttered mind and clean desk...or a cluttered desk?

I've heard it said that you can tell a lot about a person by his or her desk.  The size, shape, clutter...this scares the hell out of me.

                 this was Albert Einstein's desk.......really.

Apparently at the office I am a hand-me-down ugly metal throwback from the 1970s, complete with a drawer positioned perfectly to leave a constant bruise on your thigh and just enough storage for 3 items, give or take, you choose what they consist of. For me they are cell phone, keys and a random freebie from a conference long since forgotten.  Anyway, not my optimal work environment to say the least, but, it sure looks better than it did when I got here.

At home I'm an over-sized some assembly required fake wood big box store special with 6 months worth of paid bills, receipts and junkmail cluttered into piles... and on top...pre-school and kindergarten artwork (not mine, I'm not that much of a packrat).  My intention with the home office was to have it act as the central 'mother brain" of the household.  The place where photos get downloaded and organized and where the perfect playlists are compiled and uploaded to Ipods.  It has not really come to fruition at this point....a year after it was created.  I am still hopeful though.  Others in the house, not as much.

At any rate, it scares me more than a bit that my work areas are so seemingly haphazard and discombobulated.  But you know what, somehow, it all seems to work out just fine.  I have a photographic memory.  Somehow my brain seems to catalog the mess and unless it is moved and "organized" by someone other than myself, I can almost always find what I am looking for.  Granted it is a stressful place to sit and work, but that pushes me to grab the laptop and get out.  Which I am fairly sure is why laptops were created.  People realized that an office may be a great place to collect things you think you need to keep but don't care enough about to put in a place you frequent...but it is really no place to get any work done.


I started this post a few months ago...in my office.  I am finishing it on the laptop, outside.  Where the sun is shining and the only thing on the table other than the computer is a cold beer.