A new study has found that women get royally pissed when they’re given a nickname in the office.  No, they’re not talking about that time your boss got drunk at the holiday party and called you Tits McGee.  The names included on the no-no list ranged from the benign “kiddo” to the slightly more (okay, a lot more) bizarre “poppet”.  While the study was conducted on women of various ages in the workforce, I do suspect this aversion to causal titles had to have stemmed from somewhere.  Perhaps a too-friendly college professor?  A nagging group of guy friends?  A fake-nice roommate from hell?

Becoming so drastically offended by someone referring to a peer as “dear” (also on the list at #8), just seems a little extreme to me.  I know you’re all probably envisioning some grotesque, perverted, middle-aged dude with a heavy breathing problem leering at you while rasping, “Hey darlin’ (#2) , bend over. I think I dropped my pen.”  And yes, that would be gross.

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Last time, I went room by room and identified what needed to be done to organize and make most efficient use of the space in my small house. School is starting again in a month and I wanted to have everything in its place and better systems for some of my everyday activities.

I started in the office, concentrating in the computer area. College seems to bring with it numerous credit card offers and bills and notifications that always seem to be tucked in various places on the desk, asking to be thrown away or forgotten. So I got very a simple, $3 silver mail sorter that went nicely with our translucent blue desk (who says you can’t be functional and stylish?.) There are slots for outgoing mail, my mail and my boyfriend’s. Using this simple system, we have been able to keep track of our mail much better. Now I can pay my bills on time and not have mini heart attacks when I can’t find that one, really important piece of mail.

If you are anything like me, disorganization is not simply limited to your desk. No maam; it extends also to planner and mind. It’s difficult to remember due dates in the midst of piles of homework, so I got a small dry erase board from a dollar store and stuck it to the nearest wall with all the due dates for our monthly payments. It’s not written down and forgotten about in some small place in my planner or on a note that will get lost; it’s in a place that I can’t help but look at. Read More »