What a delightful adventure. I gotta say Rebecca, your writing reminds me most of Enid Blyton. I think you should try your hand a writing a few adventure stories! 🤗
I'd forgotten about air tags. As for your scurrilous dismissal of my suggestions, I know someone who put her house keys in the fridge once. After an hour of frantically searching, she thought ok, let’s think calmly with a cup of tea, and when she went to get the milk, there they were.
Many years ago, I saw my friend and her children by a postbox on a street corner. Sleep deprived with toddler and baby in tow, she hadn’t been able to find her keys when she arrived home after shopping. She retraced her steps to no avail and wondered if maybe she had dropped them near the postbox, when she had posted a letter. As we searched the pavement and nearby grass verge, a postman arrived to empty the postbox. I moved out of his way and explained why we were searching the ground. He opened the box and began emptying it. “Are these your keys” he asked pulling them out from among the letters. With a look of amazement, my friend thanked him and opened her bag to put them safely away. “And is that the letter you meant to post ?”he asked, pointing to the letter still in her bag.
Actually I had done you a disservice - I leave so many things in all sorts of places! Yours were great ideas for places in which to look, and I really did appreciate your support of my plight! 😊
I love this post. I often look up at the plough and look for the other stars. I can feel your pain losing your notebook. I lose things all the time the tension grows until I make myself sit down and calm. Then it starts again. I have solved the problem of the missing notebook…….I just another one. I now have loads of notebook everywhere. So I am not sure that is a solution 🤔😘
Thanks, Jo! Replacing the notebook is one thing - but when you really really need the notes that are in the notebook that’s missing, well, that’s a problem that a new notebook won’t solve! 🤣
Rebecca. I love this, and also: your repurposing of the elastic bands that come wrapped around hiking socks. 💫 I see you. ✊ I use them as hair bands but this is just next level.
Brilliant! Hilarious too - and very impressed with your system! You've also reminded me that I used to have a similar thing using an old-school Address Book (with those wee alphabetical side tabs!) but then I had to remember what I had "filed" everything under. Which was later both a challenge and surprise lol. I love YOUR book with its actual page numbers, never seen that before.
Love this. Love your wonderful eccentricity, which I mean in the most complimentary way.
Terry's response were so right - you have no idea how often I put things in off-the-wall places because I'm not concentrating. Tonight, my car keys were in my make-up bag and dog treats were in my wallet. Don't ask although I will say I am not senile. Yet!
I'm in awe of the tracker and must have one for my car keys. And my glasses! Oh, and bracelets that I lose. And my mind this week, obviously.
And I'm desperate to go outside and check the Big Dipper so that I can find the North Star.
For some reason, I feel very Philip Pullman-esque, thinking about it. Something to muse on.
Awww, it's a lovely compliment, Prue - thank you so much! 😘
You've made me laugh out loud with the car keys in your make-up bag and dog treats in your wallet - that's brilliant!
It's Sunday morning here, which means it's Sunday evening in Tas. So: I hope you have a peaceful and really good night's sleep, and I shall be thinking of you tomorrow. xxx
Oh, how lovely, Mary - what a wonderful way to think about them.
My favourite star is Capella, because she actively twinkles - she's very special. And Cassiopeia is my favourite constellation, because of its 'W' shape - that was the first letter of my maiden name.
Thanks, Rebecca, and how great you have a favorite star and constellation, too. My favorite constellation is Orion's Belt, and my planet - Venus. I miss seeing millions of stars at night because the light pollution in Austin is remarkable.
Oooh, I love Orion - he’s one of only a few constellations that I can recognise at a glance! Bad luck re the light pollution - our sky here is pretty good for stars, because we live in a rural village with only two streetlights to its name.
Now this is a use case for an Air Tag! I used to have Tiles, which do a similar thing, but I let the batteries die…I’m not known to lose much, but an Air Tag could be useful for vital things like a notebook!
To be honest I'm now thinking of attaching AirTags to EVERYTHING! Not only do I lose my car IN car parks, but I even forget in WHICH car park I've parked it in the first place. Need to tag my wheels for sure!
So glad you found your notebook, Rebecca! As I was reading, I immediately thought of suggesting an Air Tag, so great minds obviously think alike. I would have the same problem if I lost my bullet journal (which, being an A5, is at least a little harder to misplace); I regularly tell people that if it isn't written in BuJo, it isn't going to happen, so I guess I would just become a hermit.
Thanks, Deborah! Gosh, you've given me the heeby-jeebies - if I ever lose my bullet journal I would be toast! Like yours, mine runs my life.
My BuJo comes with me most of the time, unless I'm travelling light, and I engage with it multiple times a day. I'm so grateful to have discovered the system - I started my first in 2018, and now it's second nature. All hail the Bullet Journal! 🙌
Oh Rebecca! I was absolutely 🤢 the whole time I read this and so relieved the notebook was found! I also carry a small notebook everywhere - soft cover, pen inside, held by a strap just like yours - and I would be DEVASTATED if I lost it!
We’re kindred spirits, Jen, both with knowing that awful, awful feeling that something precious is lost - and the fact that we’re both notebook people! 🙌
Wow! What a journey! And what a relief! I loved the image of Jim on his hands and knees chasing dust bunnies ( I would keep this husband, if I were you. ) And your final paragraph so seamlessly tied your initial star exploration into the lost notebook. Inspiring, as usual, Rebecca, not only in content, but in style and structure!
I've been keeping a journal since October 12, 1978, and it has mounted up to 70+ volumes and 6m+ words by now. My deep fear: That the 1904 barn I write in will finally burn down after 120 years, and all of my journal entries will go up in smoke. So I hired a tech person from the local university to scan them all. Now I worry that the internet will burn down, and all of my backups will be gone, too. We scribblers have so much to worry about!
And gosh, what a very good question! Yes, I did - as little short notes as they occurred to me days later. I’ve got - from a few days after I’d lost it:
‘Losing my notebook and losing my way.’
‘Take screenshot of notification.’
‘The north star.’
And then - dated Thursday (so, two days before I published the post) - there’s a whole page of notes - sentences and half-sentences to include in the post, and some notes about AirTags.
I’m now kicking myself for not taking pictures of THOSE pages to illustrate this post. Might do that later, and update the post accordingly! 🤣
Oh, gosh, I didn't mean it to be a "you should've" question. Just a curiosity. Sometimes I write things on a To Do list that I've already done. I wondered if this worked the same way. Love that you captured the event. It deserves that!
Oh no, I didn’t read it as a ‘you should’ve’ at all! I just can’t believe I’d missed the opportunity to show my notes relating to the lost notebook IN the actual lost notebook! I’ve updated the post now to include a picture of the actual page - it’s the pic right at the bottom. 😊
And yes, I do that with my To Do list! Some might feel that that’s a bit of a cheat, but it really isn’t - my list for each day is contained in my bullet journal, and it contains not only tasks but notes about things that happened that day, who might have called, a bill I might have paid, how work went, that kind of thing - so it’s like a whole record of things that I might want to refer back to. For example, it wasn’t on yesterday’s list to cut the grass, but we nevertheless cut the grass - so I added ‘Cut grass’ to the list and marked it as done, so that when I want to know when we last cut the grass, well, there it is!
Blimey, I’ve just read that back to myself and I sound absolutely barmy! 🤪
Um… I have a ‘journal’ / daily diary with similar notations in it. So at least two of us are barmy. Hmmm…. I think I may have mentioned my mother’s exercise books at some point. That’s where I learned it, though thankfully I don’t record daily temperature ranges. Just particularly extreme conditions. Our comfort diaries. Such is life.
Neither of you sounds barmy in my view! I've never managed to keep daily lists or journal entries. When my mother was alive (she was a BIG list-maker), my bi-monthly letters to her served as some sort of record of life events. Now I suppose Chicken Scratch has taken up some version of that baton. A close relative (I'll protect his identity but will note that it's not my husband nor my father!) wrote down what he wore each day, particularly which tie, and what his wife served for dinner, with little sidebar remarks indicating how much or little he approved of the meal. 😬 😒 🤨 Y'all are all good!
LOL at your close relative but gosh, although I don't do that on a daily basis I DO do that if I know I'm going to be seeing the same people for a regular event. I was doing a course a few years ago which was all day every Friday for several weeks in succession. I don't own many clothes, and wash and wear the same few things on repeat - anyway, I made sure to make a note of which outfits I'd already worn!
I know that the only person worrying about it was me, but I felt more confident knowing (thanks to my record-keeping) that it wouldn't look as if I only owned one outfit! 🤣
I'm so glad you found it! My car key has one, after a lengthy sojourn underneath my big upholstered chair last year. It fell through the bottom and wasn't found for several weeks, during which I had to use my backup key. And I know the freezer and such, sound like ridiculous places to look but I have honestly found my glasses there, after removing them because they were fogging up in the cold air!
SUCH a good idea to tag your keys! And gosh, that’s the sort of place I would never have dreamed of looking for my keys - I’m staggered that you had EVER found them!
LOL re your glasses in the freezer - but that does make perfect sense!
I remember years ago - we’re talking the 1980s - a family member was given a little electronic keyring that whistled when you clapped your hands, the idea that you’d never lose your keys. The novelty wore off pretty quickly, as did the battery life! 🤣
We had a lamp that lit when clapped-at-- it was okay, I guess. And the only reason I eventually found the key was that I was cleaning and moved the chair. I'd long since given up the search, although I knew it was at home since the car was at home!
What a delightful adventure. I gotta say Rebecca, your writing reminds me most of Enid Blyton. I think you should try your hand a writing a few adventure stories! 🤗
And congrats on finding that notebook back!
Ooooooh, well, that notebook of mine goes on many adventures, so gosh, I might just explore that idea! Thank you so much, Punit! 😁
Thank you for taking us on this journey. :-)
Aww, and thank YOU for reading, Christian! 😊
I'd forgotten about air tags. As for your scurrilous dismissal of my suggestions, I know someone who put her house keys in the fridge once. After an hour of frantically searching, she thought ok, let’s think calmly with a cup of tea, and when she went to get the milk, there they were.
I did that once as a new mum, Terry. The keys were in the fridge and the milk was on the table in the hall !
🤣🤣 Thanks, Maureen! I will pass that on to the person who did it. Chortle
Many years ago, I saw my friend and her children by a postbox on a street corner. Sleep deprived with toddler and baby in tow, she hadn’t been able to find her keys when she arrived home after shopping. She retraced her steps to no avail and wondered if maybe she had dropped them near the postbox, when she had posted a letter. As we searched the pavement and nearby grass verge, a postman arrived to empty the postbox. I moved out of his way and explained why we were searching the ground. He opened the box and began emptying it. “Are these your keys” he asked pulling them out from among the letters. With a look of amazement, my friend thanked him and opened her bag to put them safely away. “And is that the letter you meant to post ?”he asked, pointing to the letter still in her bag.
BEST LOST KEYS STORY EVER!!!!! Thank you so much for sharing it here, Maureen - the postman’s punchline was EVERYTHING! 🙌🤣😁
So pleased you enjoyed it Rebecca.
Hahaha!!! Oh I can SO imagine that.
🤣 I love that!!!!!!!!!!!! 🤣
Actually I had done you a disservice - I leave so many things in all sorts of places! Yours were great ideas for places in which to look, and I really did appreciate your support of my plight! 😊
I love this post. I often look up at the plough and look for the other stars. I can feel your pain losing your notebook. I lose things all the time the tension grows until I make myself sit down and calm. Then it starts again. I have solved the problem of the missing notebook…….I just another one. I now have loads of notebook everywhere. So I am not sure that is a solution 🤔😘
Thanks, Jo! Replacing the notebook is one thing - but when you really really need the notes that are in the notebook that’s missing, well, that’s a problem that a new notebook won’t solve! 🤣
Rebecca. I love this, and also: your repurposing of the elastic bands that come wrapped around hiking socks. 💫 I see you. ✊ I use them as hair bands but this is just next level.
Thanks, Jill! And HA - yes, well spotted!!!!! 🤣
Brilliant! Hilarious too - and very impressed with your system! You've also reminded me that I used to have a similar thing using an old-school Address Book (with those wee alphabetical side tabs!) but then I had to remember what I had "filed" everything under. Which was later both a challenge and surprise lol. I love YOUR book with its actual page numbers, never seen that before.
Inspired and charmed. And Jim is a lovely man!
LOL - thanks, Sue! Systems are everything - but they only work when they work - mine are in a state of constant evolution!
You're right about Jim. I'm a lucky girl. 🥰
Love this. Love your wonderful eccentricity, which I mean in the most complimentary way.
Terry's response were so right - you have no idea how often I put things in off-the-wall places because I'm not concentrating. Tonight, my car keys were in my make-up bag and dog treats were in my wallet. Don't ask although I will say I am not senile. Yet!
I'm in awe of the tracker and must have one for my car keys. And my glasses! Oh, and bracelets that I lose. And my mind this week, obviously.
And I'm desperate to go outside and check the Big Dipper so that I can find the North Star.
For some reason, I feel very Philip Pullman-esque, thinking about it. Something to muse on.
Awww, it's a lovely compliment, Prue - thank you so much! 😘
You've made me laugh out loud with the car keys in your make-up bag and dog treats in your wallet - that's brilliant!
It's Sunday morning here, which means it's Sunday evening in Tas. So: I hope you have a peaceful and really good night's sleep, and I shall be thinking of you tomorrow. xxx
Watching a lovely movie called Fishermens' Friends. Keeping me occupied.
Greater bear, lesser bear, the North Star were my childhood nighttime friends. Great post, RH.
Oh, how lovely, Mary - what a wonderful way to think about them.
My favourite star is Capella, because she actively twinkles - she's very special. And Cassiopeia is my favourite constellation, because of its 'W' shape - that was the first letter of my maiden name.
Thanks, Rebecca, and how great you have a favorite star and constellation, too. My favorite constellation is Orion's Belt, and my planet - Venus. I miss seeing millions of stars at night because the light pollution in Austin is remarkable.
Oooh, I love Orion - he’s one of only a few constellations that I can recognise at a glance! Bad luck re the light pollution - our sky here is pretty good for stars, because we live in a rural village with only two streetlights to its name.
Sounds dreamy to have just 2 street lights!
Seems I miscounted! There are two on the way out of the village, so I guess that makes four! 🤣
😂
Now this is a use case for an Air Tag! I used to have Tiles, which do a similar thing, but I let the batteries die…I’m not known to lose much, but an Air Tag could be useful for vital things like a notebook!
To be honest I'm now thinking of attaching AirTags to EVERYTHING! Not only do I lose my car IN car parks, but I even forget in WHICH car park I've parked it in the first place. Need to tag my wheels for sure!
So glad you found your notebook, Rebecca! As I was reading, I immediately thought of suggesting an Air Tag, so great minds obviously think alike. I would have the same problem if I lost my bullet journal (which, being an A5, is at least a little harder to misplace); I regularly tell people that if it isn't written in BuJo, it isn't going to happen, so I guess I would just become a hermit.
Thanks, Deborah! Gosh, you've given me the heeby-jeebies - if I ever lose my bullet journal I would be toast! Like yours, mine runs my life.
My BuJo comes with me most of the time, unless I'm travelling light, and I engage with it multiple times a day. I'm so grateful to have discovered the system - I started my first in 2018, and now it's second nature. All hail the Bullet Journal! 🙌
Oh Rebecca! I was absolutely 🤢 the whole time I read this and so relieved the notebook was found! I also carry a small notebook everywhere - soft cover, pen inside, held by a strap just like yours - and I would be DEVASTATED if I lost it!
We’re kindred spirits, Jen, both with knowing that awful, awful feeling that something precious is lost - and the fact that we’re both notebook people! 🙌
Wow! What a journey! And what a relief! I loved the image of Jim on his hands and knees chasing dust bunnies ( I would keep this husband, if I were you. ) And your final paragraph so seamlessly tied your initial star exploration into the lost notebook. Inspiring, as usual, Rebecca, not only in content, but in style and structure!
Yeah, he’s a keeper! Ten years this year (although we’ve known each other for eighteen).
Thank you so very much, Sharron, for the very fine compliment to my writing - I really appreciate it.
And thank you too for your support with my lost notebook at the time! 😘
I've been keeping a journal since October 12, 1978, and it has mounted up to 70+ volumes and 6m+ words by now. My deep fear: That the 1904 barn I write in will finally burn down after 120 years, and all of my journal entries will go up in smoke. So I hired a tech person from the local university to scan them all. Now I worry that the internet will burn down, and all of my backups will be gone, too. We scribblers have so much to worry about!
I absolutely loved this !
You’re very kind - thank you so much!
I'm sorry. I can't comment. I'm utterly exhausted having gone through the twenty-seven stages of anxiety with you on this read.
The burning question: Did you write about the saga, retroactively, in your notebook? :)
LOL, Elizabeth! I’m so sorry!!! 🤣
And gosh, what a very good question! Yes, I did - as little short notes as they occurred to me days later. I’ve got - from a few days after I’d lost it:
‘Losing my notebook and losing my way.’
‘Take screenshot of notification.’
‘The north star.’
And then - dated Thursday (so, two days before I published the post) - there’s a whole page of notes - sentences and half-sentences to include in the post, and some notes about AirTags.
I’m now kicking myself for not taking pictures of THOSE pages to illustrate this post. Might do that later, and update the post accordingly! 🤣
Oh, gosh, I didn't mean it to be a "you should've" question. Just a curiosity. Sometimes I write things on a To Do list that I've already done. I wondered if this worked the same way. Love that you captured the event. It deserves that!
Oh no, I didn’t read it as a ‘you should’ve’ at all! I just can’t believe I’d missed the opportunity to show my notes relating to the lost notebook IN the actual lost notebook! I’ve updated the post now to include a picture of the actual page - it’s the pic right at the bottom. 😊
And yes, I do that with my To Do list! Some might feel that that’s a bit of a cheat, but it really isn’t - my list for each day is contained in my bullet journal, and it contains not only tasks but notes about things that happened that day, who might have called, a bill I might have paid, how work went, that kind of thing - so it’s like a whole record of things that I might want to refer back to. For example, it wasn’t on yesterday’s list to cut the grass, but we nevertheless cut the grass - so I added ‘Cut grass’ to the list and marked it as done, so that when I want to know when we last cut the grass, well, there it is!
Blimey, I’ve just read that back to myself and I sound absolutely barmy! 🤪
Um… I have a ‘journal’ / daily diary with similar notations in it. So at least two of us are barmy. Hmmm…. I think I may have mentioned my mother’s exercise books at some point. That’s where I learned it, though thankfully I don’t record daily temperature ranges. Just particularly extreme conditions. Our comfort diaries. Such is life.
Neither of you sounds barmy in my view! I've never managed to keep daily lists or journal entries. When my mother was alive (she was a BIG list-maker), my bi-monthly letters to her served as some sort of record of life events. Now I suppose Chicken Scratch has taken up some version of that baton. A close relative (I'll protect his identity but will note that it's not my husband nor my father!) wrote down what he wore each day, particularly which tie, and what his wife served for dinner, with little sidebar remarks indicating how much or little he approved of the meal. 😬 😒 🤨 Y'all are all good!
LOL at your close relative but gosh, although I don't do that on a daily basis I DO do that if I know I'm going to be seeing the same people for a regular event. I was doing a course a few years ago which was all day every Friday for several weeks in succession. I don't own many clothes, and wash and wear the same few things on repeat - anyway, I made sure to make a note of which outfits I'd already worn!
I know that the only person worrying about it was me, but I felt more confident knowing (thanks to my record-keeping) that it wouldn't look as if I only owned one outfit! 🤣
That's so lovely, Beth. Keeping a journal is such a super thing - so we are NOT barmy!!! You're absolutely right! xxx
I'm so glad you found it! My car key has one, after a lengthy sojourn underneath my big upholstered chair last year. It fell through the bottom and wasn't found for several weeks, during which I had to use my backup key. And I know the freezer and such, sound like ridiculous places to look but I have honestly found my glasses there, after removing them because they were fogging up in the cold air!
SUCH a good idea to tag your keys! And gosh, that’s the sort of place I would never have dreamed of looking for my keys - I’m staggered that you had EVER found them!
LOL re your glasses in the freezer - but that does make perfect sense!
I remember years ago - we’re talking the 1980s - a family member was given a little electronic keyring that whistled when you clapped your hands, the idea that you’d never lose your keys. The novelty wore off pretty quickly, as did the battery life! 🤣
We had a lamp that lit when clapped-at-- it was okay, I guess. And the only reason I eventually found the key was that I was cleaning and moved the chair. I'd long since given up the search, although I knew it was at home since the car was at home!
I remember those lamps! And LOL re the car being at home - yes, that narrowed down the keys’ location to your house at least!
(I must make more effort with cleaning… shhhh, but I mostly vacuum AROUND the furniture 👀🤫😁)