How to use this Page

Really really really good tips in the Mystie Winckler book Pamela Barnhill recommends here, gang. I thought I was already using Evernote & Google Calendar efficiently, but I picked up some useful new ideas (including better integrating my systems) in the book. Which is 30% off with the code in Pam’s post. So, like, under $3.

In Paperless Home Organization, Mystie Winckler leads you through the process of using digital applications to build your very own paperless system. She walks you step-by-step through how to use four free apps to digitally store the same information you would normally keep in a home management binder.

Which means if you have a smartphone, or an iPod Touch, or any tablet, then your binder no longer sits cluttering up your counter, but in your hand – at the doctor’s office, the bookstore, even at your school room table.

I’d been meaning to try Remember the Milk—my pal Ron raves about it, and he doesn’t rave lightly—and Pam’s post, and Mystie’s book, nudged me to take the plunge. Last year I relied on TeuxDeux for daily task management, but my free trial period ran out and I decided I wasn’t enough in love with it to pay for it. It’s a really gorgeous, clean layout but too hard to go back to past days. Remember the Milk isn’t quite as visually appealing (its web app, that is; on my phone it’s quite nice) but it is so much more flexible and functional. Thanks to Paperless Home Organization, I’ve now got it talking to my Gmail account (my RTM to-do list pops up in my inbox sidebar) and WOW, this is just right for the way mah brain works.

As for Evernote, I rely on it for everything. Or so I thought. Now I see all sorts of new bits of recordkeeping I can shift over there. Very pleased.

By Edward Zelinsky

Nicholas Sarkozy, the president of France, has condemned as “disproportionate” Israel’s response to the flotilla bringing cargo to Gaza. Gaza today is controlled by Hamas, a terrorist organization which is dedicated to the destruction of Israel and which has repeatedly launched attacks on Israel and its civilian population. Israel had told the flotilla’s organizers to bring their goods to the Israeli port of Ashdod for inspection, with all civilian goods to be trucked subsequently from Ashdod to Gaza. The Israeli offer was rejected.

Mr. Sarkozy’s criticism of Israel raises an interesting analogy: Suppose that Monaco were controlled by a violent terrorist organization like Hamas, committed to the destruction of France. This terrorist organization, when it has the means, routinely lobs missiles at French civilians over the French-Monaco border. Would France passively accept this situation? Not likely.

Most probably, France would invade Monaco to destroy the threat to its civilian population. Alternatively, France would blockade Monaco by land and by sea, making sure that weapons and other supplies with military uses do not enter Monaco.

Suppose further that a flotilla were organized to break the French blockade of Monaco. France, concerned about military supplies being part of the cargo, would order its navy to intercept this flotilla. France would perhaps tell the organizers of the flotilla to bring their supplies to Marseille where these supplies could be inspected so that, after such inspection, civilian goods could be transported into Monaco.

Suppose that the organizers of the flotilla rejected this offer and instead proceeded to Monaco. Is there any doubt what, under these circumstances, the French response would be?

Finally, suppose that the President of Israel condemned this French response as “disproportionate.” Mr. Sarkozy’s likely retort: France has the moral and legal right to protect its citizens and its territory. Any violence which results is the responsibility of the flotilla’s organizers who rejected the French offer of inspection and transportation for civilian goods.

Mr. Sarkozy would be right.