At Work or How I stay organized

Yes, that is my desk. As you can see, not a lot of space, so staying organized while I obsess and compulsively search is really important. I've taken to adding post it notes and clips to my piles so that I can quickly search through them for what I am looking for. You can also see that I also enjoy listening to music/audiobooks while I work. The large sheet from the notepad has citations for the obituaries and marriage notices I found. I will save the image and type the name of the newspaper and the date, page and column where available. On the bit from a biography, I actually wrote the name of the individual and his father's name so that when I get to it I don't draw a complete blank. The calculator is there to figure ages.

Lots of notepaper around because it gets buried so easily. Also, I am a southpaw, so smaller pads work better for me, although I have a large notebook sitting on my scanner. I usually use that for tracking census when I am searching for a family. Just more room to write the info, makes me wish I was more ambidextrous. Don't forget the paper attached to the top of my laptop. Right now it is holding a bunch of obituaries for me to type. I try to print obits and marriage notes two to a page. The note holder also will clip to the side of the monitor if necessary. What you can't see are my stapler and my little sticky-notes flags. I use these to mark pages in books.

No, that is not dirt on the wall to the left of my monitor - it is the shadow of a lucite case that holds some of my miniatures. I love minis and am trying to figure out a place to put together a half-inch scale dollhouse kit I have owned for years.

The printer on the far left is the possessed thing that has been making me nuts the last couple of weeks.

I know the size of my office would not work for a lot of people but it is actually larger than the office I occupied when I was a pathology secretary. And it is bigger than the cubby I had when I worked at the library. Since this has MY STUFF in it, I like it a lot better. It also has a window which helps me keep an eye out for the newspaper and the mailman and is great for birdwatching.  Not pictured are the binoculars I use to try and identify birds at the bird feeder. DH thinks I use them for spying on the neighbors! Who has time for that?