Health and Efficiency

Once upon a time it wasn't too difficult to keep on top of things. The post would arrive at a predictable time of day, usually early in the morning, and you sat with your buttered toast, opened the envelopes with a silver paper knife, and, that done, proceeded to the day's work in the knowledge that unless unforeseen events arose nothing would take you by surprise until the next morning. Then came the telephone and, eventually, the answering machine; in theory this could have resulted in a string of demands, but it takes effort to talk to people or to frame your request or news into something coherent enough to be recorded on an answerphone, so there was still a filtering process.

Now there is email. Anyone can throw a word or two together, attach a string of relevant (or less relevant) documents, reply instantly to anything you have sent them, any time of the day they choose. And, unless you are very disciplined indeed, the messages gather, pile, cram against the day the Lord has made like drifted snow, but not so pretty.

To reduce the general levels of mania, I am wresting control of my email inbox. I will check emails, I tell myself, only at specified points three times a day, when I will either reply and delete, print the documents there and then, and delete, or shove the message into a pending tray if it requires more thought. Will I keep it up? Well, I must do something.

I sent a message to a clerical colleague today only to have an automated reply telling me he only checks his emails 'at the start of the week'. Would we could all be so bold. And get away with it.