Review: Field Notes Brand Graph Notebooks

My love of graph paper is growing, as are my ass and my gratitude for good design. My perfect graph paper would be something between French ruled paper, with excel spreadsheet headers, a table with alternating colored rows, and metric grids in light blue, that old mimeograph purple, maybe some chestnut brown and red on the margins. I know, it’s like LSD-lover’s graph paper & it exists in some other dimension where things can be four sizes, colors, and shapes at once. In any case, I have decided that since graph paper is a huge part of my thinking process, to start reviewing it for any other notebook/pen/paper/office-supply GTD-er obsessed with writing things by hand, making lists, and keeping track of the little things that bring joy to life that you don’t already add to your Evernote account.

On that note, let’s get to it: the good, the bad, the brown:

Praise
• Design. Mr. Draplin could design a plastic hot dog cozy and I would probably buy it. The guy has a feel for the way things should be made that makes my soft spots, such as the ones for unions and American denim, squeak out a little cry of joy at holding a piece of craftsmanship instead of just keen design work. Like I say people, craft reigns supreme, I don’t give a shit how awesome your Google sketch-up house is if you can’t use a belt sander.
• Size. It’s perfect. Fits nicely with my Moleskine Calendar, and singly slides into any pocket, shirt-front, back pants pocket, kangaroo pouch, etc… Its 48 discreet pages, so making notes about the Rabbi’s sermon won’t attract the eyes of your nosy Sabbath neighbor.
• Color, type, paper. Perfect harmony. And if you think it’s easy to hit that Holy Grail, then go ahead and try it. Harmonizing simplicity in design and execution in craft is perhaps one of the most difficult achievements in design and def. in life. Ah, the brown color! It’s glorious. The light brown graph lines- I could swoon, they are so comforting. My eyes love these pages; my hands love the covers. My heart loves them as objects. My butt loves sitting on them.
• Other killer stuff. Colors subscription. If you have the money- drool worthy like everything Draplin & Coudal Partners do.

Meh.
• Because it is only 48 pages I can’t create and track projects over much time in one book, maybe just about a month. So I can really only use these for short trips, like my recent trip to Phoenix, not ongoing stuff over months.
• At $9.95 for 3 books they are 3 bucks+ each. If I were to use two of these a month, that’s 8 packs of 3 per year = $80 a year just in notebooks, not to mention addt’l cost if I need them shipped. And that’s just one kind of notebook. I use 4 kinds.
• Because I would need over 20 graph notebooks a year, they would need to be organized in a way that I could to go back to them to harvest ideas and glean plans that I am ready to unleash on the patriarchy. I started numbering them but then found i had projects in one that i wanted to carry-over so I would need to copy projects across 20 notebooks. It’s much easier to organize 4 Leuchtturm 1917 graph books than 20 Field Notes.
• Hipster factor. Blech.
• Why the fuck can’t anyone make graph paper with a smaller grid? Speaking of, 3/16 x 3/16 is a grid shape that is visually appealing but I wonder why that particular measurement was chosen? Anyone know? Metric-phobic?
• No pocket in back cover. I like them. It’s where I keep my business cards so I don’t have to carry one of those d-bag card cases. I could tape a pocket on the inside back cover but why ruin perfection? Especially when I have adorned it like so?

Here are two pics of pages from my notebooks, recent one from Phoenix and otherwise. These pics taken with my iphone so don’t bitch at me about image quality. You get what you pay for and since this information and my love for graph paper is FREE, I am sure you will be supportive.

Sketch for turning East German Military Bags into Bike Panniers

The blank Field Notes book with the Pabst can above I used on my trip to Phoenix as a journal. I did this because 1) it’s a lot lighter to carry than a bound book 2) more flexible since you can bend the crap out of it and 3) if I lost it, it’s not like I would have lost the last year of work. I found the notebook unusually inspiring. I assume it’s the design. Good design = good thoughts. Who knows but whatever it was, it worked for me. I had it half-filled before my flight left home.

When you order from Field Notes, as I am sure you will, I suggest getting at least one mixed pack. You will find a use for them. And they make awesome small gifts to add on to another gift, like a bottle of second-rate bourbon for the jerk that drank your Maker’s. Their pens are fine too, though I like a more liquid-y ink, there is nothing like staring at someone while clicking your Field Notes Brand ballpoint pen. It feels like you can write tickets and assess fines. Overall, I would say a very worthwhile investment for short trips and ideal small projects less than one month long where you’d like to have an archive of each individual project. An additional boon is the rugged sex appeal, which I also have, or so I keep telling myself.

The GTD-part: Though I have only shown pages with sketches or random notes, when I want to get stuff done, my note taking method is specific and focused: I put on a little soft rock, put a little Sanka in the percolator, and sit just to the left of my IBM Selectric at my large metal desk as the percolator heats up. I sit with my calendar & project cards and decide what actions I will commit to that day. Then i get my graph notebook out.

On the right hand side of my graph paper book, I write the day of the week, the date, and sometimes the time and weather. (It’s so I can remember nuances about my life because I’m halfway to my grave at this point.) Under that, I write the things I need to do that day that are the next actions on my projects or just regular-ol’-crap. Looks like this:

Tuesday – March 16, 201

BUY stamps
SEND package back to ____
FILL OUT FAFSA
FIND someone to watch the cat: –/–/–
SCHEDULE Allergy appt: (phone-number)
TAKE photos for review of Field Notes
EMAIL photos to self

Everything I write begins with a verb & more importantly, I try to put no more than 5 big things on my to-do list in any given day so that way I have time to sit in the tub at night and read Monocle. But let’s be honest, I work on projects until my eyes give out.

Now then, during that day…. I’ll take notes from calls, tape receipts if I mail stuff, or note stuff I need add to the next day on the left-hand page. If there is still room on the left-hand page, I might finish that page with a few short sentences about my day, before passing out. I try to write five sentences about each of my days. I forget about 5 out of 7 days that I want to do this but you know what? I’m human and tomorrow I can try again. The cool thing is that if I need to look over any day of the last five years of my life, I can find exactly what I did that day, who i talked to & about what. This has saved my ass when say, arguing with my cell phone service provider.

Anything undone at the end of the day get circled and copied to the next RIGHT-hand side page. I know some GTD-ers will cringe at that since i supposedly committed to my list, but listen pal, if a nice lady asks me to have a drink after work, I do. The list can wait, trust me.

I’ll post pics and more detailed explanations if there is interest.

Tags: I love graph paper.