santa cruz wharf

20 April 2009

Virtual Spring Cleaning

Voicemail box is full.
Text message limit is maxed out.
Guess I need to go through them.

At this time in my life, for the most part only four people text me; SugarCookie, Little Missy, The Cub, and The Teamster.  I have saved texts of the odd sentimental message from each one ….a few of which are from two or three years ago.

I can no longer keep up with my Reader.
If I don’t “read” for a few days there will be hundreds of posts awaiting some sort of action. 

I have accumulated 298 subscriptions in my Reader, which I have divided into twelve categorized folders. 

Granted, two thirds or more are of a “news and information” type nature.  I reject the pabulum most people rely on.  I read the left, the right, and the in between cause I want to know more than the twenty second sound bite which main stream media has deemed sufficient for our consumption.

Since June of 2007. I have “starred” 174 posts to save in said Reader.  I have emailed myself an additional 202 posts to save in my own email folders.

Forty-nine percent of these saved and starred posts contain some sort of information I assume I will want to reference or access at a later date. Seventeen percent are political, religious, or sociological  rants or raves. Eleven percent are from the
Faeries…go figure. The remaining twenty-two percent are a mishmash of posts, most of which I don’t remember why I saved them.

And then there is my personal email.
420 contacts in my gmail address book
More than half I do not recognize.
Google saves everyone for me.
I wish they wouldn’t do that.

Google sets aside a significant allotment of storage space for each of its users.  Below your Inbox they provide you with how much of this space you are using.  As of this very minute, mine says:

You are currently using 396 MB (5%) of your 7318 MB.

Cool.  I am only using 5%.  Pat my little self on the back.  Makes me feel as if I have kept on top of the email thing.  I KNOW that I delete dozens and dozens of messages daily.

But still…on closer inspection.
1999 sent email messages saved.
533 in the Inbox.
154 “starred” for action or review.
59 folders sorting out my email.

I have kept…as in not deleted…a total of 5,852 gmail messages dating back to 24 August 2006. (Oddly enough 888 of those are “chats”. ) The scary part is that gmail combines replies and forwards into one string of messages and counts it has a single message. For you math-geeks out there…that means I have saved (on average) just over five emails each day for the past 967 days.

Time to wear out the delete key.

17 comments:

Sandee said...

When I'm gone for a long weekend I sign into my Google reader and quickly 'mark all as read'. It stresses me out too much to try to catch up.

Wear out that delete key Katherine. Just saying.

You are heading to Stockton for Mexican food with Linda right? I hope so.

Have a terrific day. Big hug. :)

Linda said...

I have to agree with Sandee in that when I log in after missing a day or two due to work or what-have-you and there are hundreds of unread posts looking at me, I get a little queasy! I feel a bit guilty about not reading everyone's posts but sometimes there's just no time to do so.

I'd say it's way past time you do some virtual cleaning before you drown in all that awaits you!

Desert Songbird said...

I have my Gmail download to Outlook; then I read and purge from there. I have found messages that are over seven years old! What the hell was I thinking?

I did quite a bit of my own virtual spring cleaning.

Oh, and my Reader only contains blogs, and my subscription list is quite manageable; still, when the unread posts start numbering 100+, I get antsy.

Anonymous said...

Please, before deleting save one more "sent email" to make it an even 2000.

Just because... C;)

I, Like The View said...

I had a big saved email clear out a while back. . .

it's not that I'm a hoarder, just that some things are worth keeping - mind you, I was only in the hundreds!

hope you feel refreshed after the spring cleaning deleting, it's a little like tidying your sock drawer or organising a kitchen cupboard. . .

. . .possibly!

(-:

The CEO said...

I have been tempted to write to you on more than one occasion, most recently about your stunning image of the sailboat where you split the horizon with the two pastels of the water and the sky. I try instead to make sure that I leave the comment in such a way that you know I was really impressed. Everyone gets so much e mail that I think they have lost their meaning.

I rarely write my therapist, where my deal is that I eat all of her squid and oysters and she says 'tsk tsk' when I write that my mother hated me. It's the perfect relationship, and rarely strained.

I guess that's why you're stuck at 1999. I don't want to contribute to the delinquency of a minor.

Nice post!

The Teamster said...

i can help...if it's not worth more than 5 dollars and you're not using it for over a year (unless it has sentimental value)....throw it away......

i do....

and you figured out the %'s?

"and for you math geeks"?...

Vinny "Bond" Marini said...

Truly, there is some math geek going on in this post.

I can test you if you'd like...just let me know!

Mike Golch said...

I think my computer needs more that just spring cleaning.

Dana said...

Oh my! Are you a virtual pack rat? Good luck!

Mel said...

Geeze......save yourself that 11% and just use SEARCH for cryingoutloud.

BTW-- 6 whole MB of gmail's allocated 7318 MB. That equates to 0% used!
Woooohooooo!! I rock!!!

Ummm.
You don't think that's anything personal, do ya?

Sorry....I confused myself with the neurotic Brit there for a moment. It's passed!!!

*laughing!*

Delete, delete, delete!

Now...is this where I confess that I saved stuff to those bitty flashdrives?

*laughing*
Oh..and CD's...
OMGosh...and floppies!
Remember those?!

Oh, the things I'll need to destroy......LOL

dadshouse said...

I have tons of bookmarked web pages I have NEVER visited a second time, even years later. It's so much easier to just google them again... :-)

Oh, and I have 1109 UNREAD email messages in my google read. I wonder how many are Twitter emails saying someone new is following me, and do I want to follow them. Twitter-bots are going crazy.

At some point, just get a new email address and never log back in to the old one!

CrAzY Working Mom said...

My reader said I had 1000+ posts in it last week. I read a few of each subscription and managed to comment on at least one post of each. But there was no way in "h - e - double hockey sticks" that I was going to be able to read much less comment on each one. That's what happens when you don't have time to even open your reader for 2 weeks...that and Facebook, Twitter, and Flickr keep calling my name. In addition to those children who call me Mom! *LOL*

Good luck with the delete key. It's easier said than done.

Travis Cody said...

It sure can add up, can't it?

Schmoop said...

Nobody ever sends me anything. Cheers Kat!!

Maggie Moo said...

I detest that Google saves every contact I email too. I wish I could turn that off-it's one of the few features I miss from AOL.

Good luck clearing things out-I have to do that every now and then too. I tend to do my text messages while waiting in waiting rooms or while on the T.

Marilyn said...

Wow. And you have time to visit my blog? I'm honored.

I'm going to think of something goofy to sent Matt-man now.