Take to the skies with this colorful, flying agenda template. Whether traveling or staying home, this template is sure to make you think of beautiful trips you've taken in the past or are about to take in the future.

Once complete, you will find the entire set here:

http://wordswithin.info/blog?page_id=826

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Sorry I've been away a while, folks, but sometimes my work takes me places that just aren't accessible to the Net. Thanks to Innowen, as usual, for her tireless leadership (and great articles, as usual!) while I was away.

So, I came face-to-face with a small herd of wood bison last week. These are truly wild, shaggy creatures nearly the size of a small SUV --I'm told they're the largest land animal in North America-- and quite capable of running up to 50 mph. And right now, at the end of the lean season, they can be downright ornery and rather dangerous as they roam through the sub-Arctic Northwest Territories wilderness in search of patches of frozen, dried-up grasses. I did manage to sneak up within 20 or 30 feet of them and take a goodly number of photographs before my fingers went numb with the cold and I lost the ability to manual focus. When the alpha male began to feign charges, I figured it was a good time to leave.

Here's yet another shout-out for Noodler's Polar Black fountain pen ink. Yes, it does work in extreme cold, and I've used it in -50C temperatures. As soon as I got back to the vehicle, I wrote up my notes using a still-frigid Moleskine and Polar Black in my red Lamy Safari. (Red, because it inspires warmth....)

On a vaguely semi-related note, does anybody else think the main character of Into the Wild should have spent less time reading Thoreau and more time reading nature books, and perhaps even buying a map and compass? Sheesh. An excellent film, but ultimately a very frustrating one for me to watch.

Okay, I can be a little obsessive. (For example, see my recent posts about fountain pens, fountain pens, fountain pens, and ...erm... fountain pens.) Unfortunately, combined with my persistent belief that my next productivity tool could be the non plus ultra, this can translate into drawers filled with unused gadgets, bookcases jammed with partially used planners and notebooks, and a selection of writing utensils that would shame any office supply store. And, although I am embarrassed to admit it, while I tend towards the intimacy of pen and paper, the tinker in me is certainly inclined towards items demonstrating an almost awkward complexity. But do those help me be more productive? Rarely.

I've mentioned not only my Macs in these pages, but my Palms, my Newtons, and various other attempts to find a perfect portable writing machine that also allows for efficient time management. The Newton eMate 300 (or alternatively, the Newton MessagePad 2100 with keyboard) was the closest thing thus far, as it offered me the ability to write without being tempted by the distractions of the web, use the amazing MoreInfo to structure my days, and have a smallish and rugged package that lasted up to 20 hours. But, as attractive as the Newtons were, I started yearning for the ability to look up online resources, draw small diagrams, send email, sync easily with my other computers, and so on, all of which are possible on the Newtons, but not easy nor intuitive. The thought of typing several dozen pages on a cramped smartphone thumb-board while the battery ticks down didn't seem to offer any respite. What I needed was a very small laptop... a subnotebook, and one that wouldn't cost a fortune. And then, I unexpectedly received one: an Asus Eee PC 701 4G Surf, currently going for an average retail value of roughly $350 USD ($400 for the non-Surf model, which means it has a webcam).

I eyed it suspiciously. Small, clunky, inexpensive, tiny-screened, Linuxy, and therefore decidedly un-Mac-like. Could it fit the bill?

Yes, there is something a little sensual about writing with a quality fountain pen in a nicely bound journal like the Epica, or perhaps a Moleskine inside a rustic Renaissance Art cover. They exude a certain romance, evoking a cafe Hemingway or a WWII pilot jotting down his desperate days in a foreign land. But, romantic as that is, it's often not very practical in a workplace environment. (Would you jot random boardroom notes in an exquisite $100 leather journal? I think not.)

However, these past few days, I've experienced a shining example of how the modularity of disc-based notebook systems like the Circa/Rollabind and Myndology/Atoma ones can be extremely practical from an informational and organisational standpoint.

Although the nature of my job dictates a degree of confidentiality, and thus I can't get into specifics, I've been recently working on a video project that involves a lot of notetaking, paper-shuffling, scheduling, file-toting and creative exercises. While some might prefer a laptop for such things, carrying one in this case would not be a particularly bright idea. Walking outdoors in semi-mountainous terrain, I had to keep my weight low, and had to expect both rain and extremely dusty conditions with little notice.