Good Works Grapevine

Hey - just found out that my interview with the Reston Observer went to print. Small potatoes for most - big, fat baked potato with cheese and bacon for me! Woohoo!

Many thanks to Kate Meier and Marion Myers for the connect!

Happy Monday everyone! It’s a lovely day here in the DC burbs and I’m giving a little thought to my Monday morning routine (which is really my daily morning routine). Setting aside the household “must dos” (like letting the dogs out, cleaning up any mess from the night before, sending my hubby to work, etc.) how do I get the most from my AM time? I will admit that I am not a morning person and I’ve started sleeping in a little later in order to catch up on some much needed R&R. So, I’m usually not coherent until 10AM. Most of my friends are up at the crack of dawn, but I am much better in the evening hours.

I am looking for a little advice (and getting up earlier ain’t happening) so here’s my plan. May there are a few tips you could share to help me streamline my tasks?

• Check my news and blog feeds. I have a gazillion of these set-up and really find value in all of them for different reasons. The problem is, this morning I’m looking at about 414 posts to go through. I prefer the Feeds option offered by Flock, so I’m not sure whether there is a more useful tool out there. Is there a more effective way to manage feeds that you can share with our readers?
• Write my blog posts. I currently write for 5 blogs with more on the way. One is weekly and the rest are daily. I know that I need a better work flow for blogging and should really study Chris Brogan’s blogging work flow. It’s a great process.
• Check for RFPs. Until I get my business really moving, I’m checking the web for RFPs (got one on my desk that’s due Friday). Looking for blog help, small web development projects and the likes. What I find here lays out the rest of my week.
• Return phone calls. Inevitably, I need to return calls from Friday.

During the week, I do a little of this, but Monday AM is by far the time suck for catching up. During the week I tweet, blog, write proposals, write technical docs, write strategy docs, prepare for speaking gigs, etc. My latest endeavor is setting up a GoodDogz.org presence in Second Life. So, my weeks are busy.

I guess I’m just a sucker for time management and am looking for some suggestions/tools for managing my freelancer time.