Wherever I go, there I work (and play)

FROM DAVE: This is a guest post from my buddy, Jake Olson, regarding a couple of handy apps that he uses. Jake works from his home in TURKEY! How cool is that? Speaking of Turkey, Happy Thanksgiving everyone! And here’s Jake:

Hi there Anywhere People! My name is Jake Olson. I know Dave, the original AnywhereMan, from high school and have greatly enjoyed his website AnywhereMan.com. I also live the AnywhereMan lifestyle and enjoy it quite a bit. I’ve been working full time for a Distribution company called Lukas Media that sells DVDs and Woven Gifts from Turkey since last winter. Although our company is based in Tulsa OK, I am able to run the company from my home in Adana Turkey. Prior to this job, I was working as a freelance English tutor here in Turkey. Although that work was very fun, afforded incredible flexibility and very good pay, I was financially tied to one geographic location in that if I decided to travel to visit family, I was unable to make any money, despite having family in both Turkey and America (my wife is Turkish).

In the midst of that, I read The Four-Hour Work Week by Timothy Ferris and was inspired by the idea of being able to work from anywhere in the world. I decided to take the part time work I was doing for Lukas Media at the time and craft it into a full time position. Although I’m not exactly working four hours/week, I have managed to create a job that is rewarding and unrestrained geographically. I am truly able to do my work from anywhere in the world that I can get wi-fi, and I love the Anywhereman lifestyle.

Well, that’s my intro and my Anywhereman Testimony. The main reason I offered to do a guest post today is that I have two strong recommendations for products we started using in the past two months.

Check out the video I recorded about the products. Don’t knock the quality, it was recorded on free software that required no download. If you need to record training videos of your screen as a resource for employees or clients, I recommend checking out Screencast-O-Matic.com. If you are in an industry where people still insist on using Faxes, you can’t really just say “I’m from the 21’st century, I don’t do fax” you have to go with it. We finally broke down and found an online fax service; Metrofax.com it’s a pay/per/month service (unfortunately) but for us it’s so worth it. $15/month vs. hassling with a fax machine, fax line, etc is worth it. Check out the video to see how easy it is to use.

I hope these are helpful to you. Please connect with me on Facebook.com/JakeDOlson or Twitter.com/JakeOlson. Happy Thanksgiving and long live the AnywhereMan lifestyle.

DAVE: Thanks Jake!

Image by William Hook via Flickr

In my previous post I came “clean” about my messy desk.  Several of you commented offering words of comfort and advice, and I appreciate that. I reached out to a few organizing experts on Twitter as well, and professional organizer Stacy Kaplan from Clutter Away by Stacy K. offered up some great tips.  Here’s what Stacy had to say:

1. Spend 15 minutes a day organizing your desk. Take a photo at the end of each session to track your progress.
 

2. There are 4 places where a piece of paper should end up:

(1) in the recycle bin (most papers),

(2) on a desktop filer (more about this in the next step),

(3) in a file drawer adjacent to your desk or

(4) in a deep freeze file away from your desk.

Files in spot #2 are for important papers and are most likely currently sitting on your desk. Files for spot #3 are for papers you need regularly. Files for spot #4 are for archival items, such as old taxes and records.
 

3. For your desktop, I recommend using a vertical, graduated filer where each folders stands up and the folder behind is higher than the folder in front. Office Depot and Staples have these filers. You should end up with 5-7 files and they should be for those papers which you need all the time (i.e. To Do, To Read, Bills To Pay, Travel, Tickets/Invitations, etc). Make labels for each folder accordingly.
 

4. Purge (recycle) any papers which are:

- Duplicates

- Obsolete

- Available on your computer or the Internet

- Available from someone else if you accidentally toss

- Untouched for at least a year

- Saved for “just in case” but not critical

- Related to a task you don’t have time to do

Good luck and please keep me posted on your progress!

Thanks for these tips, Stacy! I will keep you and the rest of my readers posted on my journey…my long, much needed journey.  Everyone, be sure to check out Clutter Away by Stacy K. for all sorts of great organizing-related services. Even her website is well organized!