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4/27/2010

Starred Items Addict

I have a problem.  A huge problem.  It starts with having 1000 blogs in my Google Reader and the cute little star feature.

Something you may or may not know about Google Reader.  You can star items that you want to go back and check out later.  But if you want to un-star them, you have to do it one at a time.  You cannot select multiple items to un-star.  You can not un-star all.

Exactly one week ago I spent hours....HOURS...un-starring all of the items in my Google Reader.  I wanted to start fresh.  The fastest way to do this is to use the short cut keys.  n, then s.  'n' for next and 's' for star (or in this case to remove the star)

n, s
n, s
n, s

n, s
n, s
n, s

I know there were over 10,000 items.  Two years worth.   But I stopped keeping track after 10,000.  

I am really surprised that those buttons on my keyboard still work.


Today, exactly one week later I already have 142 items starred.  And that was being frugal.  I can't let myself get back to 10,000 so I am going to purge the 142 I have and try to come up with a system of figuring out what to do with all of those ideas without posting 142 more times in a week.  I might have to take advantage of Twitter.  Start using my Facebook page.  Something.

If you have any suggestions, please let me know.

But today I am going to be posting a LOT of random things to get my reader cleaned out again.  I can't bare to just delete them again.  So enjoy.

11 comments:

Lynn said...

I would say just pick the best each day and let the rest go. You can also bookmark a few in categories like Valentine's Day, Christmas, Etc. and then just go back and look at those later.

Kelli @ WhimsiKel said...

I send myself an email with the link to the project I like. Then I label and archive them in my gmail account. Right now the labels include things like kids, clothing, sewing, quilting, crafts, decor, etc, etc. Then I can either do a search of my gmail or go look at the label for ideas. I star items until I have time to send the emails and label them. Good luck! I love your blog!

Unknown said...

There is a program called Evernote which is really great about letting you tag and organize things. I HIGHLY recommend it.

Michelle said...

I say you schedule out posts for the next two weeks and take a vacation! You deserve it, I have no idea how you keep track of it all!

Jill Wadle said...

I had that same problem! So I started to save ideas like this -

When I find something I like, I right clik on the post and hit "print".

Then select Adobe PDF as the printer.

Then name the file and save on my comupter.

It saves the idea in a neat little pdf document and I can organize them on my computer.

I've even gone as far as then saving the .pdf files to my itouch.

Then when I get somewhere I can pull up the idea and might actually make something instead of just collecting ideas!

Now I have a question, why does your blog not show up with pictures on reader?

Thanks for all the great things you post!

Myrnie said...

I tag a LOT. If it's a cake I want to try, I tag it as cake. Patterns, embroidery patterns, gifts to give, kids crafts, sauce...etc. If it's something I want to DEFINITELY DO (imagine that in bold, with fireworks coming out for effect), then I star it.

Lorie said...

Myrnie, the tags are how I keep all of my different subscriptions organized, so I can't use that idea. I wish I could!

Lynn, that would be the SMARTEST idea, but there is SO MUCH good stuff out there!

Kelli, an email is a pretty good idea too...if you don't hoard emails already (I am SO bad!)

Ashley, I think you are my husband under a fake ID (kidding!) He LOVES Evernote! He is always trying to get me to use it. Maybe I should listen?

Michelle, but then I would be two weeks behind on MORE good stuff! ;D

Lorie said...

mjwadle...VERY good idea. Of course then I would have 10,000 PDFs :X

Melissa said...

There are just too many things to keep track of-- good ideas, things you will "eventually" get to. I dont have a good system, but just "search" my google reader with a keyword that I hopefully remember :D

Mrs. Wright said...

You could also create a shared folder in Google Reader that we could go and dig through! It would be like your pre-sorted reader feed- I would sign up!

Julie said...

i have a similar problem!!! i wish reader would let you organize your starred items like you can with bookmarks.

i am using chrome right now and you can sync your bookmarks to anywhere you sign on with chrome so i've started doing that and it helps to star them in folders inside of my bookmarks.

please let us know what you figure out i'd love to here what you do

i think google needs to help us ladies out by adding organization to the saved posts.