Am I Your Guest Blogger?

If any of you have had a chance to check out my Facebook page you will see my plea: Am I your Guest Blogger?

For the last week I have been struggling with my current crisis: My laptop crashed.

No, when it happened I didn’t scream and run around in circles with my hands on my head like one of those cartoon characters my son watches on Nick. I was prepared. I had a backup. Unfortunately, I didn’t discover until I restored my files that my backup didn’t include my Outlook. So I lost my e-mails, contacts, and calendar. It didn’t hit me until much later how bad it really was.

Two days after the crash, I was drinking my coffee feeling mighty pleased with myself over being so prepared for the crash and not losing any of my books when I realized something: When I lost my Outlook files, I also lost my calendar and in doing so…my guest blog schedule and blogger contacts.

That was when I started running around in circles and screaming like one of those cartoon characters that my son watches on Nick.

Why don’t I use a proper organizer? I tried. I do admire those who I see whip out one of those leather bound notebooks that are broken up into various sections: one for addresses and phone numbers, the other for the calendar in which to record your dates, and then the section in which to slip in business cards. They look so…so… ORGANIZED. They even smell impressive.

As soon as I get one of those I’ll fill out the front page with my information on the first page. I’ll write it out carefully using my best penmanship. Then I’ll fill out some of the contact information and put in a couple of dates on the calendar so that it will look like I lead a life in which appointments are made and kept in a premeditated manner; anything to create the illusion that my life is not a hodgepodge of happenstance.

I am usually able to maintain this illusion for three and a half days. Then I will tire of breaking out my organizer to write things down and decide to save time jotting notes down on a yellow stickie that happens to be within reach of the phone. Why waste time writing said note twice? Why not just stick the yellow stickie (Hey! They call it a stickie for a reason!) to the appropriate page on the calendar in the organizer.

At least I’m using the organizer!

Then, I’ll slip the organizer into my Mommy bag, where it will fall to the bottom and get buried under old grocery shopping lists written out on yellow stickies. Yes, I know the organizer has a writing pad on which to make up said lists, but first I would have to dig it out from the bottom of my purse to use the writing pad.

At the bottom of my purse, my organizer will remain along with my lost open pens that will mark up the pages and the leather cover, which in no time starts smelling like the back of my closet.

It is usually rediscovered around September.

After thirteen organizers and fifteen years of trying to get organized, I gave up. That was about the time I discovered Outlook.

This I can handle. I do most of my communication with e-mail anyway. So, when I get a date that I have to remember, with a couple of keystrokes I simply save the email, along with all the contact information into my Outlook calendar and with another keystroke, I’m back in my e-mail. No hunting down pads of yellow stickies and working pens to write out my stuff. That organizer can stay at the bottom of my purse for discovery by the archeologists in a couple hundred years to land in the Museum of Natural History. Then I’ll be famous.

I thought I had it all figured out—until my computer crashed and I discovered that the Windows 7 backup does not include Outlook, which includes my calendar, with all my contact information, including my Guest Blog dates and the contact information for the Bloggers.

So, this week I have been feeling like a fool hunting down bloggers to ask: Are you missing a guest blogger?

Please pass this message and e-mail link around to any bloggers you may know who are missing a guest blogger. My missing guest spots were for sites about books and writing. The dates and contact information I am missing are in August. I am to send the post in at the beginning of July.

In the meantime, I’m going out to buy an iPhone.

UPDATE: Great News! I have found my mystery blogger. It was Jeffrey Marks, Little Blog of Mystery, August 8!

Thank you to everyone who contacted me offering to let me guest on your blogs even though you weren't my mystery blogger. I will be in touch since I am setting up a blogging tour with the release of It's Murder My Son on July 1!