I have a confession to make. I rather enjoy stacks. I don't particularly enjoy cleaning and organizing, I understand their purpose, but I don't enjoy them, and I will put them off if possible. I have a dear friend who has been a boss a couple of time, and a mentor for more than half of my life now. She once commented that my desk always looked like a hurricane, and she was glad to know that I knew where each and every item was in the stacks. But that was 20 years ago; I had a lot less on my desk, and in mind to keep track of the piles.

Periodically though, my boss would put her foot down and say “Ok, I know you know where it is, but *I* have to know where to find it when you are out of the office.” OUCH!

I keep my client files very organized and have them at the touch of a finger, but I have an idea stack – and a “to do” stack, that are usually stacked on top of each other. I’ve realized that these stacks (or sometimes clutter) threaten my very thinking power. You know, when you know you have filing, or you can't find that list of things you wanted to write articles about; or as you are going through your stacks you find that shiny new object that takes you away from what you are doing? It's maddening!

This became very real in an unusual way not long ago. My computer (that is only 1.5 years old) was getting very sluggish. So I dug in to find out why -

There was a LOT of junk on my computer. I keep my spyware and virus protection up to date, but there was still a lot of junk, and even an errant spyware that was missed by my regular SpySweeper. I don’t know about you, but I love to try new programs and trial programs, but they leave little footprints in the registry that the computer has to "think extra hard" to get past, even after the program has been removed. I found a program with good reviews Wise Registry Cleaner, and deleted what was safe to delete, and for now ignored the "iffy" registry keys. I will go over those with a computer expert I happen to be related to when we both have time.

There were tons of old emails that I don't need, I tend to be bit of a pack rat and worry I may need it as back up. So I backed up my email, backed up files from projects that are a year or more old and put them in the corresponding client folders. I also ran the WiseDisk Cleanup tool. It found hidden temporary files, at least 1 gig of memory was freed up with these little adjustments that took an evening to get done.

Suddenly, where the CPU usage had been strained at 95% and higher, I now have 34% usage. My computer is no longer having brain freeze. I do much better on not having stacks on my desk than I did in my early 20’s, but I would not be honest to say there’s not *A* stack next to me even as I type, but what is slightly exciting, and more than a little encouraging, is what if I could get a nearly 60% increase in my brain power because the external distractions were at a minimum? I think it’s time for the final spring cleaning and get the desk organized.