Not busy, just disorganised

As Cliff Richard almost sang: Procrastination breeds consternation. I've got so much to do but don't know where to start. (It does fit. Don't deny you've got a copy of Congratulations somewhere. Dig it out and sing along.) I used to read Keith Waterhouse's columns avidly as a teenager. I think that may be what's made me so militant about the correct use of apostrophes (although I shall doubtless bung one in the wrong place in the course of this post.) I was saddened to hear of his death, but cheered immensely by the extract they used on the news last night. Paraphrasing wildly, the gist was that he appeared busy by doing six things at once, but was actually working on one while avoiding the other five. While he was working on his column, he was avoiding working on his novel. While working on his novel he was avoiding working on a script. The loud twang you may have heard around twenty past six last night was my soul resonating in sympathy. Right now, as I write this I should be doing at least one of the following: looking for a job that doesn't lead to ossification of the soul, polishing my CV as a means to getting said job (hollow laughter), practising my driving in readiness for the commute this mythical job might entail, ironing the kinks out of the manuscript of my first novel prior to submitting it to another agent, going through the Writers' and Artists' Yearbook (apostrophes seem OK there) to find another agent to send it to, replying to all the wonderful Authonomists who spared the time to give me sound constructive criticism on said book, reading the work of said Authonomists and giving them almost sound constructive criticism, working on the plot of my second novel which has stalled slightly, getting a framework down on paper for the other two books I've got in mind, reading my library books before they go overdue, reading the magazine backlog so I can recycle them, watching the DVD backlog so I can put them away instead of piling them on the floor, tidying my room so I have somewhere to put the DVDs, listening to the two plays and a serial I taped from the radio last month or longer ago, taking the stuff I have cleared out to a charity shop and washing my hair. In no particular order. Now it could just be that I have appalling time management skills, but there is a lot to be said for simplifying life and cutting out much of the pointless activity that leads to headless chicken syndrome. I think the best plan would be to write everything down and assess the usefulness of each task, rank them accordingly, and work systematically. I'll add that to my list of things to do.