Some days are not so much about the effectiveness. Instead they are about having half a dozen conversations via email which would have gone much faster on the phone, but did not actually involve the phone because I was trying to stay focused on work. The work which never actually got done because I kept being distracted by other work. It was a day about taking care of lots of random tasks which needed doing, but which somehow never quite made it onto the To Do list.
Among the things I did not get done was being contemplative about the fact that today is the sixth anniversary of the day that Howard cleaned out his office at Novell and became a cartoonist full-time. But I suppose my distraction is actually in keeping with our tradition of working through anniversaries rather than celebrating by the spending of money on gifts or food. Our first wedding anniversary was spent painting a house. Our last few wedding anniversaries have been spent on the road working conventions. Although if I were really trying to honor this particular anniversary by working really hard it would be nice if I had something concrete to point to rather than a pile of random stuff, most of which is more finished than yesterday, but is not yet complete.