I have now become obsessed with what I will describe as the ‘paper problem’. Trying to apply the new rule of ‘only handle any piece of paper once’ (I suppose this is like ‘find everything on the web in three clicks…more of that later this week).

However, there is obviously a transition phase from what looks like paper chaos, to one of order and structure. I am in transition.

Since the new paper problem busting regime has started I’ve on the whole found most things much more easily - train tickets, even a ticket to the opera was exactly where I expected it to be. But… the book token that’s been sitting on the scanner for at least six months is nowhere to be found. Where can I have categorised that? Also, I cannot find my oyster card (which admitedly is plastic rather than paper).

Do systems work where people pile up all their stuff ‘but know where it is’? Do they? If so how? Is it spatial recognition - I know it will be in that pile, good luck or good memory? Or do such systems really not work, but the users claim they do because they want to suggest that there retrieval is about providence rather than prudence?

Whatever; once you start to behold the vast volumes of paper which surround you, this whole issue takes on new and ever expanding dimensions.