Thursday, June 26, 2014

One Hot Mess Vol. 8: Disaster Inbox

Where to start, wherrrrre to start...


We could talk about my numbering issues from my last post (9, 11, 12, 10?).  We could definitely talk about that.

We could talk about the fact that I fed my kids pasta sauce for dinner the other night. Like, literally just sauce. That's it.

We could talk about the ice chest from our camping trip that I just realized is still on our porch, buried under my yard sale pile. I'm pretty sure there is a piece of cheese floating in a few inches of water inside of it. Which is absolutely terrifying.

But, no. There is something else I need to talk about today.

My inbox.

My phone is clearly emerging as the most disorganized part of my life. Let's not even discuss my notifications, that's another issue entirely. My emails! This is a serious problem. I've just let it go for years and now I'm starting to actually care. I'm starting to realllly care. And as far as I know, there is no way to stop it. I can delete emails individually or I can move emails into sub-folders and delete them there, but we are talking 50,000 emails. FIFTYTHOUSAND. What am I supposed to do with this?? I'm on this big minimalism kick, you know? I'm cutting down our belongings by a significant amount. It feels SO good. I feel 70 lbs mentally-lighter. But, my inbox. My inbox feels like a tumor on my face. It is the red, throbbing cancer in the midst of our lighter, more orderly existence. It is a solid two fingers up at all my efforts, with maybe even a sticky-outtie tongue. It is a poison.

So, what do I do?? What am I missing?

SOS. SOS! White flag and all of that.

Oh, and link 'em up, my friends.

(If you've never done a link-up before, it's super easy. Just click on the "An InLinkz..." button below and copy and post the URL to your blog post in the prompt. We wanna see what you got!)


17 comments:

  1. Holy frijoles! I think you have no choice but to start all over with an entirely new email address!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Wowzers! That stressed ME out. Do you think you could find somebody to pay ($10-$20?) to just click "select all" and "delete" for two hours (since I think you can only delete as many as can fit on one page at a time)?

    I would seriously be considering how much $$ or time (neither are ideal) you are willing to spend to just get rid of this problem once and for all.

    Good luck! And once it's cleared out, put an end-of-the-month calendar notification to DELETE these things you crazy lady! :)

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  3. Don't call it pasta sauce - call it tomato soup!

    I can offer you no help on the email situation as I am an obsessive deleter.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Delete everything and tell anyone who needs to talk to email again!

    ReplyDelete
  5. I have the same problem with my email. If I ever bother to try to delete things I use the search feature to help. For example I might search for Facebook to find all the email notifications from them, select all, possibly scroll through to see if anything important got caught, delete.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I see on your 'connect' page that you use gmail - there SUCH AN EASY FIX to either get rid of it or just unread it!!! It would take you between 5 and 15 minutes. You just need to decide how far back the items are worth you replying to and either 'read' or 'delete' the rest. Follow these steps:
    1. Log in on a computer
    2. In the search bar (I'm going to say you don't want anything from before Easter) type: before:2014/04/20
    3. Hit Enter
    4. Check the little box on the upper left (right under the search bar)
    5. When the ones on the first page are highlighted - click "select all conversations in this search"
    6. Click the archive button (that's the one right beside the check box you clicked in step #4)

    Then they will ALL GO AWAY - it will take a few minutes for gmail to complete the search.

    If you just want them 'unread' click the 'more' and a menu will drop down and you can click 'mark as read' or if you want them to be gone forever click the 'trash' button.

    If you just archive them, they'll still be there if you want to read them as some point and even will be bolded as they are unread - but they won't appear in your inbox as an unread message.

    Finally - to see them click on the 'more' button on the left hand side of the of the screen and 'all mail' will be listed below.

    I would be more than willing to help you if you need it - I LOVE gmail and am a little anal about having my inbox all unread!

    Good Luck!
    Katie

    p.s. after you do this, that number on your phone will have some meaning - you'll actually know when you have a message!

    ReplyDelete
  7. I keep two personal email addresses. The first is the hotmail account I've had for 15 years, which gets ridiculous amounts of junk email. About 5 years ago I started a gmail account, but only sent that address out to friends and family. I still use the hotmail account ANY time I sign up for anything, or order something, or communicate with anyone that isn't friends or family. That way I keep my gmail account off of mailing lists and keep it "clean." It's crazy, but in 5 years I haven't gotten a single item of junk email to that account. Not ONE. I still check open my hotmail every day and glance through the list just to see if I got anything important or check to see the status if I ordered something. So that doesn't really help you with your current inbox issues, but could be a suggestion for the future!

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  8. Um, WOW! That's quite the stash of emails you have there. Maybe save them for a rainy, relaxing day when you're all alone? Oh, who am I kidding. Read them on the toilet like the rest of us, LOL!

    ReplyDelete
  9. First, answer the twelve messages from St. Josemaria. It is his feast day and twelve is more manageable than 50,000. Probably better for the soul too. Then, put the kids to bed, pour a margarita, and sort by sender. It is time to delete en masse. Start with the easy ones. Feeling extra motivated? Unsubscribe to the most recent email from each corporate sender. You'll probably get rid of 80% of the emails in an hour or two this way. Another night, start tackling the rest, bit by bit. You can do it!

    ReplyDelete
  10. Oh, the inbox drama! I agree with the above comment - deal with the emails from Saints first :)
    I was hoping to link up today, but "time restraints" and all that... I posted my submission to facebook instead. Hopefully I'll get a legit hot mess linked up one of these days... goodness knows we've got enough to choose from around here!
    https://www.facebook.com/OrdinaryLovely

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  11. You might archive just ones from your husband and then delete the rest. Really, if you haven't read it yet, it isn't important any more. Like papers that sit around and age out in importance.

    Free yourself! Also, tag any as spam going forward and gmail will help clean these out of your inbox.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Yikes! I thought the 1000 emails in my husbands inbox was bad! I'd do a search for all the emails from "xx" and then start sorting/deleting from there. Then I would sign up for unroll.me!

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  13. H.o.l.y. cow. FIFTY THOUSAND EMAILS? How many do you get per day? Is this a I-haven't-checked-my-mail-in-a-year thing or more like just a month? Definitely start tagging spam and that'll help with what's coming in. The rest of the comments above sound like they've got great ideas for deleting, too. Good luck!
    xox
    giedre
    ps. Found you via Camp Patton - looking forward to reading more!

    ReplyDelete
  14. Well, you have an email waiting to be read from me!! LOL! I sent it a week ago??? Don't quote me on it. In general it was a thank you for sharing your conversion story and how it somewhat led me to begin a RCIA class this August. :) So in case you don't get that email, thank you!
    BUT...
    Oh my goodness, I have never seen so many emails in my life and it blows my mind! I don't even know how to offer advice on cleaning that up. I think I would just cancel that email and open a new account and start fresh. Haha! ;) Good luck with it. Oh, and I agree with the girl that says to call it "tomato soup". We all have the tomato soup days!!

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    ReplyDelete