The Grammar of a To Do List

Organizing a day…

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Polly: Do you keep a diary?

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Annie: Nope. Used to. It made me think about keeping a regular habit. It made me practice writing. But then the act of writing every night became an end in itself. So now I just transfer the To Do tasks to an archive file.

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Polly: But a To Do list doesn’t read like a diary.

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Annie: No, more like a snapshot of a day in my life.

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Polly: What’s best language for writing to do lists?

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Annie: Personally, I note a start time, then location, people and describe the task beginning with a verb, then a noun. For example, 10:00: Room X203: panel members, present PPT Tokyo 2020.

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Polly: Do you need all that information?

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Annie: I don’t NEED to write all those, it just helps organize my thinking about a task.  “When” I need to do it, “where” I need to be, “who” is there, “what” I need to do, kicking off with an imperative verb, adding a noun phrase.

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Polly: Do you add any reason you’re doing these tasks?

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Annie: Not usually.

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Voice-over

“Why” is the ghost in the To Do machine. Unseen and generally unwritten. To Do Lists are something of a “wh4” creation.

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