When Bad Things Happen to Organized People


A couple of weeks ago, I was dining with a group of friends before we all headed to the Van Halen concert. (So shoot me..I LOVE 80's rock.) Right before we were all about to squeeze into one SUV and drive to the show, my buddy and organizing client Joe got a phone call from his burglar alarm company saying that his home alarm was going off. Since we were dining close to his house, we all rushed over to see what the deal was.

Upon arrival, we found that the would-be burglars had busted out one of Joe's french doors. Luckily, the alarm went off immediately and scared the hoodlums off before they had a chance to steal anything. We had a bunch of handy fellows along (that's them in the photo) and everybody jumped into action cleaning up the glass and securing the door.

Because Joe and I had recently finished organizing his basement, he knew immediately where to find the plywood, saw, screws, screwdriver, etc. From the time we arrived at scene of the crime to when we were en route to the concert was only about 30 minutes. Joe was so pleased that he knew right where to find everything he needed to fix the damage. And the rest of the gang was happy because we'd paid a pretty penny for those concert tickets and we didn't have to miss a minute of the show.

The moral of this story is that being organized can make a potentially chaotic situation much more manageable. Knowing where to find the tools you need in an emergency can save you stress, or even save your life. A great book about this very topic was written by my friend Judith Kolberg. The book is called "Organize for Disaster" and it's full of tips to prepare you for both natural and unnatural disasters.

And in case you were wondering, Van Halen ROCKED that night!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

This site has some tips on how to prepare your house in the event of a fire.

http://www.thetravelinsider.info/info/firesafetytips.htm

Suellen said...

Thanks, Eric. I'll be sure to check that out!