On the email treadmill

by Donna Andrews

    I'm feeling a bit jaundiced about email tonight.
    When I got home from the day's errands and opened up my email program, I found that my email host for donnaandrews.com had sent me a second copy of every single email I’d received since June 16. 
    Every single email.
    And I get a lot of email.
    If I was completely caught up on email, the way I once was and hope to be again, this wouldn't have been a problem.  I could just delete all the old emails because I'd know they were dupes.
    And if I'd been really behind on my email and hadn't dealt with any of it, it would have been almost as easy.  I'd sort by date and all the dupes would be side by side with the originals, and I could just delete every other one and be back to normal.
    But as has been the case so often lately, I was behind but working hard to catch up, so dealing with all the duplicates is going to be a serious pain.  I'm going crazy, trying to sort out the emails I've already responded to from the ones I haven't yet dealt with.
    So much for my plan of getting my email inbox under control by the end of June.
    It wouldn't be so bad if they were all good and useful emails that I wanted to get in the first place, but a lot of them were emails that irked me the first time they landed in my inbox, and I'm not expecting to like them any better the second time I have to delete them.
    I was going to give you a rundown on some of the most egregious things I'm not looking forward to deleting again.  The nut cases who email every officer of every organization I belong to.  The Nigerian scam artists and their probable cousin, the dude in Zimbabwe who has already tried to contact me via Skype and QuePasa and is now bombarding me from "Are You Interested?"
    The sales emails from every place I've ever bought something and every place they've ever sold my name to.
    The nags from every charity I ever gave to and every political organization I've ever supported.
    The emails from people I've never heard of who turn out not to be new readers or long-lost relatives, but friends of friends of friends who hit "reply all" on messages to which I was one of the hundred and eighty ccs.
    The BSP from people who haven't figured out that more is not necessarily better where promotion is concerned.   I don't mean the monthly or quarterly newsletters from writer friends.  I'll scan those when I have time.  (Maybe make that if I have time.)  But the folks who send out something every week?  I don't want to hear from myself every week.
    And then the spam for Viagra and devices to enlarge a body part I don't happen to own. 
    It's making me tired just thinking about it.
    I find myself wondering: when did email change from something useful and fun into a chore?  I remember when I would open my email program and thrill if I had an email or two.  Not any more.
    Well, actually, I do thrill if I only have one or two, instead of sixty or seventy.  Especially if a good number of the sixty or seventy will be adding things to my to do list.
    Don't get me wrong.  I still like a lot of the emails I get.  When a friend emails with news, I'm happy.  When a reader contacts me to say they liked one of my books, I'm happy.  I like hearing from my editor, my agent, my writing group members.  The family can email as often as they like.  And I still find a lot of my email useful.  I don't know how the work of SinC, MWA, Malice Domestic, or any other organization would get done without it.
    But finding the happy and the useful seems to get harder every day.
    What I really need is for a cyber organizer to come into my inbox and help me deal with all of the email.  Like an online version of Niecy Nash or Peter Walsh.  Someone who would motivate me into reading what needs to be read, answering what needs to be answered, doing any necessary work that comes in by email.  Unsubscribing from things I'd rather not get any more. Bozo filtering a few more names.  Taking a long hard look at all those lists and asking myself if I really, really need to be on them.
    Or I could solve my own problem in a few keystrokes.  Block all those undealt with emails and delete them.
    Neither of those things is going to happen.  So I work along, trying to answer the important stuff promptly.  Getting behind when I travel or have a family crisis.  Catching up when there's something else, like a deadline, to procrastinate from.  I'll get back into the groove pretty soon.  And one of these days, I'll catch up.
    But right now?  Apologies.  I'm taking the night off. I may just curl up in bed with pen and a notebook and write something by hand.
   

Comments

[lil Gluckstern]

Ditto, Donna, ditto. The only mystery for me (a Luddite) is how Mr. smith in Nigeria got my name. Enjoy your night off. I enjoy your books very much.

[krisneri]

Man, does this resonate with me! I've set up multiple emails in the hope that spreading them out will make them more manageable. In one account, I get between 1200-1500 pieces of spam a day. I obviously got onto some spammer's list somehow. Gmail catches most of them, thankfully, but with that many, I can't possibly search through them for the odd piece of genuine mail that might get put into the spam folder in error. I've just decided the odds are against it being something important. Technology doesn't always make our lives easier, but most of us couldn't turn back that clock if we wanted to.

[Elaine Viets]

My sympathies. I feel your pain.
I used to just have to worry about a full desk, Donna. Now I have a full email box -- I've been working on a book outline and a revise this week and my emails are up to 158.

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

Oh, yikes. Poor thing! Wonder what would happen if you ignored it all--just, delete the heck out of of it. Then if anything is really important, someone will email you again. Just do a scan for "pultizer" or "edgar nomination." And maybe the rest can go.

[Donna Andrews]

It may come to a mass delete, Hank, but I can't quite bring myself to do that yet. I did manage to sort by date and line up a lot of them so I could see the dupes and delete them. Feel calmer now.

Elaine . . your emails are only up to 158? I am SO not telling how many I have!

I hate to say it, but Kris's 1200-1500 pieces of spam make me feel better. None of my accounts that bad . . . yet.

And Lil, I don't worry so much about how the spammers get my name. I just want someone to find out THEIR names, because sooner or later we will all get so fed up with spam that we will pass laws making spam a capital offense, and I want these guys on the list by that time.

[email marketing]

I am so glad I am not alone. I have never seen so many ridiculous scams for money coming through on my email. I am even more amazed that anyone has answered them or sent them money.

What causes that email duplication? I have had that happen on Yahoo as well.

[Kristina L]

I mostly just get spam on my hotmail account, but that's the account I use to sign up for accounts at online stores. gmail has been pretty good - not sure if that's because of filtering or because I mostly use it for family and friends.

I also get really annoyed by spammers that send me ads about increasing a body part I don't have. Does anyone actually answer these things?