Using Google Calendar's "Notifications"

I've recently started using Google Calendar. I've always been the old-fashioned paper-calendar type, but I decided to give this a try, in my ongoing effort to create a business with a truly portable office.

Although I kind of miss my paper calendar, which doesn't have to be logged into, can be scribbled on at will, etc., there's one aspect of Google Calendar which has begun to be very useful to me: "Notifications".

Using Notifications, I can set up the program to send me an email a few hours, or a day or a few days, before each "event" on my calendar, as a reminder. This is useful not just for appointments, but for the type of thing I ordinarily handle by using lots of sticky-notes taped up around my office - reminders of things that need to be attended or prepared for in the future. For example:

• hosting accounts which are going to automatically renew for the years (and hit my bank account with a sizable charge)
• transfers from my PayPal account to my bank account, which take 3-4 days, which I need to confirm
• my automatic computer backup, which I'd like to not have interrupt me in the middle of doing something on the computer

Of course, it's also handy for appointments, deadlines, and remembering to get to salsa dance class! But using it for less traditional reminders is even more useful, since it really is effective in clearing my life of the multiple small paper notes that I use for this type of thing.

As far as adding volume to my email in-box, this doesn't bother me at all, simply because (1) my in-box isn't out of control, (2) this is useful enough to warrant using email to get my attention, and (3) I just read and delete the reminders, so they aren't much of a burden.