I: Idea Book

I:  Earlier I wrote a post about gushing ideas.  In a continuation of that post, I suggest you keep an idea book for all the things you see, hear or otherwise notice that you might someday be able to incorporate into your reading. 

Most of you probably already do this. I've heard lots of writers say they keep a notebook by their bed to jot down things that come to them as they drift off to sleep.  I can't do that. I tend to fall asleep within seconds of putting my head on the pillow.  But I carry a spiral journal with me nearly everywhere I go.  My day planner has all kinds of notes jotted in that mean nothing to anyone but me.  And sometimes they don't mean anything to me either when I go back and look at them.

There are lots of things crowded into our heads.  Our jobs, day and writing, our families, the traffic as we drive, the bills we need to pay, even what's for dinner, and our brains do a better job organizing it than the smartest computer can do, but things get lost also.  We see something, read something and think to our self, I must remember that.  But if we don't write it down, there's a good chance we won't remember.  The thought is still there, dangling on some neuron buried in a tangle of other neurons and ideas, thoughts and whatever we need to survive the day.  Don't trust you'll be able to find that tiny speck of insight or spark of an idea you planted in your brain the day before or even the hour before.  If you can write it down. 

Do you keep an idea book? Where are you most often when inspiration strikes?