Leaving the house

When I leave the apartment in the morning, this is what it's like:

8:45am Turn off whatever episode of L&O I'm watching and be proud of myself for being ready to leave for work early.

8:53 am Find my cell phone (usually either buried in the sheets, in a corner of the kitchen, or in between some couch cushions).

8:59 am Find my car keys.

9:00 am Walk out the door. On time!

9:01 am While locking the door, realize that coffee mug is still inside.

9:04 am Find coffee mug. Head back to the door.

9:05 am Realize that I'm pretty sure my cell phone is not actually in my purse.

9:11 am After searching for phone in various key places in my apartment, begin digging through purse.

9:17 am Find phone in purse. Make the following mental notes:

1. So that's where my phone charger is...

2. Twenty dollars? Where did that come from?

3. This month's AT&T bill... never going to want to take care of that. (Blog post re: automated customer service on its way soon)

4. Why do I have a six-month old movie ticket in here?

5. Clean out purse.

6. So much for being ready to leave early.

Keep in mind, this whole saga used to take place at 6:00am back when I was teaching. At least now it's light outside when I'm attempting

to locate all these things. On the other hand, I used to be able to bring Courtney in for back-up when I was a disheveled mess.

I'm not very good at leaving the house. I have been meaning to come up with consistent places to keep my cell phone, my keys, my coffee mug... At least maybe a checklist by the door? Once, I was looking through a Sharper Image catalog (or was it SkyMall) and I saw these pager keychains that help you find all of your stuff. You attach the pagers to your different stuff and then have a remote control by the door so that when you need to find something, you just push the button that finds it, and it vibrates or sets off a siren or flashing light or explosion or something so you know exactly where to find it. Here's one I found on Amazon.com, made by Brookstone.

Until I save up the $79.99 for this silly thing (or if I find one that sets off explosions or fireworks, however much that one costs), I guess I'll just have to save an extra 30 minutes to go through my current Leaving the House regime.