Best Results Organizing

Paper Doll knows you’re keeping track of a lot of information. Chances are good that you use a digital device for jotting down notes on the run. Digital is dandy…except in a downpour. If it’s raining or snowing, a non-digital alternative is often preferable.

That said, paper isn’t always the best way to deal with the problem, either. Rain. Fog. Snow. Humidity. All of these make it pretty difficult to organize your thoughts without ink bleeding through a mess of soggy papers. And if you’re the sort to send an assignment notebook through the washing machine, or have ever found yourself with a squishy pile of drenched notes after righting an overturned kayak, you know that water and paper are not the best of buddies.

Happily, there’s a nifty third option — one that avoids shorted out digital devices as well as soggy papers. Waterproof notebooks!

WATERPROOF SOLUTIONS FOR WATERLOGGED WRITERS

Do you scoff? Do you wonder who really needs such a thing? Waterproof notebooks are stellar options for:

• Private detectives — especially of the film noir variety, as it’s always drizzling in those stakeout scenes
• Military personnel, police officers, and firefighters
• Poolside novelists — when you get the burst of inspiration in the middle of doing the butterfly, can you really wait until you’ve completely dried off?
• Sailors, boaters, fishermen, and lobstermen (and women, of course) — because you really don’t want to risk someone yelling, “iPad overboard!”
• Shower sages — so you don’t forget those notions that come to you mid-shampoo
• Coaches, scorekeepers, golfers and other athletes — because keeping track of stats during outdoor sporting events often means keeping dry notes, even if you can’t keep a dry eye when your team is losing
• Outdoorsy adventurers, campers, and divers — in other words, people who are the exact opposite of Paper Doll, Paper Mommy and our ilk
• Bird-watchers — who don’t seem so bothered by morning mists or summer showers, but whose disposition sours at the thought of losing data on a Wilson’s Warbler
• Agricultural workers
• Geological surveyors
• Veterinarians and vet students specializing in farm, zoo and other large animals
• Engineers and contractors working on outdoor projects
• Seattle residents and the cast and crew of Portlandia
• All the rest of us who might need to keep track of survival information during hurricanes, floods, and other inclement weather

Luckily, there’s no dearth of alternatives in the waterproof notebook market.

THE OPTIONS

Rite in the Rain makes a big splash as a major player in the field of waterproof writing. The All-Weather Notebooks evoke the sense of a bright yellow rain slicker and puddle-jumping boots.

The pages are particularly heavy-duty, tear-resistant and durable — a little humidity, coffee or sleet won’t do them in. They come in two styles: weatherproof and truly waterproof, and it is advised to use waterproof pens with Rite in the Rain notebooks.

Rite in the Rain weatherproof notebooks all include durable polyethylene covers and come in a wide array of styles, including:

Shirt Pocket Notepad — 3″ x 5″, 50 sheets, top-spiral, with a 1/4″ grid pattern. Also available with a buff or green cover — but isn’t the yellow spiffier?

Hip Pocket Notepad — 4″ x 6″, 50 pages, top spiral, with a 1/4″ grid, and also available with the buff or green covers

Reporter’s Notebook — 4″ x 8″, 50 sheets, 1/4″ ruled

Mini Side Spiral Notebook — 3 1/4″ x 5″, 50 sheets, 1/4″ ruled

Small Side Spiral Notebook — 4 5/8″ x 4″, 32 sheets, ruled or grid pattern

Large Side Spiral Notebook — 8 /12″ x 11″, 42 sheets, ruled or grid pattern, rigid back cover for support

All-Weather Sketch Book — 8 /12″ x 11″, 42 sheets, blank, with a top spiral

Other intriguing specialty notebooks include a Beef Calving Record Book, a Fire Investigation Field Book and a Job Hazard Analysis notebook.

Rite in the Rain Field Books have weatherproof paper and a “fabrikoid” hardbound cover. Each 80 sheet notebook is 7 1/2″ x 4 5/8″ and comes in a wide variety of styles, including universal, field and birder journals, as well as environmental and geology field books, each with its own unique style of ruled lines and grids.

For those who are in over the heads — literally — Rite in the Rain makes DuraRite notebooks for use in extreme weather conditions and even under water. They aren’t as fashion-forward as their bright yellow cohorts, but the DuraRite Shirt Pocket, Hip Pocket and Side Spiral notebooks use an entirely waterproof synthetic paper to ensure the safety of creative and scientific endeavors.

Rite in the Rain’s products retail for $4 to $20. For slightly more, customized versions are available — just choose your page patterns and preferred colors for covers, cover inks, paper and interior text.

Of course, Paper Doll would be a wet blanket if she didn’t provide a few spiffy wet-weather alternatives.

Emergency Zone, whose focus is survival and emergency kits and tools, has an All Weather Memo Pad that comes in a flashy red top-spiral assignment notebook.

Unlike the Rite in the Rain products, for which weatherproof/waterproof pens are suggested, pencils also work fine with the Emergency Zone All-Weather Memo Pad. Retailing from $3 to $7, it is waterproof and suitable for putting in a Grab & Go bag. No information regarding the number of pages or dimensions was available from the company.

Ritchie Navigation’s Wet Notes are completely waterproof 4 1/2″ by 7 1/4″ pocket notebooks with hard yellow plastic covers over the wide white interior side-spiral binding.

The 45-page notebook lies flat when open and comes with a soft lead pencil. The compass company’s products can be found at marine retailers nationwide. Ritchie also makes a 40-page 3″ x 5″ Wet Notes top-spiral notebook with a similar yellow plastic cover.

The Nalgene Waterproof PolyPaper Notebook is a bit of a conundrum. Scientists likely appreciate Nalgene’s 100-sheet Polyolefin waterproof notebooks for their exceptional durability, water- and chemical-resistance and smudge-proof performance under harsh field conditions.

The 4 x 4 gridded paper cannot be used with pencils, but accepts a wide variety of inks, including gels, technical markers and ballpoints. Pages are numbered 1-96, with title and Table of Contents pages at the front. The paper can actually be washed and dried flat, like favorite sweaters!

However, the mystifyingly high price tag of $70.80 per notebook makes one wonder if one has swallowed too much swamp water. Certain that Lab Safety Supply had made a typo, I checked Forestry Suppliers, Inc., only to find their prices merely $2 lower, and Ben Meadow’s forestry suppliers had the same pricing as Lab Safety. Casebound hard-cover Nalgene PolyPaper notebooks are similarly priced at Amazon.

Either I’m missing something vital, or the accounting departments of various university labs are going to erect a monument to Paper Doll once this post goes viral. (Readers, you do intend to make this post go viral, don’t you?)

Wiley’s Waterproof Notebook will do the job, but the water-themed bubbly blue cover may be a little too cute and on-the-nose for some (like our Sam Spade wannabes). It retails for about $7.95 for 64 spiral-bound pages, and a pencil, rather than a waterproof pen, is recommended.

Unfortunately, the exact measurements were not available from the company or their retail outlets. However, if you teach sailing, camping, outdoor biology labs, or other classes where adverse weather is an issue, you can request an evaluation copy to see if it would be suitable for your students’ needs.

INTERNATIONAL WATERS

International readers, you haven’t been forgotten.

The indelicately-named Suck UK is both a product design company and purveyor of odd but enchanting gifts and accessories for the home. I’m particularly a fan of their organizer-friendly products like Peel & Stick postcards and magnetic tea towels.

Suck UK’s Waterproof Notebook has a simple black cover, standard book binding, 100% waterproof paper and is designed to be used with the enclosed graphite pencil.

This notebook goes for 8.95 through the UK site, but Suck UK’s delightful products can also be purchased stateside at various sites, including Kris & Company and Ritz Sisters.

Australian readers can pick up Markrite All-Weather hard-cover 80-sheet notebooks, which are sewn with “rot-proof” thread and bound in durable casemade (i.e., turned edge) PVC covers. The soft-cover books are spiral-bound at the top or side, with polypropylene covers and 50 sheets of waterproof, tear-resistant, high rag content paper.

In addition to standard waterproof notebooks, Markrite also makes diving log books, bird-watching books (printed with detailed precision for tracking observation method, strata, and macro and micro habitat detail) and pocket-sized books.

Stationer and printer Flavell Creative Images of Scotland not only purveys Waterproof Tough Notes in multiple sizes (including A4, A5, and A6), but can also print whatever your business, club, group or family needs for any of a ridiculously extensive set of A-Z  damp-or-drowning writing purposes.

With all of these options, here’s hoping your attempts to keep your wet-weather documentation organized will meet with smooth sailing.