What's on my iPhone?

This is a post inspired by an anon question on Tumblr (hey you, anon, if you see this I want you to know you're the best!) I've been in a bit of a creative rut lately as the end of the year brings not only season's greetings and joy, but also tons and tons of essays. And of course, when my brain is confronted with a large problem, its first response is not the best method to finish the task, no, it's avoidance, which makes it all the harder to work. But I'm glad for a thing to do as productive procrastination rather than feeling crappy because I'm sitting around wasting time. I'm not sure if this is exactly what you're looking for, but here are the apps on my phone. Feel free to ask questions to clarify!

So here is my homescreen, and only screen, on my iPhone. I like to be utilitarian, though not purely by choice, as my phone only has 16GB and I want to save as much space as I could for pics. I like to lay out everything in a way that is logical for me, including the staples on top down to extras on the bottom. Therefore you have the calendar, clock, app and iTunes stores on the top row, followed by camera, which is to photos, as FaceTime is to videos. For some reason, this makes sense to me. The next row is tools, such as map, compass, weather, and calculator. Next is note based: email, Safari, notes, and reminders. These generally help me keep track of what is going on in my life. Finally, non-default apps, such as music, Spotify, Evernote, and Wunderlist. You may also have noticed that there is a bit of vertical correlation, as Evernote is to notes as Wunderlist is to reminders. I also kept the apps with a circle in the icon all in the second column. Am I a little obsessive? Probably.

Aside from default phone functions, such as call, messages, contacts, and settings, my last row is grouped apps. Each bubble has exactly 6 acts, grouped together by content and/or color. The first one, Apps, is default apps that I sometimes use. The color scheme loosely falls along the "red" pattern. The next, Extras, are the apps I very rarely touch, but can't get rid of from my phone. I thought the yellow ones looked nice put together.

The third, which has three green apps, contains resources I use frequently, from the banking app to check my balance, to the student portal that is used for assignments, the ASUC app which gives information about facilities on campus, and the bus schedule. The last app in the bottom right corner is called Emergency Chat. I use it when I get panic attacks to communicate with people when I find it hard to breathe or talk. The last bubble called "Entertainment" isn't really all for entertainment. This is where you'll find a lot of my communication apps, from Snapchat, to Venmo (a handy app that lets you pay people and be paid back), to Messenger.

I don't have a ton of social media because I find it distracting, and really I used Instagram with just one or two people, so that's about it. The last app, Inkboard, is a doodle app that lets you draw things either from scratch or on top of existing photos. I haven't put much use into, but it can be entertaining when I need it to be (or if you need scratch paper in the middle of the night to calculate how many points each question on a quiz was worth).

With such few apps, the plus side is great battery life and less distraction, but hopefully my next upgrade will let my phone play a much more central part in how I am organized. As of now, I am still tethered to my computer, though my Apple Watch also plays a large part in how I send and receive notifications. And that's about it for all the things on my phone! Not a lot, I'm afraid, but maybe it inspired you on various methods of organization at least. ◊