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I do this very thing on a legal pad, except before "get the unit tests to pass", I add a box that I can check off because checking boxes makes me feel nice.

One advantage of physical paper for the journal is that it doesn't take up screen real-estate or require switching tabs to enter into it. Another advantage is that I don't have to clear it out when I get done with a task. I just turn the page.

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Physically writing something also does _things_ in your brain that typing on screens doesn't.

I've noticed that moving things around to different parts of your brain helps cognitive functions.

One example of this is rubber ducking [0]; the act of moving a problem from the part of your brain that you use to think about it, out through the part you use to serialize sentences to another person, helps in problem solving.

[0] http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?RubberDucking

I have found this works often in my day to day life. I will be get struck at one thing and when I about to drop a mail, and I write the detail explanation about the problem, I get the answer.

Nice to know this is called as "Rubber Ducking"

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