Google on Apple (sort of): Calendar via Calendars by Readdle

Over the years, I don't know how many years exactly, I have discovered that I have a bit of a temporal concept problem. When communicating with others about dates and times, I constantly make mistakes. Wrong date, wrong time, wrong amount of time. When making plane or hotel accommodations, I have to sloooooow wayyyyyy dowwwwwn to ensure that I have the right dates, so I don't arrive someplace and have no reservation until the following day. Which I have done. At least twice. Interestingly enough, I am never late and rarely miss an appointment, but I think this is cause I am so terrified of doing so that I check everything 768 times.

For this reason, among others including some syncing problems, the iOS calendar just doesn't do it for me.  On both iPhone and iPad, it doesn't give me enough visual information to keep track of what is going on in my life. Especially not on iPhone, where if you have an appointment on a particular day, this is indicated by a non-eye-catching dot.

Dots are lame.

The iPad version gives one a bit more information, but I can't get over the skeuomorphism. Leather binding and torn paper are kinda goofy in a digital interface:

When I switched to a more open schedule this year, keeping track of my calendar became even more critical.  At an IEP meeting on a case I was consulting for, I saw that the director was using a colorful, very visual calendar, and probably too eagerly asked him what it was. Calendars by Readdle (currently $6.99 and very worth it) syncs your Google Calendar and very much mirrors the interface of Google's pretty powerful scheduling tool.  I love not only the look and feel but also the ease of use- tap the plus sign to add an appointment and all details, tap and drag to move the appointment (which, by the way, iOS calendar does not let you do). The app also naturally lets you see any calendars that have been shared with you (great for knowing where my cohorts are going to be) and displays the tasks list you access in Google Calendar as well, so I have my to-do's there! Check it out if you like Google Calendar, or consult on students who could benefit from visual calendars.