This is possibly going to be the most boring post ever.

I’m not joking.

Spreadsheets should be your best friend. Seriously.

Have I lost you yet?

Maybe I should re-frame this post as “How I Picked Our Tour of Ireland…Using Spreadsheets.”

When my mom first decided she wanted to do a guided tour of Ireland, I knew there would be some anxiety when it came to the actual act of choosing a tour. My mom likes options, and even if I had found the perfect tour right off the bat, she wasn’t likely to go for it unless she had others to consider.

See, this isn’t so boring, is it?

As I was sitting at the computer, with what felt like 5,000 windows open, I realized I needed to pull together all the information into a simple format that would alleviate the stress of the decision.

Enter, The Sheet.

The first thing I did was figure out what was most important. My mom was initially set on a 7-day tour. I balked at this for two reasons: 1) I didn’t think 7 days was enough time to explore Ireland. 2) For the money that we were going to spend on a flight, we might as well give ourselves some more time.

So I set up my spreadsheet (please stop yawning) with information I thought would be most relevant: tour name, group size, activity level (important for my mom), number of days, hotel quality, travel type (important for me), and price point. I also added in a spot for departure dates and web addresses.

One thing I did not include were TripAdvisor ratings. That’s an entirely different subject. I suggest perusing the reviews, but do so with a skeptical mind.

Once everything was laid neatly out on a page, it became obvious that Vagabond Tours was going to best fit the criteria for both me and my mom.

So even if you don’t have some odd fascination with sorting and creating lists like me, think about how using spreadsheets can help you sort through a myriad of options, whether it’s dates, flights, tours, or price.

You can wake up now.