FIGURE B

You'll now have an Associations field for each Address Book entry.

Invent abbreviation tags
The next step is to make a list of your desired associations along with an abbreviation tag for each. Table A shows the associations and abbreviations that I've come up with and use:

In order to remember all the abbreviation tags you have, create an Address Book entry called Association Tags, making sure to leave a space before the first word. By leaving a space before the first letter of the word "Association," this entry will sort to the beginning of your Address Book list. When you open your Address Book on your Palm handheld, the Association Tags entry will be at the top of the list for you to refer to if you have forgotten an abbreviation tag. Put your association tag list--similar to the one above--into the Note field of the Associations Tag Address Book entry. You can add a new tag at any time. It should resemble Figure C.

FIGURE C

Store your Association Tags in an Address Book Note field.

For each entry in your Address Book where you want one or more associations, put into your Association field each abbreviation tag preceded by the "&" sign and separated by spaces. The & symbol is a quick way of forcing the search to stay on track. For example the Associations field entry for your tennis club member-physician-neighbor would be:

Figure D demonstrates how it would show up in your Palm handheld.

FIGURE D

Add the proper association tags to each entry.

Notice that the order is irrelevant. And don't feel that every Address Book entry has to have an association tag. Some entries may not have any association. Now when you search for physicians, use the Find function to the right of the Graffiti area. Search for the string "&md" (without the quotes), and you'll get a list of only those entries with the "&md" string in it. You won't find anyone from Maryland, unless they also happen to be physicians. The reverse situation still could be a problem: if you are looking for people who live in Maryland and search for MD, you'll find all the &md tags too.