I'm happy that works for you, but for me or anyone else who can be absent minded sometimes, that does. not. work. I need a calendar to remember promises I've made to people about when and where I'll be. Tuesday I'm meeting a friend to catch up in person, Thursday I've got a birthday dinner to go to, there's a show on Friday that I have tickets to. Stack multiple events in a single night if you have a busy social life. That's not a ton of information to remember but human memory is imperfect, and that sort of information is in one ear and out the other for me.

Prior to pocket computers, I'd have a paper datebook to carry around (and lose), but thanks to modern technology, it's stored in the cloud and accessible for me at https://calendar.google.com.

Can't edit original, but what I meant there is that it doesn't need to be on a calendar that work has access to (if the event is outside working hours).

For things on weekends I put those on my personal calendar. But that's clear-cut separation since no work event will ever be there.

The conflict is only for personal events during work hours. For those I put the blank placeholder in work calendar to block out the time.

It would be nice if I could sync my work calendar with my personal calendar, but with all details redacted except for begin, end, and perhaps location.

Settings > Calendar Settings > Access Permissions > Make Available to Public > on the dropdown, pick "See only free/busy". Now you can share the link with your work calendar and it'll show up as indistinct blocks of time.

You can do it both ways, and you'll be able to check your availability for both work-related things and personal things in their own calendar, but contextualized.

Aside from the odd appointment at the dentist or doctor's office, I don't have very many appointments that need to show up in both calendars. Work hours are work, everything else is personal and none of my workplace's business.

If one covers strictly work hours and the personal one is strictly for outside work hours, then no need to check both. Just check the applicable one.

In general, if I have a personal appointment, I'm not going to forget about it. Just the act of having added it to my calendar is enough to remember it, without having to look at the calendar. I only ever mix personal events into my work calendar if I there is an overlap with my working hours, everything else is none of my workplace's business, I'll polite decline any meeting that conflicts.

Besides, last-minute meetings are a sign of bad meeting culture.