Odds n sods

The week or so since my last update was taken pretty easy. Had a couple of nice meals (at Malmaison, Reading and the Yew Tree, Highclere. At the latter the owner Marco Pierre White apparently made an appearence, though I did not see him..)

The Yew Tree meal was in celebration of our son's 18th birthday, a bit of a landmark. In honour of this we bought him a number of gifts including a type writer, an acoustic guitar and some beer (to be precise a polypin of Good Old Boy, as an alternative to the lager usually drunk by teenagers.) Both are children are now officially adults. Scary.

Also have been catching up on some reading. Particuluarly impressed by "Enough" by John Naish. (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Enough-John-Naish/dp/0340935901)

The central tenet of this book is that we would be happier if we could realise when we have enough of something and having more won't make us any happier, indeed could make us feel worse. (Interview here gives a feel of the ideas:
http://www.newconsumer.com/news/item/we_speak_to_john_naish_author_of_enough/

This simple proposition is one of the pieces of wisdom I have come to realise as I get older. An e.g. of how I applied a couple of years back was in taking the policy decision to break the ages old habit of listening to the Today program from the moment of waking to arriving at work. I felt I had reached to point of news saturation. This doesnt mean I have cut myself of from the real world, I will listen to news headlines/peruse the BBC online news/watch the occasional newsnight and avidly listen to podcasts on subjects of special interest or quality ("From our own correspondent" being an e.g. of latter).

What I dont want to do is fill every idle moment with news updates which seems to be the desire of 24 hour news channels (and apparently society in general if the evidence of our dentist waiting room is anything to go by. A giant plasma screen has been installed there showing BBC News 24 as if somehow hearing about a stock market crash here or the latest news of the diana inquest there is going to take patients minds off the upcoming visit to the dentists chair...)

Back to the book, the crucial world is in the title. One of the pre-requisites to knowing when you have enough is having sufficent of something in the first place. So really its a new experience for us, as recently as my parent's generation scarcity was the norm. Also having enough means having more than nothing. So its OK for me to want (any buy) a high tech gadget that I can attach to my bike to help me navigate my rides without constant stops/recourse to maps.