The Perfect Imperfectionist – Step 9 of 11

I wrote in the first of this series about bringing an end to paper filing at home, replacing my historic line of ring binders with the scan, store and organise capacity of Evernote. The “stuff” of life is getting smaller, whether its a smartphone with a multitude of applications, an iPad, a Macbook Air or the various shuffles, pods and nanos that now populate the world. Yes – I was back in the Apple Store yesterday (this time Manchester) and although my visit was short-lived (the crowds were actually oppressive), there was enough time to note that the square footage is filling up with hosts of smaller things. In life as in Apple. V12 Vantages aside (a boy has to be a boy) – and notwithstanding the size of our steaks at Gaucho Grill last night (Dad and lads night – see Facebook) – the world is becoming miniaturised and we would do well to note that, adapt and survive. Of course, at my age there is an indispensable accessory to all of this shrinkage – a good pair of reading glasses – without which my iPhone 4 becomes a kaleidoscopic blur (come on Apple, when are you going to start selling iSpecs to us baby-boomers?). The iPad, however, is just the job for my eye-sight and relative lack of digital dexterity (I’m too old to have learned how to type with my thumbs). I’m especially enjoying magazines, blogs and newspapers on the iPad, although I cannot pull myself away from the tactile experience of a good book – reading novels on computers still seems like sacrilege and I will more than likely continue that prejudice. I’ve noted in social media this week just how many of my generation did have a visit from Santa this year that incorporated 16, 32 or 64 Gb, wifi and 3G (language that would have been double-dutch 20 years ago). The arrival of “folders” in the latest release of operating software for the iPhone and the arrival of stacked and shared notebooks in the latest release of Evernote further improve the possibility of compartmentalising our lives within our jacket pocket or man-bag. So I’m happy to go with the flow, as far as my eyesight will allow – perhaps there will come a point when laser eye correction will become a pre-requisite? Time to start thinking about how I can make other areas of my life smaller – particularly my waist line.