Great ideas

I went out to get a present for a friend's baby this lunchtime. I wandered into a bookshop and bought a Maisy word book.

At the till, my eye fell on these and I had to bring some home.

PENGUIN BOOKS Great Ideas

Each individual book in the series is a work of art. And the ideas are quite interesting too.

Hmm. I feel more intelligent already.

Penguin proves yet again that you CAN judge a book by its cover and that we need to nurture our bookshops.

I'd read about them online when they launched, thought they looked good and then promptly forgot about them. It was only when had the opportunity to handle them and pore over them, that I was seduced into buying them. I couldn't have done that through Amazon.

iOverload

I am a sufferer of Information Overload.

As someone who works in the communications industry, this is something of a nuisance.

A letter on the subject from Tim Pyne to The Independent illustrates the problem perfectly. He had recently been to a talk by James Gleik on this very subject. They had a chat after the talk and both agreed that self-filtering had become an inevitability and I couldn't agree more with them on this point.

This state of mind can be very difficult to combat. I find it hard to get through an entire article in a magazine, let alone finish a book.

Yesterday, attempting to glean information about VAT on HM Customs & Excise website, I actually fell into a sort of catatonic state, unresponsive to attempts at revival. The only thing that saved me was a strong cup of tea and a walk around the block.

Tim Pyne, the letter writer from the start of this post (are you still with me?), decided to solve the problem by throwing his £500 iPhone into the bin. I can only hope he erased all his personal information first.

He says he's feeling much better for it, like a reformed drug addict, but I think I need to find another way.

Annoying as it is to feel permanently wired to the World outside, I do believe we are enriched by the ability to share and broadcast information as we do today. With this freedom comes the need for self-control, the power to Switch Off. I guess that's the part I need to work on!

What is this??

Just sitting at my desk, about to take a sip of my wonderful cool refreshing SanPellegrino Aranciata.


I should have realised sooner.


There was no wonderfully sensual unwrapping of the lid foil.


The colour and design was vaguely reminiscent of Pepsi.


The background banknote pattern (such craft, such fine Italian authenticity) should have been conspicuous by its absence.


But no. I took a deep swig, put down the can and this is what I saw:

Oh!

Can somebody explain to me what this is? Please let it be a design for another far flung market, one that I may never come across again. Please don't tell me that they've replaced this ...

... with something so bland. It can't be true!!!!

The Fashion Pack

I like packaging. I like jewellery. What more could a girl ask for?

These lovely pieces are the work of Yoav Kotik. I want one.