Shuffling to the Music

Much as we sometimes fear change, some inexplicable part of the human psyche loves unpredictability. Even those among us who crave order in our homes and office spaces sometimes love to throw caution to the wind and lose our organized selves in a whirlwind of spontaneity. While many of us feel that things should have their place, and be in that same place when we go to look for it as we're running out the door, still we long for the odd surprise to make life just a little more interesting. Perhaps, then, it's little wonder that our favorite iPod tool is the shuffle key.

In the days of the record and tape cassette, our only listening option was a chronological one. And because even our very favorite album usually has a song or two that doesn't quite hit the spot, we always ended up listening to it anyway, skipping the needle over (quite often making horrible scratches in the process that invariably cut through the songs we did like), or pushing blindly on fast forward to get to the tune's other side.

But with the advent of CDs, our options expanded, offering us for the first time a perhaps more playful way of listening. And while CDs undoubtedly offered us greater listening flexibility over their predecessors, portable music had not yet reached its zenith. Now we have the iPod, and the user friendly listening of the CD has been combined with a storage system that allows us carry with us almost as much music as we could ever want.

But with that enormous choice available to us on a daily basis, it can be difficult to know where to begin your listening pleasure. Of course there are always days when you have a hankering for a particular song, but when the music stored comprises all your own personal favorites, how do you choose? Perhaps that's why the iPod's shuffle option is one of the device's best loves features.

So much so that Apple, the company who make the iPod, have produced a version of their digital music player that's quite descriptively called, yes, you guessed it, the Shuffle. Realizing that the feature was one of the iPod's most popular, they came up with a music player that assumes this mode by default. You can still store all the music you like on the new iPod version, only now you don't have to choose which song to play – the Shuffle plays your music randomly, so you are always treated to that element of surprise.

Now the unpredictability that keeps us on our toes can be a part of your life every day. Shuffle to the music!

Live The Dream Today

Have you an idea about how you could improve your life but do not have the confidence to make that dream into a reality? Have you a plan that you hope to implement when you are a little older, possibly when you are retired? In this article, I write about a dream I had when growing up as a teenager, a dream I made into a reality when I was in my early twenties.

My name is Steve Hill and I was born in the second largest city in England, called Birmingham. The pace of life in Birmingham is quite hectic and the crime rate is fairly high. In saying this I am very proud to be a Brummie, the knickname for people who are born in Birmingham, and am very fond of the city.

My parents would take us on holiday each year to the South West coast of England to a county called Devon. We would stay in a place called Brixham which basically seemed to be the opposite of what Birmingham was. It was very quite, was very relaxed, had only a small amount of minor crime and the people were a whole lot more friendly. I enjoyed some superb holidays in Brixham up until the age of about sixteen and would often dream that one day, I would actually live there.

This of course was only a dream and I believed that I would probably make it happen when I had retired. At the age of twenty-three I was offered a voluntary redundancy package at the insurance company where I had been working since I had left school. This was a great opportunity for me to get paid to leave a company that I had been thinking about leaving for many years. I took the package on offer and then started to think about my next move, for example, where I wanted to work, where I wanted to live etc.

At this point in my life I had been dating a young lady for around two years. I had told her about my dream of one day moving to Brixham and she also seemed to share my passion for the area.

I then decided that I wanted to make the move now while I had the chance. Why should I wait until I am retired? Life is too short I thought to myself, I might not even live until retirement age.

My girlfriend was very up and excited about my idea of moving to Brixham and the move went ahead. I have to say that I loved living in Devon and there were not many aspects from my past life that I actually missed, apart from my friends and family.

After living in Brixham for a few years my father became very ill. I travelled up and down the motorway to visit him in hospital and eventually decided that it was now time to move back to Birmingham. This was because I wanted to spend as much time with him and my mother as I possibly could.

I will without doubt return to Devon and do not regret for one minute making the move when I did. Life is about living and about making your dreams into reality.