[Note: today’s audioblog is “on location” – background audio recorded and mixed with spoken audio.]
Audioblog: MP3 | Real Audio
I’m sitting at David and Mary’s table at the Goodbye Blue Monday coffeehouse here in Northfield since the A/C is a little strong now over in my “corner office” table by the window.
Having coffee at this independent coffeehouse in the center of downtown Northfield is one of my favorite simple pleasures. It’s a social hangout, but just as often, I sit alone to write in my blog, organize my to-do list, read a book. Like many home office types, I like having a chunk of time each day where I work in a social setting, away from my home office. I know that I’m likely to be interrupted by people I know — that I’ll see people I know and interrupt them — and that’s part of the serendipitous social glue that keeps me connected to the townsfolk. I don’t come here if I have to get work done.
Relaxing on a shaded screened porch is another simple pleasure, and I love regularly eating meals here in the warm months of the year. I’m back home now having my usual Sunday breakfast on the porch — French Toast, sausage and OJ.
I normally read the Sunday newspaper while I eat but since I’m on a “simple pleasure” kick, today I’m putting aside the paper and just eating breakfast, wallowing in the simple pleasure of the food, the chirping birds, having my wife, daughter, and dog join me, feeling grateful for the whole scene.
Quote of the Day
Manifest plainness, Embrace simplicity, Reduce selfishness, Have few desires. – Lao-Tzu, Tao Te Ching
Embrace simplicity? Piece o’ cake, man! Well, three blog entries in four days doesn’t exactly spell perfection, but I can see why it’s cool. Have few desires? Now that’s another story. I’m likely to be doing a barter for a new motorcycle soon. I’m excited, natch, since the bike I’m competing on now is an ancient ’88 Beta. But I do have fun on it still, and there’s a certain perverse pleasure in occasionally beating guys on new bikes. So while I know that I’m not really going to be any happier with a new bike than what I have now, I’m still drooling. I don’t know if I can “not have desires” when it comes to motorcycles.