Excess

* Excess (noun): more than or above what is necessary or usual. Unnecessary indulgence.

Is it just me, or do some of you also feel that perhaps most of us actually have… ‘enough’.

Perhaps we don’t actually need a ‘better’ computer with more ram, mega-thingies, or gigga-wotsits.
Maybe we don’t need a phone that makes coffee, has built in satellite navigation and can guide the space shuttle back to earth.
And what if we do get the TV that’s sixty feet wide… surely there’s an eighty footer comin’ out soon isn’t there?
Perhaps we should wait for that big boy.

Could it possibly be that, as a culture, we’ve lost a little perspective?
Call me crazy, call me wacky, call me old-fashioned.

Today I took my very manly scooter to the bike doctor for a bit of love… his regular check-up.
I handed over the keys and Brady the bike shop guy handed me another set of keys for a ‘courtesy’ bike; a motorbike to get me around for a few hours while the scooter got a once-over.

The courtesy(!) bike was a Kawasaki ZX14.. a $20,000, 1400 cc, 200horse-power, 300kph (180mph) weapon; one of the fastest production bikes in the world…. 0 – 100kph (0 – 60mph) in under 3 seconds.

‘Cause ya need that.

All in all though… a reasonable exchange for the 19hp, 0-100 in sixteen minutes, Taiwanese scooter.

So I put my helmet on, hopped on the beast, slipped it into first, let the clutch out, twisted the throttle and took off. I casually slid the ZX into second, looked down and was already on the speed limit… three gears to go, hardly any revs and I was doing a very lazy 80kph (50mph).

What’s the point of this, I thought.
An exercise in frustration.
Like giving a four year-old a bag of sweets and saying “here you go… just don’t eat any of them.”
Great in theory; a bike that’ll get me out of the state in seven minutes, but I can’t actually use any of the power… unless, of course, I want to get to that speed limit in two seconds. Sure I can out-accelerate a Boeing 747 and possibly break the sound barrier… but then what do I do? It’s kinda like building a mansion with fifty rooms and only ever being able to go into three of them; pointless.

“Sure my place has fifty rooms… I’ve never been into forty seven of them.. but apparently, they’re very nice.”

Why do we build motorcycles which will go 300kph when the fastest we can go (in this state anyway) is 110kph? And then.. why do we get really excited when they bring out a new bike which does 330kph (200mph), when we can still only do 110?

We don’t need… we can’t use it… but we want it anyway.
And when they build one which goes 400… we’ll line up for those too.
Cause we love bigger, better, faster… more.

We love excess.

And while we’re at it, let’s get one of those gigantic go-anywhere four wheel drives with some of those ridiculous wheels and one of those obscenely enormous motors that get ten feet to the gallon… and then let’s commute around suburbia in it and see exactly how much additional carbon-monoxide we can pump into our already polluted atmosphere.

A Hummer perhaps… you never know when you might have to contend with some stray artillery or perhaps a hand grenade from an irate passer-by.

To me it seems that we live in a world of excess…. and contradictions.
While billions (no, not millions) are wondering if they’ll eat in the next week, if they’ll ever learn how to read or if they’ll make their fifteenth birthday, Western corporations are seeing if they can build a robot that can pour us a drink and do the vacuuming while we watch our sixty foot TV.

Because we certainly wouldn’t want to get off our asses would we?
Imagine having to pour your own beer… or do housework.
So 1974.
Such unnecessary hardship.

Those starving people… they just don’t get how tough we have it.
They don’t have to deal with the stress that we endure on a daily basis.
We need all this stuff.

Apparently.

I don’t know if it’s an expression that’s used outside of this country (let me know), but in Australia there’s a common saying often used by blokes:

“He who dies with the most toys… wins.”

And while many people would suggest that this expression is meant to be a joke and tongue-in-cheek, the reality is that for many people, it is anything but a joke. It is actually some people’s mantra; they would never articulate as much… but look at how they live; they don’t need to say it. If you want to know what people’s values and principles are (what’s important to them) look at how they live their life.

Australia; the accumulation nation.

We love stuff.
And as much as we can get.

The other day here in Melbourne I was sitting at an intersection on the chick-puller (girls clearly dig me on that scooter) when I noticed the guy in the car next to me was changing the music on his ‘in-car entertainment system’ with his remote control!
‘Cause you wouldn’t want to have to lean all the way over (a full ten inches) and twist those knobs or push those buttons manually wouldya?

Might pull a hamstring or tear a rotator cuff.

So in an act of tough-love, I opened his car door, ripped the remote out of his fat, lazy hands, broke it in half, pulled him out of the vehicle by his ears, slapped him on the back of the head and shared a valuable and timely life lesson with him.

Alright, I didn’t really.. but geeez I wanted to.
I momentarily fantasized about it.

(You wish I did do it… don’t you?)

Bad you… you’re becoming like me.

When is enough stuff… enough?

When will we realise that we don’t need 1,200 TV channels… perhaps 600 is enough.
One of my friends just put a dish on the roof of his house that’s the size of a Hyundai… apparently it picks up Japanese TV stations… the fact that he only speaks English is irrelevant; he wants it. When I pointed out that he didn’t speak Japanese he looked perplexed… then I realised that it wasn’t about actually watching the Japanese stations.. it was about being able to tell his mates that his TV could get Japan.

It is about his ego.

Yes, I told him.
Of course.

Sometimes, less is more.

Waddya think?

Let me know (and where you’re from).