"In Praise of Slow"

I just finished reading this book, by Carl Honoré, a Canadian journalist living in London (whose father was one of our pathology professors in med school). IIRC, I read a review of the book in the paper, where I was amused by the author recalling his initial joyful reaction to hearing that there was a collection available of "One Minute Bedtime Stories" and then his horror at realizing how obsessed with time he had become - and then interested to read how he grew up in Edmonton with a physician father (so figured out who that must be, as I mentioned, one of my prior profs). Of course, I bought the book months ago, probably before Christmas even, then started reading it when I was working at "Clinic C" (while I had a lot of time between patients initially).

Lots of interesting ideas, given that part of what I was trying to accomplish with leaving "Clinic A" was to slow down my life in a sense ... so good reinforcement to know I'm not the only one feeling as I did. A good summary, from page 275, "The secret is balance: instead of doing everything faster, do everything at the right speed. Sometimes fast. Sometimes slow. Sometimes somewhere in between. Being Slow means never rushing, never striving to save time just for the sake of it".

He mentions a University of Lethbridge prof who does "slow reading" by posting thoughts and insights on the internet after each of his reading sessions, thereby taking longer to read each book but finding a greater understanding and appreciation of the books by doing so. Which is kind of the reason why I've been posting stuff about various books and films here (at least sometimes), makes me think more about them and therefore absorb and appreciate them more.

We've been making an effort every so often to enjoy a really good meal at nice restaurants, sort of related to the "Slow Food" philosophy in a way - like when we ate at Lumière in Vancouver 2 years ago, taking the opportuntity of an evening port call to find a nice restaurant in San Jose (Puerto Rico) instead of eating on the cruise ship, or even when we went to the Catch Oyster Bar in Calgary 2 weekends ago. Can't afford to do that all the time (especially Lumière ;-) ), but really enjoyable on special occasions :-).