Shockingly a University of Pennsylvania study says the number of young people addicted to gambling - largely due to increased exposure to the Internet and Internet gambling - grew by an alarming 20 percent between 2004 and 2005 alone.

I grew up in a very large family in a very small house. I never slept alone until after I was married.

No enterprise small or large public or private can remain self-governing let alone successful so deeply in hock to others as we are about to be.

Brain power improves by brain use just as our bodily strength grows with exercise. And there is no doubt that a large proportion of the female population from school days to late middle age now have very complicated lives indeed.

There are signs that the age of petroleum has passed its zenith. Adjusted for inflation a barrel of crude oil now sells for three times its long-run average. The large western oil companies which cartellised the industry for much of the 20th century are now selling more oil than they find and are thus in the throes of liquidation.

But look I was born in 1956 the peak year for births in US history. I think I'm very representative of many of the thought processes my generation have been through and by and large people of my age have had their imprint planted on the consciousness of western society for a long time.

As winter strips the leaves from around us so that we may see the distant regions they formerly concealed so old age takes away our enjoyments only to enlarge the prospect of the coming eternity.

Probably the happiest period in life most frequently is in middle age when the eager passions of youth are cooled and the infirmities of age not yet begun as we see that the shadows which are at morning and evening so large almost entirely disappear at midday.