There are just some things that you want to keep simple and don’t want complicated. Take an alarm clock for example. The old fashion alarm clock with the dials and a switch to turn the alarm on and off is simple, clean, functional and it works. In my line of work I stay in a lot of hotels. Most franchised hotels all have these fancy clock radios about the size of lunch box with a zillion buttons that are Bluetooth equipped and will tell you everything from the music playlist to the weather. They also act as the alarm clock.

I cannot tell you how many times I have stayed in a hotel and had the alarm go off at the same time the previous guest wanted to get up. One time I literally ripped the clock out of the wall at 4am. Now, the very first thing I do when I get to a hotel room is unplug the radio. It just keeps life simple.

There are enough examples of keeping it simple to cover 20 pages. Sometimes you just want what you want and don’t want to learn a new way to do it. The way Microsoft Windows updates work just doesn’t make any sense to me. I can understand upgrading something but why the need to change to change every function so that nothing looks like it used to? Why can’t it look just like the previous version with a few added upgrades? You know why? It is because there is some 23 year old designing the software and he/she thinks everyone likes change as much as he/she does. They don’t. They want to do their work without having to relearn a whole the operating system.

Therefore when I go home I want the gas logs to work off of one switch, up or down. I want the TV to turn on without reprograming the internet, I want the door to open with a knob and the heat to work with a button. I want the water to work with a knob, not a sensor, the microwave to work with the push of one button, brew coffee without using an IPad and turn the lights on with a wall switch not a home control system. I could go on and on here.

If you ask me where I think the next big business wave is, I think it will be people wanting to unplug, disconnect and go back to a simpler time. They will want to actually live life among real humans (not virtual) and have real conversation (not facetime,) put their feet up and enjoy just being off the grid. Taking a step back to simple living? Sounds crazy right? I don’t think so. KT