As 2009 ends, it is as good a time as any to reflect on our priorities and how we are going to make the year which begins tomorrow better than this one on its final hours.

A story in yesterday's STAR gives us a good indication of how, as a nation, we can do much better than we are currently, despite the recession that we will hope-fully soon emerge from.

That story had to do with the BlackBerry clones that are being sold at some stores in the Corporate Area. But while the clone phones did not have the software capabilities of the real thing, they still cost a lot of money.

No doubt they are being sold, as there are those persons who simply wish to appear to have a functioning BlackBerry and the supposed status it confers on the person carrying it around.

Just how much more ludicrous we can get than this is anyone's guess, but certainly this is an extreme in 'profiling'.

It is evident that we would do so much better financially if we could, as a nation, reorder our priorities and concentrate on things that are functional instead of items which simply serve to shore up our status and mask our low self-esteem.

That would, we suspect, not only reduce our expenditure but also lead us to having more practical tools to achieve things which add value to our lives, not only in 2010 but subsequent years.