The other day I finally bought myself a new watch. It was actually a birthday gift from my family (erm, from last March actually) but it took me ages to find something I liked.

You understand I couldn’t select just any watch. And I can tell you there are more than a few to chose from.

My new watch, had to be… just right. And I am more than pleased with it. In the last few days I have been doing some reading up on the particular range. As you can see from the photo it is a Casio G-Shock watch.

Now with its many and varied functions, multiple time zones, automatic daylight saving adjustments, stop watch, alarm, etc, I assumed it was the watch an international pilot might choose. The label did read “cockpit series” after all.

No, rather the G-Shock range is favoured by extreme sports enthusiasts. That may explain why the watch is so thick (about 15 millimetres), much of its bulk must be made up of shock absorbing material. Extreme sports fans would need every iota of that that padding. Then some I suspect.

Perhaps I could indulge in some high speed supermarket trolley racing. That would constitute extreme sport in downtown Randwick.

Of more interest though is where I read this snippet of information about G-Shock watches. They were featured in an article in the quarterly magazine published by my Health Insurance company! Further, they are also giving some of these watches away in some sort of competition.

I don’t know about anyone else, but I would have thought a health insurance company, for quite obvious reasons, would be the last place to endorse or promote extreme sports!