My 3 year old grandaughter is currently progressing, as 3 year olds do, from "I want" to "I need". Part of this process is learning what she has to do to get what she wants... "If you put your boots on we'll go for a walk" ,"If you eat your tea you can have pudding".  We're constantly  bombarded with info about what we are entitled to ("treat yourself!", "Instant loan approvals") without any effort on our part. But life isn't like that. 
I'm often asked how long a painting has taken me to complete.  I remember  an elderly artist in Wellington who used to reply to that question "About 70 years."
Sometimes the actual painting may only take an hour or two, but before this I've usually thought about how I'm going to do it for several days,  done preliminary sketches, maybe had a few trial runs -  quite a bit of effort before I lift a brush.  And the more effort I put into planning, the better the results. There are no shortcuts in my job.
In this morning's paper a local supermarket is advertising mandarins already peeled to put in your lunchbox! Sigh...

I've been thinking about this over the past week! Our little local school (around 30 pupils ) staged their annual production the other night, "The Snow Queen".  Every pupil had a role, teachers , parents and others helped out with costumes, props and music etc and it was a great success. The kids and audience really enjoyed themselves, and everyone was blown away by the quality of both acting and singing - some of these pupils are only five years old! This little school never ceases to amaze me with the amount it manages to achieve, there is always something going on and the children get a great grounding in lifeskills as well as academic subjects - they should be very proud of themselves. 
On the other hand, today I went to the Lake Station Hereford bull sale. And there, size really does matter!  I sat in the sun and did some quick sketches of these beautiful boys while prospective buyers checked them out . While I was there Malcolm  gave me a quick lesson on which bits should be big(!) and why (!) and all of the various things that make a bull a prospective prize stud. So, yes , depending on what you're talking about - size certainly does matter.
PS. to my subscribers- sorry if you were sent this twice, I don't think that the spam box liked my first title! :)