The iPod generation may enjoy a higher standard of living than any before but I can’t help thinking that doesn’t necessarily mean better.

A few things have sent me wheeling along that thought path this week.

First, at the end of an afternoon’s shopping in Brum I decided to go sit by the temporary beach in Chamberlain Square and enjoy some all-too-rare sunshine.

As I made my way past the town hall I passed a large group of teenagers all sporting the current Emo uniform, head-to-toe black garb and scowls (nothing like a bit of individuality is there?)

They were doing the normal thing teens have done down the post-war decades – generally hanging around looking feckless.

But one thing did make this lot stand out – the sheer flamin’ size of them.

Not so much muffin-top as family-size-cream-sponge-with-a-cherry-on-top.

There’s no doubt kids are getting bigger and fatter.

The reasons for this are probably many and varied but it hardly helps that they are living in a world where food (much of it bad) is just so conveniently and abundantly available.

The mass feeding frenzy of consumerism engulfing the country over the last 25 years or so has spewed forth a generation of overweight and listless kids (forget about the loss of school playing fields this lot wouldn’t go near them unless they replaced the grass with french fries.)

The fast-food chains are always the ones fingers point towards when obesity becomes a debating point – and rightly so.

But we should also look at the price-check obsessed supermarkets, peddling poor quality, additive-heavy grub for pennies.

At a good guess an average family’s shopping bill will not have risen much in the last 10 years, although it’s likely their cholesterol levels have.

I got thinking along these lines after my visit to Wolverhampton’s Indoor Market this week.

Stallholders are facing the worst trading conditions they have ever known and fear the market could shut.

Again, reasons for their plight abound, but business cannot have been helped by the ever-extending tentacles of the supermarkets.

And here I have to hold my hands up and admit as much guilt as anyone else.

When I was a kid my parents would do the same shopping route every Saturday morning, going off to visit the butcher, greengrocer and bakers to get much of the week’s essentials – supermarkets held much less of a pull at the time.

As soon as I left home for college though I fell into the far more convenient supermarket habit and it’s one I’ve never dropped.

So while talking to the market traders I had to admit it was my first visit there.

I doubt I’m on my own in neglecting the lure of fresh food for the plastic-wrapped, much travelled offerings offered by the supermarkets.

The danger is that if we continue to ignore the alternatives to Asda, Sainsbury, Tesco, Morrison’s et al, there won’t be any left at all.

When it comes to markets like the one I filmed at on Tuesday it’s becoming very much a case of use it or lose it.

Do we really want to live in a world where the giant supermarket groups are our only food source?

Worrying but very possible.

Yes living standards are higher but I don’t think that vision of the future would represent better.

There again on a slightly more positive note I would like to offer a ringing endorsement of the iPod generation.

Having being given an iPod Shuffle on a recent press trip to the States I finally got it working this week and used it to provide the soundtrack to my nightly run.

After hulking around a personal CD player on my weary plods for the last few years the experience of clipping a feather-light blue square to my shorts before filling my head with exactly the same tunes represented a real leap forward, (and the sudden weight advantage must have knocked a fair few seconds off my time).

In this respect at least life is very much better than it once was.