title: Best way to request and display "you have x new messages"?
body: <p>I have a messaging system for members on my ASP.NET MVC website.
  Messages are flagged as read or unread.</p>
  
  <p>Now I'd like to display in the navigation bar a label wich says "you have x new messages" if there is any. This, wherever I am on the website (not only on the discussion page).</p>
  
  <p>I could do a request for retrieving the number of unread messages on every page of the website but it seems bad to me.</p>
  
  <p>What other ways do you recommand ? (caching, cookie, etc.)
  I assume it is a well know scenario.</p>