Harumph!
Harumph 1
Have you ever noticed how much we are driven to go shopping, when we receive a 40% off coupon for some store or when another noisy emporium tries to seduce us with the announcement of fantastic savings on everything in the establishment? Human nature being what it is, the ploy usually works.
I am no different than most people. When Borders or Barnes and Noble sends me a 40% off coupon on any book or record in the store, I immediatedly print it out and rush off to find something which I can neither live without nor really afford. Forget the fact that I couldn't possibly squeeze one more book into my already crowded apartment. The temptation is always palpable.
There used to be seven deadly sins. Now there is an eighth one: The need to be immediately gratified. The folks who are trying to tempt me to rush down to their establishments and buy, buy and buy still more, know that most people have been infected with this impulse. Don't have the money, they say. No Problem! We will put it on your account or charge it to your Visa or MasterCard. This is the folly that pervades our times... that what whatever we want, not only do we deserve to have that thing, we can have it, even if we don't have the money. No wonder most people in this country are up to their eyeballs in debt.
I am trying to become a fiscally responsible person. I am doing my best not to fall off the wagon and give into my impulses to acquire more things which I want but cannot afford right now. And I do not need to tell you, it isn't easy to keep my resolve. But I am at least trying in the same way that I am trying to lose weight. Sometimes I stay on course... sometimes not.
If I succeed, I will become one of the stalwart, the few... one of those who is conservative in what I choose to spend my hard-earned money on. And if I do actually succeed in reforming myself, to some in our economy I will be viewed as cheap at best or as an economic traitor at worst. Oh well, you can't please everyone all the time. I'll march to Thoreau's drummer and leave it at that.
Harumph 2
Have you ever found a piece of some device on the floor. You don't know exactly what it is or what contraption it goes into. However, you are reluctant to throw it away, because the moment you do, you will find the device to which it belongs and either have to go out and buy a replacement part or simply trash the device itself.
What happens is that we begin to accumulate a bunch of these unidentifiable parts, cluttering up our already cluttered homes.
Is there a solution to this dilemma: to keep or to trash immediately? I am not a good person to ask, because I am always anxious that if I throw away that unidentifiable piece of whatever, I will irrevocably disable a critical piece of technology in my life. My collection of whatevers is still growing.
Have you ever noticed how much we are driven to go shopping, when we receive a 40% off coupon for some store or when another noisy emporium tries to seduce us with the announcement of fantastic savings on everything in the establishment? Human nature being what it is, the ploy usually works.
I am no different than most people. When Borders or Barnes and Noble sends me a 40% off coupon on any book or record in the store, I immediatedly print it out and rush off to find something which I can neither live without nor really afford. Forget the fact that I couldn't possibly squeeze one more book into my already crowded apartment. The temptation is always palpable.
There used to be seven deadly sins. Now there is an eighth one: The need to be immediately gratified. The folks who are trying to tempt me to rush down to their establishments and buy, buy and buy still more, know that most people have been infected with this impulse. Don't have the money, they say. No Problem! We will put it on your account or charge it to your Visa or MasterCard. This is the folly that pervades our times... that what whatever we want, not only do we deserve to have that thing, we can have it, even if we don't have the money. No wonder most people in this country are up to their eyeballs in debt.
I am trying to become a fiscally responsible person. I am doing my best not to fall off the wagon and give into my impulses to acquire more things which I want but cannot afford right now. And I do not need to tell you, it isn't easy to keep my resolve. But I am at least trying in the same way that I am trying to lose weight. Sometimes I stay on course... sometimes not.
If I succeed, I will become one of the stalwart, the few... one of those who is conservative in what I choose to spend my hard-earned money on. And if I do actually succeed in reforming myself, to some in our economy I will be viewed as cheap at best or as an economic traitor at worst. Oh well, you can't please everyone all the time. I'll march to Thoreau's drummer and leave it at that.
Harumph 2
Have you ever found a piece of some device on the floor. You don't know exactly what it is or what contraption it goes into. However, you are reluctant to throw it away, because the moment you do, you will find the device to which it belongs and either have to go out and buy a replacement part or simply trash the device itself.
What happens is that we begin to accumulate a bunch of these unidentifiable parts, cluttering up our already cluttered homes.
Is there a solution to this dilemma: to keep or to trash immediately? I am not a good person to ask, because I am always anxious that if I throw away that unidentifiable piece of whatever, I will irrevocably disable a critical piece of technology in my life. My collection of whatevers is still growing.
posted by hfireman | 12:48 AM
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