Spending money like I have it!

I spent a lot of money today. At least to me, it seemed like I...no, to anyone, I spent a lot of money today. Well, OK, maybe to Paris Hilton, I didn't spend a lot of money today. Anyway, we've established that for me, and for most people, I spent a lot of money today. I bought a new sofa sleeper for my living room, a chair sleeper (that's an extra wide chair that pulls out to a twin bed), a new grill, and various little odds and ends. The total was well over 2 grand. Now, I made a little extra money on this last paycheck from OT, but it was closer to $300, not $2000. I'm not sure what I was thinking.

Well, the sofa sleeper and chair, we had been planning on getting, so I wasn't surprised at that. We had actually waited until today to get sofa because it was going on sale. It's funny about that too, last week we went to look at the sofa and the sales person told me about the sale they were having next week. They hadn't announced it yet, but it was 15% off on everything before noon on Saturday only. She suggested we wait. So, we waited. While I was waiting, I did some math and shopped around a bit. It was a great deal on the sofa. Anyway, we went in this morning to buy it. We didn't see anything announcing the sale though. I assumed there would be more of a fuss. As it turns out, they changed the sale at the last minute. They changed it in a way that rendered it completely useless to us. Luckily, our salesperson told me that while they didn't actually have that sale going on, they would honor it because she told me to come back. So, I got my 15% off on everything. I was happy. Now I just have to wait 8 weeks for the sofa.

As for the grill, it's a funny thing that happened. It's funny because my wife denies that it works this way, but she did the exact same thing to me when we got our TV. Let me explain. What happens is that I mention that I want a new grill and I don't like our grill. I mention this casually and in conversation when it comes up. I'm not dropping hints or anything like that. Honestly. I say that someday I want to get a new grill when we can afford it. Well, today, we go to Lowe's to get some paint so my wife can paint the back splash to our kitchen. Well, while we're walking by the grills, she just stops and start looking them over. Of course, this kind of thing catches the attention of the sales people and they come over. She then starts asking them questions and stirring up interest in a new grill. This is out of the blue, you see. I hadn't mentioned anything about the grill in weeks. So, she stirs up all this stuff about a grill, and then when it comes time to buy it, she looks at me and backs out of the deal. She says "Oh, it's whatever you want to do. I have nothing to do with this." After stirring all of this up, I buy the grill. Then later I hear "I can't believe you bought a grill." Yeah, she said that. I said that she instigated the whole thing, which she denies and says that she was "just looking".

She did the same thing with the TV, only that was worse because I hadn't mentioned ANYTHING about a new TV. That was ALL her. She just starts looking at TVs when we're at Best Buy one day and she just wanders over there. I asked why she was looking at TVs and she says that we need a new one, so she just wanted to see what was out there. Well, I'm a guy. Technology is like porn to guys. The only thing more porn-like to guys is actual porn. Anyway, once she started me down the new TV path, there was no stopping me. I was like an 18 wheeler sliding down a snow covered road after my brake lines had been cut. There was only one thing that was going to stop me at the end of my path and that was a new TV. So, that's how we ended up with the 42 inch LCD HDTV we have now. I have to say though...it's a damn fine TV and I thoroughly enjoy it.