Wednesday, October 24, 2007

A Dollar Buys Impulse

Yesterday I had a very, very strong urge to buy an accordion. I was looking at some deals on eBay and thought that maybe I could get one (including shipping) for $50 or so. Then I thought, who knows in what condition it's in? Would I ever have time to learn how to play it? If I couldn't figure it out on my own, where would I find a teacher? How would I take it with me to graduate school? Where would I practice, and could I lug it all the way to the HFAC? If I decided to do street performing, would I really want to go all that way to Salt Lake? I finally talked myself out of it.

Then this morning I was walking through the bookstore on my way to work. I thought, "hey, my birthday was recently, I could buy myself something else other than that calligraphy set." I walked over to the classics section and decided $24 was way, waaay too much to pay for a book in the public domain. However, the Dover Thrift section really tempted me. For a minute I was about to buy Walden, Madame Bovary (both of which I have read), and Flatlands. I think it would have amounted to seven or eight dollars total. But I withstood this impulse: I've already read those books, and besides, I already own several books I haven't read yet (Don Quixote and volume two of Proust's Rememberance of Things Past chief among them). I could probably buy the books more cheaply at Moe's if I really wanted them.

Then this evening I went to the grocery store. I was about to buy a can of chili for a dollar, but told myself that I already had a few cans of chili and plenty of Ramen. Finally a deal presented itself that I didn't resist. A Hershey's Symphony bar (are candy bar names italicized?) for a dollar. And yes, I did have about 6 candy bars at home I hadn't eaten yet. Did I lose self-control for a moment? Did my impulse get the better of me? I don't really care. And this candy bar tastes sooooo good.

3 comments:

Andrea Landaker said...

Hmm, I've seen kid's accordians for $10-15 or so . . . maybe you could try one of those first and see if you like it.

Rachel Helps said...

Hmmm... kid's accordions only play like 2 chords (or at least the one I had as a kid did). It's pretty rare that you see one with buttons and I don't think any of them have a keyboard, which seem like they would be the most fun parts of an accordion.

Andrea Landaker said...

Hmm, there's this one:
http://www.amazon.com/Hohner-Inc-Kids-Accordion/dp/B000UWIO8S/ref=pd_sbs_t_5_img/102-2745791-3621752

But for that price you could almost get a real one, so it might not be worth it. :-)