Thursday, September 11, 2008

I almost bought a Mac Pro today.

Today I was probably less than two clicks away from purchasing a Mac Pro. This, when I am one payment away from paying off my credit cards. All I'm waiting on is payment for the Mr. T book project (or my next paycheck, whichever comes first) and I will have completely eradicated all of my consumer debt.

I've carried a credit card balance since 2000, when I custom-built a PC for college. I've come close to paying it off several times, but time and again I've succumbed to the pattern of buying stuff. Woodworking equipment here, electronic drums there, computer monitor, furniture, toys, stuff stuff stuff. Some of it has been necessary for my profession, like Adobe CS3 software, but much of it has been just... stuff. At one point I had a balance of over $6,000. I know that's actually below average in this country, but it's still unacceptable. So over the last year I've disciplined myself to pay that sonofabitch down, and now I'm one payment away, and I'll be damned if I didn't just almost shoot it right back up into the thousands.

Not today, baby. They almost got me, but not today. My mantra from now on shall be "If I don't have the money for it, I probably don't need it." I'm holding to my plan, which is - wait for it - saving money until I can afford to buy something. What a crazy concept! Besides, in a few months, when I actually have the money, the price might come down, or I might get more bang for my buck. And don't give me any business like, "well, just put it on your credit card and pay it off when you get the bill." I'm not falling for that ballyhoo.

Two quad-core 3.0GHz Intel Xeon processors with 4MB RAM is going to be pretty sweet, though.

1 comment:

Teresa said...

What??! Waiting to buy something until you have actually saved up the money? That's just crazy and you are certainly not your mother's son. Are you adopted?