I'll be the first to admit it, I am not frugal. I don't believe in saving money and buying something of less quality. Quality is more important than price. I can buy a cheap pair of glasses but from past experience they will break or fall apart. The great thing about Oakley is the lenses will never be scratched. You can take out a lense, put it on the flor, stomp on it and it won't even have a scratch:
"Oakley sunglasses comply with the ANSI Z87.1 requirements for impact and high impact protection. They feature Oakley’s High Definition Optics (HDO) which provides clarity whilst also protecting the eye. All Oakley glasses must pass two tests before being produced for sale. The first test consists of firing 1/4 inch steel ball at the eyewear at 102 mph (150 fps), the second test is dropping a 500 gram or 1.1 lb steel spike on the lens from 130 cm or 51 inches. In both cases the lens must not crack, shatter or eject from the frame." (Wikipedia).
Oakley is also made in the USA. They may cost more but hopefully some of that money goes to US workers.
Anyways... I'll start paying down the debts next month, I promise!
HS
4 comments:
They may be scratch resistant but what if you lose them?
I spend about $25 on sunglasses, they last about 1-3 years before they break. They usually do not get scratched and work great, but I am not doing all that much outside (besides driving, walking, and bike riding.) It's losing them I worry about.
If you can afford them and they make you happy, why not?
My brother alwasy had these sunglasses so your post brought up a happy memory of him in those glasses (we even wanted him to have them at his wake. My family has a sick sense of humor.)
For me, the definition of frugal is not, as you see it, "saving money and buying something of less quality". In fact, most frugal people I know- myself included- see being frugal as distinctly different from being cheap, or stingy, or buying the least expensive/lowest quality item just to save a buck.
Because I AM frugal, I can afford to pay more for top quality- when and where it matters.
I agree with Courtney. Being frugal does not mean buying low quality.
I would consider myself to be frugal. At times I do by store brand products, but this is not always the case. Sometimes I buy name brand on sale and sometimes I by name brand for full price.
I would say that I know what I value and how much I am willing to pay for the things that I want.
You can justify your actions all you want. If you were truly at peace with your financial decisions you would not feel the need to defend them.
After reading a few posts, I truly sympathize for you and your situation.
It took me a full year of stopping, starting, stopping, starting on the Dave Ramsey plan to finally GET IT. I would sit down at the end of the month, peruse my spending, and sometimes cry at how stupid and childish and shortsighted I was to be spending so much money on NOTHING. On eating out. On little frivolities. On things that were not building my financial house.
You make over $100K. There is no reason, none at all, financially, why you can't get out of this financial mess. At least, no logical reason. It's all mental/emotional. Until you truly, really, deeply understand just how much you are literally throwing into the wind every day you remain in debt, it's not going to happen for you.
It took me a year. I don't know how long you've been at this, but trust me, I wish I had gotten serious on my first try. It's like when people go on a diet, and they say "oh, I'll have the cake because it's so and so's b'day... I'll eat the greasy pizza because we're all working late and the boss bought it for us... I'll have that ice cream sundae because it's the 4th of July..." on and on it goes. There is always a "good" excuse to spend money. And it's usually BS.
Is your wife in this with you? Are you seriously comfortable with making a human being, creating another person that will need to be fed and taken care of, when you are living paycheck to paycheck and if you lost your job in this terrible economy you couldn't make it? Is that the way you want to start out?
You should check out www.thesimpledollar.com. The birth of his child scared the shit out of him and got him on the right track. Personally, I'd want to be on that track *before* the kid comes, you know?
You shouldn't give up, but more than that, you should start to *really*, sincerely, try.
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