Buyers remorse sucks
I’ve been on this buy-nothing-purge-everything-unnecessary-keep-only-multi-functional-stuff…uh…thing, for about 5 months now. Did I ruin that hyphen-athon by using an actual hyphenated word? Oh well – And yet I am still human and I have moments of weakness. Case in point, I was – for a few short weeks – the almost proud owner of a shiny Obsidian Black Dell Mini 9 netbook.
“Almost proud?”
Yeah, you read that right. Even as I clicked “Place Order” on the Dell site, I wasn’t happy with the purchase. That was first moment of suckage in this little saga. The second moment was when it arrived 2 weeks later. I really like the little thing…but every time I opened it up to check email or browse RSS feeds, I had that little pang of remorse that makes it impossible to enjoy a new toy.
Let me explain – I bought this machine with an eye toward the consulting I plan on doing after my international move this summer(I’m still going to post about that soon, I promise…again). The idea was that I could connect a dead harddrive to this little machine to run scans, pull data, etc…it runs Linux so virus’ would have no effect. Here’s the rub…my primary computer is a MacBook. So, yeah, that virus rationalization…out the window. How ’bout the portability one? It’s a 13″ MacBook…vs a 9″ Mini…that one’s a draw. But the overall issue here is simple. No, that’s the reason/problem…simplicity. As my overall goal in life is to simplify any and all areas of my life that can be simplified, owning a second laptop flies straight in the face of that goal. Then it slaps it silly and walks away in a huff.
I ordered a $20 cable that will let me attach the very same drives to my trusty MacBook…and called it a done deal.
Why, after 6ish months of successfully purging, selling, downshifting, and simplifying – why did I give in to this whim and purchace the computer? I can’t answer that. If I could come up with an answer for that, I likely never would have bought it in the first place because I would have had the reasons not to buy it at the ready and would never would have clicked that “Place Order” button. So the little netbook went up on Craigslist for what I paid for it minus the accessories (wanted a quick sale to end the trauma), and it was gone the next day.
What did I learn from this little excercise in self-flagellation? Other then not all pain is bad…sorry, overshare…I learned that I am in fact human (shocking, no?) and will occasionally give in to these weaknesses. I’m just glad it only ended up costing me ~$50 for the accessories I tossed in with the sale and a couple of weeks of awkwardness…
But I stand by the post title…buyers remorse does suck.
Yup, I’ve been eyeing one of those little Dells… and I just can’t rationalize it… yet. Good for you for admitting your mistake and rectifying it.
Hey, can I be an annoying editor-type for a second, and point out that your tagline should read “more to life than…” instead of “then”? Yeah, I find all the typos in restaurant menus, too.
That little semantic snafu has been bugging me as well…but as it’s not my quote, and I’ve seen it attributed as is in several places…I have to honor the original (and hope not too many others notice!).
The Mini is a great little machine, especially for the money…so if it’s something of genuine use, go for it!
[...] the habit. As recently as a few months ago I made an impulse purchase that I instantly regretted (here), but with practice you can kick the shopping habit! I’ll talk more about that in a later [...]
[...] question is this, does this count as buyers remorse like the netbook I wrote about previously? Or can I count this as simply a continuation of my purge since I bought it [...]