Fancy Microwave

There are two types of shoppers, there's the person who likes to research and scope out stores and track down the best price for an item -- that's me -- and there's the other type of shopper, someone who will buy something just because it's right there -- that's Peter.

That item can be the suckiest blender/food processor/fan/air conditioner in the world, but if it's at the Lowe's while we're shopping for a replacement hacksaw blade, then that's the item he's going to want to buy IMMEDIATELY because IT'S RIGHT HERE AND I'M ALREADY HOLDING IT.

Needless to say, we've gotten into a lot of heated arguments at stores because I want to go home and ask the crystal ball I call THE INTERNET and ask it if it's a good idea to purchase that $35 blender from Target (the answer was no). But Peter wants to get his credit card and put $35 on it on a blender that will fall apart the second time he uses it.

And I completely understand why he wants to just buy the blender. Because then WE WILL HAVE A BLENDER AND CAN USE IT TONIGHT. And I'm all -- BUT IT MAY BREAK THE VERY NEXT DAY. LET'S WAIT TO BUY ONE THAT WILL LAST A FEW YEARS.

I was raised by extremely frugal parents. Parents who taught me that it was best to save up to buy things IN CASH and be careful how you spend your money. These are people who showed me their booklet of mortgage payment slips instead of reading me bed-time stories.

Peter, on the other hand, was raised by a woman who will buy Hummel dolls as an investment, a person who thinks that "credit card" is synonymous to "free money." In other words, Peter was raised by a RENTER. Not that there's anything wrong with renting, but I wouldn't advise you to do it for sixty-five years.

But I am trying to be better about it. Being with Peter has taught me to bend a little more and to compromise. Sometimes it's better for me to pick my battles. A few days ago, we went to Sears to purchase a microwave that I had researched -- a $200 microwave that would suit our needs just fine. Unfortunately, Sears was out of that particular microwave. But they did have a $350 microwave that had a "browning feature" that was good for "melting cheese."

This is probably a feature that we would never use, a feature that no microwave really needs, but this microwave, the one that cost nearly double what we had planned out in our microwave budget was the one that was in stock, so Peter wanted to take it home.

And I didn't even argue with him. That's love, people.