What's the most irresponsible purchase you made that you don't regret?

meep_launcher@lemm.ee to Ask Lemmy@lemmy.world – 271 points –
257

My stupid, ugly lizard.

I had my eye on a beautiful female leatherback bearded dragon with great genetics! She was around 200$ and I was so ready to buy her. Contacted the breeder and was told that she had been sold just a few hours earlier. Absolutely crushed.

Then the breeder offered up a defect dragon. It was going to be culled due to a genetic fuck-up that caused it to be born without spikes or scales. They're much much much much much more difficult to care for into adulthood, due to their special needs. 20$ adoption fee + shipping.

He was the opposite of what I had wanted.

So naturally, sucker that I am, I adopted him.

He's turning 5 this November.

I love my stupid, ugly lizard. ๐Ÿ’•

(here is what a standard one looks like:)

You and your lizard are awesome. He looks like a little alienโ€”I'm glad E.T. found home.

You just made me well up. People can be so good.

He's so ugly it's cute

He certainly has his charm, that's for sure!

Now I want a lizard

As long as you get one with scales, I'd highly recommend it! They do require at least a 75 gallon habitat, though. Ideally 120 gallons! Also, ideally a front-opening one (they get spooked if you come at them from above).

Also will need a heat lamp and a long UVB fixture that spans at least 1/3 of the habitat.

Oh, and they eat insects & greens. Babies eat 80/20 bugs & greens, but transition to 20/80 bugs & greens as adults. Crickets or dubia roaches are the best insect staples!

My dragon is around the size of my forearm, but they won't get much bigger than your entire arm.

As babies, they are very skittish / energetic, but as adults, they are pretty mellow. If you'd like a smaller, chill cuddle-buddy to just hang out with, a dragon is for you!

I am just considering my options of low maintenance pets. This seems like a fairly decent option.

Definitely adopt an adult! Just be aware of their lighting, space, and food requirements. Many are essentially friendly pet rocks that simply enjoy hanging out & looking cool. (:

Looks a bit like the ghoul from the fallout show, in the best possible sense! You're so kind to take care of him, sometimes I gain hope for humanity โค๏ธ

What are the special needs? Cute lizard.

His skin is the issue, mostly. Bearded dragons shed by rubbing themselves on rough surfaces. Due to having no skin protection from scales, he is prone to cuts and scrapes from such surfaces. Cold-blooded animals are notorious for slow healing, which means open wounds heal extremely slow, leaving the animal very prone to infections and further complications. SO, I've sanded down corners, sharp edges, and other things in his enclosure.

He also requires lotion, aloe, and massages to keep his skin / shed healthy. If this is not done, the shed can become stuck on certain appendages, which can lead to loss of blood flow, with can lead to rot/infection, which can lead to required amputation or death. Common stuck shed amputation parts for scaleless beardies are tail tip, all toes, and even eyelids.

So this dude has a better skincare routine than I do, gets weekly massages, gets humidity checks (too little = dried out skin, too much = respiratory infection), has temperature control, special furniture, etc.

Given me more white hairs worrying about him more than anything else in my life, that's for sure!

My answer is very similar to this. I talk about it a lot, I was around eight years old when I just supposed to "take care" of my pup whose canid species is only semi-legal here, but it turned into full blown pethood. She passed away and I currently have a granddaughter. I wouldn't trade her for anything.

Someone I don't really know all that well, last spoke at school, has an autistic niece. She lost her toy and was distraught, so her aunt put up a post on Facebook to say it was discontinued, and to ask if someone could locate a second hand one somewhere. I'm not really sure why, but I felt bad for her and thought that maybe I'll use my Google-fu to help.

I did a reverse image lookup, found the original manufacturer, looked up one of the main execs, found their contact details against their personal domain, and asked them if they could help out. They said they'd be happy to help, and I said as a gesture of good will that I'd pay for the new toy - perhaps several so that she'll always have one if it were to break.

After speaking to the owner, I had paid for several toys for an autistic girl I had never met - probably around ยฃ500 worth. The exec went a step further and flew to the UK to give her and her aunt the toys, probably for some good press. I never told the aunt it was me, and I told the exec to keep it between us. They put out a press release where I was referred to as a "mystery hero", and said that for her they would resume that line of toys, with her receiving a custom version with her name attached. To their credit, he said her aunt and mother kept asking who the person was so they could thank me, but they stayed firm and said that it was up to me to reveal myself.

So, for ยฃ500 I made an autistic girl and her family happy, and got a nice photo of the workers with a note that said "thank you". That money was supposed to go towards car repairs, but I decided that a month of walking and leftovers for lunch to make someone happy was worth it.

You made someoneโ€™s life measurably better. A goal anyone should driver to achieve. Good on you.

Woah get outta here with this wholesome shit, i came here to get an... Oh wait this isnt reddit. Carry on mate!

a month of walking and leftovers for lunch

probably did more good for your own health than the car repair would have

Kudos to you for doing this, but for all that free press they got and the exec's trip on the company dime, you'd have thought they'd let you keep the ยฃ500!

During COVID, I went a bit mad and got really into collecting Transformers action figures. I'm still not entirely sure why. One day I just bought one on a whim, and before I knew it my closet was full of unopened, mint condition toy robots.

Anyway, Christmas rolls around and I see a flyer for a local toy drive. A sudden compulsion hit me, so I loaded up my entire stash and donated the lot. Just like that, the spell was broken. Not even Soundwave was spared.

To this day, nobody in my life knows that I spent thousands of dollars on plastic crack, only to foist my addiction on some poor, unsuspecting kids. I like to imagine the War for Cybertron rages on in their hearts.

Not even Soundwave was spared? Shit dude. That's some hard core cold turkey.

Steamdeck. Had some cocktails and bought it, got it and had buyers remorse. Figured I'd give it a shot anyway.

Love of gaming rekindled, now I don't doomscroll during downtime at work.

Installing bazzite tomorrow if I get around to it.

edit: installed bazzite in a few hours this morning, zero to hero. If you fuck with the penguin you're going to want to do this. Very simple and straightforward as far as linux installs go. My deck is a 64GB LCD that I upgraded to 2TB and it worked fine, so the 64GB limitation is just the SSD, not anything to do with the deck itself.

Don't forget to backup your saves for games that don't do cloud save. I have fast internet and most of my games are also installed on my desktop PC so I didn't worry about backing up any of that.

I'm on the fence. I get a 1 hour lunch, already own a switch, but never use it. I know the deck has all my games already, I just cant with the current price.

Check eBay for the non OLED version, you could find one at a good discount especially if you buy a 64 GB

Had a look, everything is still high 200's. I might just get a refurbished that comes with warranty

I had pretty much stopped using my switch before I got the deck. There just weren't enough compatible games to keep me interested. I ordered a deck impulsively and, like people often say, I fell in love with video games again. In absolute numbers it's a big investment, but I've gotten like 3000 hours out of it so far. I love being able to wake it up, play 20 minutes of a AAA game, then suspend the game and come back later.

Suspending a game is something I hadn't considered. Must be good for travel or short bursts

Same. I had a Switch but there were too many games I couldn't play, and my PC can't handle anything beyond Stardew Valley.

Got a second hand Deck and I can hardly believe how good this thing is!

what are you trying to play? I've been happy with an Anbernic for classic arcade games

Trying to play Gnome3, honestly. The gaming side works fine for me I just want to use the whole computer.

Unsure about the experience on steam deck but on my PC Bazzite runs like a charm! Installed Proton-GE for extended compatibility and have yet to run into a game that doesn't work out of the box or has significant issues. Even the very niche game Sprocket runs great!

Curious, why did you put bazzite on it and not keep the default steamos?

Laptop replacement for (infrequent) travel, limitations of desktop SteamOS, because it's neat.

I have an older brother. I invested $1000 in his first show, lost it all.

He went on to win a Tony award.

Also, it's likely I may one day inherit some of his wealth. He's single and childless.

Too bad he didn't consider that an investment in his future and not just explicitly that show.

He never payed you back after becoming successful? What an ass.

Nah, he's used his position to give me some exceedingly cool experiences. I feel more than paid back.

It must also be fun to see him in big time stuff and awards shows and be able to point and truthfully say "that guy owes me a thousand bucks!"

I'm so proud of him. He has a play he produced that's currently planning a world tour.

We're the sons of a poor roofer. I hope he makes enough that he never has to work again off his current show.

A round blanket with the pattern of a pepperoni pizza on it. Bought it as a funny treat for my wife and me. Our, now, 5yo sleeps with it every night. It's his pizza blanket!

I've almost pulled the trigger on a tortilla blanket for my wife, as she always wraps herself in the blanket like a burrito, but I'm afraid I'm the only one that will find it funny.

Do it. It's soft and lasts forever, even with an infant to 5yo. It has only started to see some minor holes but my kid likes picking at holes so he is likely making it worse.

My first parrot Johnny. I purchased him for my husband as a surprise Valentine's gift when we were dating/living together. While we had done our research and made sure we were ready to handle the responsibility, we were not financially in a great place at the time. My credit card was almost maxed but I made the impulse decision to call the company to get a limit increase so I could make the purchase. And while it did take me some time to get out of my young and dumb credit card debit I never once regretted getting my little turkey bird. He passed away from old age almost 2 years ago but I still miss him everyday.

One time, I walked out of my then apartment and there was a parrot standing on the windshield wiper of my car. (I did not live in a tropical or otherwise parroty area.) I was not prepared for that situation and had no idea what to do with it.

I held out my hand and he hopped over, then just hung out on my shoulder. I carried him around my neighborhood asking anyone I saw if they had any idea where he came from so I could return him, but no one did. He ended up staying in our bathroom with a closed door overnight (we had cats) then we took him to an exotic bird shelter in the morning. Obviously I did what seemed most responsible in that case, but I think I could have become a parrot owner if I had been so inclined.

Hopefully he did well. And here I thought the distribution system only worked for cats!

Bought a Steam Deck during a fit of depression despite not traveling much and having a full gamer PC.

Turns out it's really nice for the few times I do travel (especially on long train rides) and when laying in bed after just waking up.

I blew way too much money on a stuffed dog at a hotel general store for my wife. We were driving a Uhaul during a snowstorm to move in together. The roads became very slippery so we decided to sleep through the storm. It was our first hotel stay together and money was very tight, but it was a romantic gesture. She cherished it until our son claimed it as his own personal "security blanket."

What the fuck kind of hotels have a taxidermist on staff and sells stuffed dogs. Thatโ€™s like seriously fucked up.

Perhaps I should have said "plush dog."

lol Iโ€™m an idiot. I just finished a rewatch of Mr. Robot in which a taxidermist that stuffs formerly living animals plays a prominent role. That show kinda fucks with my head and messed up my perception of reality for a while.

Me dropping $1350 on an impulse purchase of a 3D printer was probably "irresponsible" when I got my first engineering job paycheck.

That said, I've had a bunch of hours of fun with it, and am now starting to design possibly marketable items with it that I could make income with later, so it hopefully won't be too stupid. Could be worse, I could spend $1300 on alcohol a year and have nothing for it but liver damage.

Tools that are well loved like that are always worth it imo. Anything to simulate the creative side of the brain.

Which printer? Just bought a $400 elegoo neptune 4 pro a summer ago and it has been well worth it. Even though my petg prints have been shit.

I pulled out all the stops and grabbed a Bambu X1C with AMS combo when they were on sale back in July. It's probably overkill, and aim not a huge fan of their closed ecosystem, but I did have the money, and I also need to do true engineering materials that are difficult at best on lower end non-enclosed printers.
The main thing that sold me was my experience using P1S printers at college. Theyre super fast and rarely have issues.

I've really had zero problems with it. Every single print failure to date has been filament wet out of the box from Bambu, so I'm designing up a custom drying box right now to fix that problem. If you're having problems with petg, definitely re-dry any filament you have lying around.

Because of the closed source nature of it, I won't get one even if they're better in some aspects. I think Prusa is catching up, so I would want to try those out.

I spent over 2k on this 2B statue but to me it's worth it since Nier Automata is one of my all time favorite games

Damn 1/3rd scale. So like 1-2 foot tall? Fair play. Nier Automata was one of my favourite gaming experiences, so many feels. I love the end sequence more than about any other gaming moment.

I don't make big money irresponsible purchases, but I have spent money needlessly on Star Trek decorations for my house.

I have a picture of this one in my house somewhere, but I can't find it, but I do own it. If you press the button, it plays the fight music. And it plays... and plays... and plays... for like 60 seconds!

That's not irresponsible. That's logical.

I remember when Leica released their first digital full frame camera. I was excited cause I had a m4 that I used for a decade with a bunch of lenses. Searching thru estate sale after sale to compile them. The M9 came out on 9/9/9 and I was on vacation in Tokyo at the same time. figured if I waited a few years I could get a used one maybe.

So my wife and I went to the Leica store to look at it on the release day. When we went in there I chatted the guys up and they told me a preorder fell thru and gave me an opportunity to buy it. I wasn't even really considering it when my wife told them we will take it. I had half the money and she gave me the other half. I got to spend the rest of that week taking photos in Japan with my digital Leica instead of my film one. Traveled all around the world with that camera. It was the most expensive thing besides a car and house I've ever bought.

You have a great partner.

That would never happen again, no longer DINKs and now I drop more than that per year on my house just to keep it together :D Ended up selling all of my Leica gear except my M4 and a 50mm Summilux. Back to all film, medium format on a $300 mamiya, complete opposite from those days.

Most of my photography gear falls under "well, that money could have been spent more wisely". But photography has been one of my major ways of dealing with depression, so I absolutely don't regret it. I can't really put into words how good it felt to finally get a Camera That Didn't Suck.

right at the start of the pandemic I bought a nice projector and 135" screen, and converted our entire basement into a dark theater. It's really great for playing video games, watching sports, and obviously watching movies. Even with multi-view showing 4 events at one time like in the olympics it's still like having 4x 60"+ screens on the same wall.

Motorcycles. All 3 of them. I miss them.

i live in car dependent America, my motorcycle have saved me every time my car is waiting for repair parts, so i don't miss work, and when riding downtown, where parking is a headache. So i see it with a more utilitarian eye

Motorcycles and mopeds are amazing in urban areas that haven't built up public transit, honestly. They can be crazy efficient, have a ton of electric options now, and give people the range and speed to use existing infrastructure and not need dedicated lanes/shallow grades like bicycles.

I've not owned one since I grew up in a rural area and I'm not suicidal enough to ride one on a 65mph highway. but am planning to move to an urban area in a few months, I'll probably get one for going downtown.

I find driving two wheeled vehicles in cities scarier than on the highways., and stopped riding them when it seemed like it was more dangerous that it was worth because of all the other terrible drivers.

Drag car...

Tens of thousands of dollars for 3 or 4 trips to the track a year.

And I'm itching to build another.

Early pandemic, I bought 4x 3D printers and started a print farm to make PPE masks for doctors. I was cranking out around 60-80 pieces a day.

After the shortage was over, I ended up donating it to my buy nothing group.

I bought a pick-up truck because I've wanted one ever since I was a kid and one day I just realized I'm an adult with money and I can buy whatever I want.

Well I started my own business a few years later so it turned out to be quite useful purchase in the end anyway

I spent almost 6k on my computer setup, 2k just on the 4090 no regrats

Ice machine

Infinite bedside ice

I'm picturing this thing literally on your nightstand. Please tell me I'm right.

Very nearly! I have desk that I scrounged from the garbage literally right up against the bed and a nightstand right next to it. It's on the desk since the nightstand holds my TV.

So it's not literally on a nightstand, but it is literally bedside, i.e. I can use it without getting out of bed.

Does it not make tons of noise?

We have an ice machine in the freezer and often it is the loudest thing in the entire house. I also have a mini fridge in the office and the compressor on it runs every few minutes. It would be awful to try to sleep in there

Dude OP isn't even mortal at this point; he has ascended to godhood. That compressor sound and ice dropping into the plastic basket only powers him up.

Haha, that and the two running box fans I have on full blast pointing at my head and pillow are my greatest sources of comfort.

Yes I like being really really cold.

Not really? Although I'm probably way more tolerant to (wideband!) noise than others because I sleep literally inches from two box fans.

But you don't need to run it while you're sleeping. It goes from room temperature to ice in under 10 minutes (20 minutes for the "good" ice after the insides have had a bit of time to cool down).

To be clear, what I have is a Frigidaire portable ice maker. Here's its Walmart product page, although I can't vouch for Walmart's website respecting your privacy.

I actually bought a knockoff of this a couple years ago off Amazon, and it worked for about a year, but:

  1. The infrared sensor was crap from day 1, so I always had to manually override the machine's decision that the ice was full, even when it was completely empty.
  2. The water where I was living (dorm room in city) was much...harder I think? It was safe to drink, I even tested it myself, but whatever minerals were in it very quickly fucked up my machine's internals. I'm living at my parents house with better water.

So far, the Frigidaire is a much better unit, and I use it tremendously more often because I don't have to babysit the thing and constantly override the infrared sensor.

The water supply is just an ordinary tank. Basically just open the lid, dump a Super Big Gulp of water into the tank every few hours and you're set. Everything is self contained.

It doesn't keep the ice cool for you, i.e. it's not a freezer. Once the ice gets dumped in the bucket, you're on your own.

So if you go down this route, I recommend getting a decent version of it. Mine cost about $87 in store from Walmart but I really bought this unit as an impulse buy, so I imagine you can get it cheaper if you do some shopping.

$1,300 on an OLED television. literally everything on earth just looks better

My house. I bought when the rates went up, but Iโ€™m so much happier than living in an apartment.

that's like the least irresponsible purchase. even at a high interest rate, you are still paying on a principle that creates an asset with equity that increases your stable wealth. When you rent, all that money you pay just evaporates and you never see it again. A mortgage payment is almost always the better financial choice, unless you need to move frequently for work.

I merely meant that buying a house at a high interest rate is the irresponsible part. But yes, everything you say is true.

I'd argue even that being irresponsible. yeah high rates suck but you're still paying on an asset, not a black hole.

Also, mortgages can be refinanced if/when rates drop later.

I refinanced at 3% then did a HELOC to pay for a new roof. One of the best decisions I ever made

Same. Recently bought a house, rates are very high, but I can live with it. I've literally never been happier than I am now, no matter how many weekends I spend completely drained repairing some random thing.

My most irresponsible purchase was definitely a high end stereo system. I got into it in college after hearing some amazing rigs. Itโ€™s the irresponsible thing Iโ€™ve always wanted but really couldnโ€™t afford (starting life, marriage, kids, school bills, etc.). Eventually we had saved enough where we had some $ leftover after getting lucky timing things in the housing market.

I begged my wife like a kid begs his mom in a toy store (Iโ€™m not proud). She didnโ€™t get it, but was all โ€œdo it if you want it that bad.โ€ It. Is. Awesome. It has gotten used everyday for like 7 years now. My wife has even become a big fan - she โ€œgets it now, this is awesomeโ€

I have to pry her music away from it to play mine! :) My kidโ€™s friends like to come over our house and hang out watching movies and listening to music on it. Totally frivolous and way too much money - but no single thing has brought people together quite like awesome music.

100% would do it again.

What set up do you have?

  • Emotiva 5x200w modular amp

  • Marantz pre pro

  • Ascend acoustics towersx2 up front, sierra2โ€™sx2 rears, horizonx1 center

  • Pair of Rhythmik sealed 15โ€™s, with integrated amps 600W each

  • Misc. stuff - blue ray player and whatnot.

I really like the ascend stuff. Most of my audiophile friends canโ€™t believe the bang for the buck. Tough purchase though - internet only. No easy way to demo unless you find someone in their forums willing to invite you over (which Iโ€™ve done).

I also really like the Rythmik subs, but only as a pair.

I hate my marantz. Thatโ€™ll get replaced soon. Iโ€™ve got my eye on Anthemโ€™s gear.

Amp is fine.

where we had some $ leftover

  • Emotiva 5x200w modular amp - $3000
  • Marantz pre pro - $3,199.00
  • Ascend ELX TOWER SINGLE - $2,649.00
  • Rythmik E15HP/HP2 15" Subwoofer - $1,599.00

Prices taken from first hit I found. Total ~$10500

I'm not judging (I acutally somewhat envy you), I am just saying that $10000 is more than some leftover money.

Moved across country for a job. Super high market to one less crazy. Had to do stupid things to buy into the first market, recouped that money and reinvested it back into my retirement (where it belonged) when we moved back. Decided to have some fun as well. โ€œLeftoverโ€ in terms of housing money is where that term slipped out from.

It was insane $ for me ;) But it was something I wanted for almost 30 years and couldnโ€™t afford. Itโ€™s insane what you can spend on stereo equipment. My wife and I both drove cars until they broke, 14 and 15 years, both over 350k miles. Some people buy sports cars - we chose a stereo ;)

Excellent and nice choices! I feel the same way about the Revel F208 speakers I bought a while back. Completely didn't need them since the Revel F36 were already pretty good but oh was the improvement noticeable. I honestly don't think I will replace them as long as the are working properly.

That would involve quite a bit of begging if I were to try that too.

I spent front money on a guitar at Goodwill when I was buying My mom all kinds of stuff. I was tripping balls and had convinced myself people were sneaking money into my wallet. I just wanted to show my mom a good time. A year later I El Kabonged a home invader with that very same guitar.

El Kabonged

Le mao

I'm glad I got the experience to El Kabong someone. It's a hindsight appreciation edition of 'I wish a fucker would'.

We bought a new house in our same town because it was slightly bigger and closer to the downtown area. We didnโ€™t need to move, but did it anyway. Offer accepted in February of 2020, rate locked at the end of March.

I bought my house July 2019.

Got the lowest price the market had seen and the lowest rate in decades.

Iโ€™ll never fucking move at this point

Wife and I bought an apartment in April 2018, great deal, great rates.

The we had a kid in 2023.

We have a second coming in 2025

We need to buy a house, and have no idea how the fuck we are going to make it happen. We're not even that bad off, we both do pretty damn well, but we are about to be facing $4k/month in childcare, and even with the huge pile of down payment money we have saved, we wouldn't be able to afford the mortgage.

We still own our apartment though, which is better than renting. I keep telling myself "We will figure it out, people have done more with less", but man... If this was like 5 or 6 years ago we would have been living large.

I bought a sauna. Second hand from a guy who had it in his third floor attic 50 miles away. Had to dismantle it get it in the van than rebuild it on my lean to.
I then got myself a big old whiskey barrel for a cold plunge pool.
No regrets, a sauna straight after coming off the hill in wet weather is the best.

Off topic: How do you prefer to pronounce sauna?

I pronounce it sawna. But I prefer when it's pronounced sowna. I just think I I'm not nordic enough to pull it off without sounding like a twat.

Valve index vr set. It's incredible how into a game you can het. First time I played half life alyx for 3 hours straight I had to touch a wall after stopping playing because I simply got so into tje game my brain didn't know what reality was anymore.

I've been so tempted to buy this for several years now, but I just know the successor will be revealed two weeks after I buy one. D:

Buy one already! I wanna see what they come up with next.

Oh god the handover after your first long drive into VR is something else. Nothing felt real for me for a good few hours. Super weird experience.

I was looking at my hands, thinking how amazing the finger tracking is.

I played more Walkabout Mini Golf than all the real-life mini golf I've played combined

Walkabout mini golf and eleven table tennis are virtually indistinguishable from the real thing. It is very literally unreal how unrealistic they are.

I just got the wallace and gromit course and that prompted me to watch my old W&G shorts collection dvd on my PS2 while eating nachos. Sometimes you need a little nostalgia.

My previous bass guitar had one of its machine heads snap off, and I had rehearsal that same day, so I looked online at the used instrument stock at local music stores and found a bass guitar used that was a very unique, discontinued model that I'd been essentially dreaming of for a while, and happened to be there.

What I probably should've done is replaced the machine head, which would've been a very quick and cheap fix, but I instead bought the new bass and then took it to use at rehearsal. Now it's my daily driver and I'm very glad I got it.

Edit: I fucked up and fixed the comment, somehow it double posted instead of just editing.

Musicians curse.

I'm a multi-instrumentalist and I now have 3 guitars, a bass, a banjo, two ukuleles, a sousaphone, trombone, trumpet, soprano trombone, bugle, clarinet, tenor sax, Roland keyboard, melodica, cajone, stylophone, otamatone, ocarina, concertina, and a recorder. My goal is 50 instruments by the time I'm 50.

I have a problem.

If you can play sousaphone and other various brass, you might be able to pick up the didgeridoo. The embechure is kind of similar (see also: alphorn). It's the circular breathing I'm still trying to get the hang of.

And a I picked up a hand pan drum last month for giggles. It has a lovely tone.

Edit: I'm a shameless enabler.

I have a similar problem, but what is worse, most of them I can't really claim to "play", I've just kind of fooled around with them.

Probably our car. It's a great car, I spent weeks researching the perfect car for us. I love it and I'm grateful every time I drive it, but we bought it on credit and it's way out of our price range to buy. It'll take us about 6 years total to pay it off.

I still understand my decision at the time, but it was driven by a specific chain of events that made it make sense, and in principle I'm against buying a car on credit, just buy an older reliable car you can afford.

Nah Iโ€™d say thatโ€™s a good purchase. I just bought a new car on credit too because Iโ€™ve had pretty bad luck with buying used cars before. They always required quite a lot of work to get running and then something breaks and repairs are needed again. Case in point the current car's AC system broke down a little while ago and after all the repairs that were done already I have a feeling that getting the AC repaired would mean Iโ€™ve paid more in repairs than to buy the car. And thatโ€™s just not worth it. So I decided to take out a little credit and just buy a new car instead.

It can be a good purchase and still be irresponsible, IMO. I love that car and it will serve us for years to come, I don't regret it. We could have gotten a much cheaper new car, for example, but at the time we decided our biggest value for money was the car we have now.

I understand and agree with your attitude to buying a car on credit. Two semi-objective justifications I can see are safety and quality-of-life.

Newer and better cars are safer, and you might not have even a minor collision throughout the whole lifetime of the car, but the (hopefully never) day a crash happens you'll be forever grateful to yourself you bought this car. And if you have some "smart" assistants on-board those actually can make you not end up in the accident.

From my experience I have realized that (within reasonable bounds) if spending more on something results in substantiality higher quality-of-life then it's a money well spent. Because you end up being happier, calmer and actually more productive if you don't have to waste your energy on inconvenient things.

Not sure if that makes you feel any better...

Some of the considerations we took when choosing the car, I totally agree. I don't regret the decision, the monthly payments are not a huge burden on us, fortunately, but it was still not the best financial move.

Wondering which car you ended up choosing.

A 2 year old Nissan Leaf from the stand. Meaning, it belonged to Nissan as a test drive car before it was ours.

$4k on a classic luxury car that needed work.

Iโ€™m $17k into it and itโ€™s been in my garage long enough that I canโ€™t start it without draining all of the fuel.

Itโ€™s really lovely, but good lord luxury classics are expensive to restore. I restored and drive an old truck for $6k and a lot less heartache.

I bought a Steam Deck. Irresponsible for the fact it mostly exclusively exists for gaming, and isn't a very productive item to buy.

But gods damn is that such a fun device!

Same. Middle of spring quarter at college and I decided what better way to spend financial aid then buying a portable gaming console?

An Xbox 360 with a VGA adapter and Dead Rising. My TV at the time was one of those gigantic old 90s video editing CRTs, the kind that take all sorts of analog inputs like RCA and S-Video and even did HD if you could convert something to BNC, but pointedly would not do Component or HDMI. A few days prior I'd learned that VGA can be repinned directly to BNC, and then when I was wandering through Best Buy I saw they'd gotten some 360 VGA adapters in. I stopped, flipped a coin, called heads, it landed heads, I bought it.

I'd figured I'd get some minor fun out of it, basically just bought it because I really wanted to play Dead Rising. Instead I wound up using the ever loving hell out of my 360. Still have it, still works, no RROD or anything.

Mini-split AC for my office. My central air always struggled to keep the room cool with all the computer equipment. Work & gaming is so nice now.

A VR headset. have only gotten to play it a couple of times. my apartment is a bit too small.

Buuuut, in not too long I am moving to a bigger one. So then I can continue playing Half Life Alyx :D

Got a couple of retro consoles. I definitely don't need them but it's really nice.

1700 dollar massage chair. I can barely move it but I love it so much. I might still get the odd personal massage but using the chair every night helps my sleep enormously and it definitely gets the kinks out.

A family member bought the egg ones for like 4k or 5k. I thought it was terrible. YMMV but man what a giant money pit. They swore it helped their neck. I swore it was too rough.

An 8 inch mini monitor. I find myself . . . using it for everyyyyythhiiinnnng. Videos, documentation, Remote Desktop Sessions etc etc etc. It even has composite and BNC so I could hook up a playstation if I wanted to. :)

I bought it just because the thought of having it was funny. And holy crap the size difference!!

Can I ask what I'm sure everyone is thinking, how are any of those things improved by being tiny?

I have 2 monitors and sometimes I wish I had a tiny monitor so I can put any video calls in the corner so I don't have a dumb overlay on my productivity monitors

I've thought about wall mounting a 50" above my setup to drag things that I need open, but not where I'm working...

To add to this, I use an old iPad as a third monitor at work for Teams mostly. It's 1024x768 which seems to be the minimum supported resolution for Teams (except for some applets) and I don't need a good quality picture for Teams.

Unfortunately the app I've been using (TwomonUSB) seems to be no longer available for Windows download (CDN down), but this doesn't affect me personally as I still have the setup anyway.

Can you link to it? Is it touch screen?

I bought a high end home stereo setup with large speakers and a subwoofer with my first credit card when I didn't really have the money to pay it off quickly. Ended up paying an extra 25% of the cost in interest and had to really go cheap on food for a couple years.

Still use it 20 years later.

300 euro's worth of cocaine that I smoked in a day.

I'm not proud of it, and I don't often smoke it, but it was a fun day.

Not to judge you or anything, as I really don't, but I think it'd be more accurate to say "crack", as in order to smoke cocaine, you'd have to freebase it. And freebase cocaine is crack.

When consumed, cocaine can be found in two primary forms:ย 

A water-soluble hydrochloride salt, which is typically snorted

โ€œCrackโ€ cocaine, a water-insoluble base form that is smoked

That being said I've inhaled a few hundred euros a night at times as well so again, no judgment. I'm just pedantic.

Crack comes from the crackle sound you get when smoking if you use baking soda to make the freebase. I use ammonia. Nowadays they just use the name crack for freebase cocaine, which isn't really accurate. Where I live we just call it smoking coke because almost everybody uses ammonia, and most people don't buy freebase directly.

So to be accurate we should call it "freebase cocaine" and not "crack".

So to be accurate we should call it "freebase cocaine" and not "crack".

I agree with you. Unfortunately most drug users I know (both recreational and problem users) aren't too strongly into prescriptive language use.

Second limited edition steam deck. My kids now use both of them.

Pellet grill, the larger size, and I got WiFi. If Iโ€™m smoking something fir hours, I can see grill status and meat temperature remotely

Iโ€™ve made so many outstanding meals and the WiFi really is useful for something that cooks that long

My rower, a Concept 2. I bought it for myself as a congratulations/self care splurge after leaving a truly toxic job. I love it and it has been a great way to get some exercise basically whenever I want (I'm fortunate to work from home) without the hassle of going to a gym.

Resale value is solid. Great purchase but they are pricey. Health is the real wealth.

That was honestly a big part of my decision to buy that make/model. I figured if I crashed and burned with it, I could resell it for a reasonable price. It was pricey and borderline irresponsible at the time, but I don't regret it at all. I'm really looking for forward to getting back on it soon a after a hiatus due to a shoulder injury. I'm really antsy to get back to it!

Wanted an AWD vehicle that could tow at least 3.5k pounds but I prefer something sporty, always had wanted to have a Volvo at some point and I love unusual engines... So I got all of that in the same vehicle (XC60 T6 R-Design, 2.0L with a supercharger and a turbocharger). My only regret would be not getting a T8 for the 100% electric range now that I'll have to return to the office...

I've made a few frivolous purchases, but I don't think I've made an irresponsible one yet.

I consider frivolous as "unnecessary but desired" and irresponsible as "Spending funds that are not excess and intended for a debt, payment, or life necessity"

$95 on a flashlight and then $50 to have it done with custom cerakote. To be fair, it's a badass flashlight. Consequently, that led to the purchase of a few other flashlights with similar features but much cheaper and without the custom coatings.

See the attached image for more details and feel free to ask me any questions :P

I hope this isn't blatantly obvious, and I have a guess, but which is the expensive one? I really like the lit up buttons

Edit: I feel it is the large one due to the similar textures on the others. Mind explaining a bit what makes the light special? Super bright, fun colors? I enjoy them, I just have never looked into the hobby

The expensive one is the white-ish one all the way on the left! That one is made of titanium (with the exception of the copper head). All the other lights are made of aluminum. Also, the cerakote coating is special because it changes color with heat! At rest it's a dark navy blue, but as it gets warmer it turns into the greyish white you see in the picture :)

The special thing about each of these lights is that they're almost semi-custom made, you get to pick certain things such as the color and material of the body, the actual length of the battery tube for different types of cells, and most specifically the type of LED that gets put inside. They also use an open-source and insanely complicated user interface called Anduril 2.0.

The fancy colors you see the lights putting out in the image are just auxiliary LEDs that look pretty. You can change what color they're producing or even have em do a little light show if you set them to do that.

There's one guy who actually makes them, his name is Hank Wang. You can find his store at intl-outdoor.com. Considering the amount of customization that goes into these lights and the quality of the LEDs themselves, the value of them is actually rather amazing.

In this image you can see how the beams vary in color temperature across these lights.

All of this is super neat, thank you for sharing! I enjoy knowing about them, but I wouldn't have any practical use

Hah! I use my mf01s every night when I go to bed. I turn on candle mode, give it a timer, and drift to sleep. It's an incredibly expensive night light but I love it

I originally came from Olights, I was a big fan of them. I never understood how people could complain about them until I finally had a flashlight with great CRI and tint. Also, the fact that these things use Anduril is incredible. After learning how to use Anduril 2.0, I hardly want to use any other flashlight!

Needless to say, I'm done with Olight. I'm actually looking to sell them away lol

My car. I bought a luxury car back when I was in grad school and it cost me a year's salary used. I would tell anyone else not to do that, but over the years I have had so much fun driving that car. It's a 2008 BMW 328i with a manual transmission and sports suspension (which makes it rather uncomfortable, but it corners so well). It has been breaking down a lot recently and I'll probably have to get rid of it soon, which I'm not happy about. They don't make cars like that anymore and even if they did, I can't reasonably justify buying such an impractical car at this stage of my life. Maybe I'll make another irresponsible purchase anyway...

My dice sets. I was going through some serious retail therapy for my depression and might have spent about $1000 on scores of dice sets (over a period of several months to a year. But I almost have enough to fill a display case with only the d20s! Not that I would, because I use them too frequently and my apartment is currently too small for the display case.

) You trying to throw a syntax error buddy?

When I bought 3 ounces of weed during the pandemic

Only 3?

Lol it was a lot for me. Lasted me 2 years.

Good effort! Ditto for me these days. Back when I was young & foolish that might have only lasted me a few months tops. It was actually shortly around that time I finally stopped for a couple of years & now just occasionally enjoy. Much healthier life balance. ;)

3070ti and a 43โ€ 4k gaming monitor, sometime in 2020 when pandemic pricing was at the highest bullshit level. it would cost less than 1/2 that 18 months later, but I'm glad I didn't wait.

massive screen real estate at 144hz all the time was worth it for work alone.

Six motorcycles in 2 years

How many do you have now?

After selling one and borrowing a dirt bike for my kid, 6 are in my possession, but the one I'm borrowing is grown out of now.

I have an 82 Kawasaki that needs minor engine work, and to get sold, a newer retro sport bike and an older klr650.

I'm thinking next year I'll sell the sport bike and klr and consolidate on a larger adventure bike, taking my fleet down to 3.

One mx bike, one klx300 that is capable on dirt and road, and one sportier adventure bike. That way my kid and I can ride trails anywhere and I can do some nice trips too. We can kinda trade off depending on how we feel like riding.

I thought I was crazy with a beginner bike into a fast naked bike within 12 months lol. What are they?

I still think of myself as a beginner but I am obsessed with doing everything I can to be as safe as possible, thankfully I also think learning safety is fun!

In October 2022 I bought a 2001 Kawasaki w650, that was my first bike since I briefly tinkered with dirt bikes about 10 years prior. I sold that this spring.

That same year in November I picked up an 82 Kawasaki ke100 and a 2004 KLR650.

This spring I picked up a 2019 Kawasaki z900rs and a 2017 KTM 125 SX.

A few weeks ago I picked up a KLX300, which is the first new thing I ever purchased, and I just finished putting the 650-ish break-in miles on it yesterday, so I'm really excited to take that on the trails now.

I think what I'm finding is riding very different bikes in different ways teaches you all kinds of different skills that are transferrable to all of them in subtle ways.

What are you riding on now?

My first bike was a 2006 Suzuki GZ250, a little beginner cruiser bike with just enough power to keep up on the highway with it pinned in top gear. Comfortable and fun, especially around town.

After 3500 miles on the GZ, I made quite the jump to a 2012 Triumph Street Triple R. I wanted something sportier but still fairly comfortable (vs something like an R6, where there were plenty available near me). I didn't want something heavy or something that I would grow out of soon. I've only had it for about a month but so far I'm loving it! It's incredibly fast (to me ofc; can't even imagine what a literbike feels like), I really need to be careful with it lol

The funny thing about bikes is they're all so fun. I put over 300 highway miles on my klx300 over this past weekend and that hardened my nerves way more than the capabilities of my z900 did!

The great thing about higher performance bikes is that, while they can certainly go way faster than we should ever ask them to, they can also maneuver way better than we should ever ask them to.

They all bring me so much joy in so many different ways. I absolutely appreciate my sport bike like an engineering marvel (I'm pretty simple), and getting slightly naughty on it when no one is around is definitely thrilling, but honestly the bike rides so nice that even low speeds feels so good, and high speeds don't actually feel so high. The little bike is kind of the opposite in a way that's also fun anyway. It feels naughty even when it's not haha.

Anyway I hope you're staying safe out there. It's the best way to have fun for longer!

I get the thrill of going fast on a slow bike like the GZ250. I have dragged pegs and asked it to do ridiculous highway trips (once 80mi of highway in one go, on a bike that can barely do the speed limit), and I even tried offroading the poor thing. (I dropped it a couple times lol)

The Street Triple is a whole different beast. One that tempts me to go way too fast. Luckily, I can (usually) resist those temptations and just cruise along.

I am being safe. I keep any slightly naughty things away from traffic, and I am ATGATT. It's weird how unsafe some riders are, just today a bald man on a cruiser passed me on the highway with no helmet.

Ya a lot of folks make a lot of poor choices. I'm sure I do too.

I like to take note of any way I could have done something better in a ride, even if it's just something simple like getting passed by a car before I knew it was there -- a mild reminder to always be checking the 360.

As of right now, a bunch of Magic the Gathering cards. I have nobody to play with. I regret nothing.

There's another purchase that would've been one of the most irresponsible of my life, but the seller didn't actually have the thing in stock. No, I won't tell what it is, I'll just let you folks imagine

First bicycle this summer and soon second bicycle for winter. I have never felt better than since I started commuting on my bike to and from work.

This is hard because of I like it then I don't think it was irresponsible. Generally the irresponsible things I purchase are more like monthly things or meal deliveries. I can't point at one thing and say "that's it!"

My V8 Holden Ute. Sure it's not super practical but it makes up for it in Smiles per gallon.

I just did that too, recently bought and slowly fixing up a VE series 1 SSV with a manual L98

It does nothing but cost me money but I fucking love it.

I bought a $600 vintage, late 70s turntable that's just beautiful, pristine condition. Tbf I paid $25 on an online auction. I keep going up to it every couple of hours and just staring at it in awe. Now I need to buy a receiver and speakers to match it

$25 for a $600 item? That doesn't sound irresponsible at all. Or even frivolous.

Tossed a hefty chunk of change on a Maschine+. AKA fancy beat pad for finger drumming/music production that can operate as standalone device. Did catch on sale, but still a hefty investment.

While not as "responsible" as other things I'm saving for, it's been a fucking blast! Always fun having an easy way to kick beats without schlepping a full kit, and tbh I have so much more potential for making weird noises with the pad.

I always look at things like these and are tempted to buy them. There is so much cool audio gear out there that I feel like could "up my game", but then I realize I have no game and already own a bunch of fun production gear that collects dust because I don't have the time or energy to make music anymore.

I considered selling some of my stuff, but want to hang on to it just in case any of my kids pick up the hobby and all my stuff is cool and "retro" at that point. Shit it is almost already cool and retro - Akai MPC1000, Korg Electribe SX ESX1, Korg KP3, Dsi MoPho, a couple other bits and bobs.

But yeah, always tempted to buy cool new awesome shit that I would never use.

That's the curse, man. Finally got fun money budget (kinda), but also got zero damn free time. Don't even have kids! Where the hell is all the damn time going?! HOW is it the last week of August?!

Definitely would keep the gear to try and share with the kids. Old music tech is dope! Old tech in general, still quite cool. Loved hitting retro games on the thicc floppy back in the day. Or whatever other gadget pops would have around. Cherished times.

Spent $800k on a house remodel. We gutted it and rebuilt it.

I did all the plans myself, I got them approved by the city, I made all the interior design decisions (my wife had veto power but left 90% of it all to me). In theory, in my area, the house has gone up in value by equal to or more than what we spent.... but realistically I overspent. The amount I pay for loans is enough to make my very hefty salary seem low, but I don't regret spending the money (It didn't help that interest rates went up right before we pulled a $500k loan!). The house is awesome and it's MY/OUR house since I did the design myself and I worked with the contractors throughout the entire process. I know every trade off we made and I can tell you why we made every decision. Doing this was a bucket-list item... but yeah... I overspent.

My previous bass guitar had one of its machine heads snap off, and I had rehearsal that same day, so I looked online at the used instrument stock at local music stores and found a bass guitar used that was a very unique, discontinued model that I'd been essentially dreaming of for a while, and happened to be there.

What I probably should've done is replaced the machine head, which would've been a very quick and cheap fix, but I instead bought the new bass and then took it to use at rehearsal. Now it's my daily driver and I'm very glad I got it.

Tickets to Avatar: The Last Airbender in Concert and the merch I bought at it. I spent something like $200 in total, but it was WORTH. EVERY. PENNY.

Those are fun! I went to 4 or 5 of the Harry potter movies in concert. It's a fun way to re-watch older movies on a projector above, while having an amazing live orchestra play through the whole movie. It's really cool that the orchestra director can follow along with the electronic karaoke-like metrenome and keep everyone in sync with the movie the entire time.

They didn't show full episodes from the show. Rather, it was clips from the show organized around specific characters, themes, or moments from the show. Sometimes (not often, but sometimes), they would use voice lines from the show as well.

For example, (Avatar: The Last Airbender spoilers) ::: spoiler spoiler they had clips and music about Iroh. It included, of course, Leaves From the Vine with audio and clips of Iroh singing it. I cried through that whole segment. I don't think there was a dry eye in that theater. :::

For the encore they made an entire song out of ::: spoiler spoiler the Secret Tunnel song :::.

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Almost 800 bucks on a Flair 58. I already had a decked out coffee setup but I couldn't resist. Now it's my go to machine.

My Triumph Street Triple R (when it works).

After taxes, insurance, and service it cost me $5000, but when I twist that throttle and hear that screaming inline-3 at 11000rpm pulling harder than a V8 mustang, its intoxicating and I forget my worries, if only for a moment.

reliability problems?

So far it's just been the battery not being screwed in tight enough, and me not having the correct tools to screw it in tightly. Other than that it hasn't had a problem in the 300 miles since I got it (recently). I'm such a noob at mechanic stuff.

I bought some googly eyes, and I keep them in a baggie in my pocket wherever I go. I have not used any yet, however the very thought is immensely riveting.

An couple of American made guitars. A thinline telecaster and a Taylor 717. I've been playing on cheaper guitars for 20 years and finally was in the position to treat myself. While they sound a play a little better it's not a huge difference, especially after a proper setup. The acoustic was the bigger improvement for sure.

Definitely a luxury purchase but after 4 years of the electric and 2 of the acoustic I still love playing both.

3 gm/3 ml of oud oil for $650 plus shipping. Was amazing! No regrets whatsoever.

What do you use it for? Anything more than perfume?

iMastari

You burn the wood as an incense. Oil for "perfume".

More recently, probably a wireless handheld controller for my model railway.

Model railway is a hobby for people with lots of time, space, and money. I generally fall short on two of those, although lately there is a bit more disposable income to go around. Last year I was able to splurge on the control setup that I always wanted, which is a stationary controller - basically you sit at a table and control the trains with two rotary controllers and a touchscreen for a number of other things. Looks a bit like this.

But since it's stationary and my layout is fairly big, sometimes it can be a bit cumbersome to test something that's five metres away. So I decided to also splurge on the matching wireless handheld controller, an Android-based device with another rotary controller and the ability to control almost all aspects of the stationary device.

Did I need it? Hell no. If I had waited a few more months, a perfectly suitable free smartphone app would have been available that I could have used for the purposes intended. But am I loving it? Fuck yes. Irresponsible to boot, but no regrets, not for one second.