robotech_master

Well, here I am back at work again, getting ready for the Big Weekend. This weekend was a Big Weekend of another sort, as it was the annual "Tax-Free Weekend" in Missouri and a lot of other states, where states voluntarily forego their chunk of the 6% sales tax in the name of Education, saving a decent chunk of change for back-to-school folks (and people who are not going anywhere near schools but can still use the same stuff). And there were some purchases I'd been needing to make anyway—my numbers of slacks and shorts have been dwindling, and my shoes were just about to fall to pieces around my feet. And there were also some things I needed to buy for trip prep. And Saturday was the only free day when the buses would be running on the schedule that would let me catch a return trip home without having to go 3/4 of the way around town to get there. So Saturday was it.

( My Saturday Shopping Experience )

At work this morning, I arranged to get my paycheck this week a day early, so I can deposit it on my way home Thursday and have it officially hit the bank account Friday afternoon. That way I'll have the money in hand in case of emergencies, or in case I see anything I've just Gotta Have at the dealer room.

I've estimated the amount I can afford to spend, and I should be okay as long as I stick with it. It will probably mean passing up a lot of tempting purchases, but on the other hand I'm not really going there to buy stuff anyway. In the worst possible case, I may have to put a couple hundred dollars more on my credit card, but I can pay that off with the next BioKinetic study.

Alas, when I have to worry about conserving my finances, what a time for me to rediscover a company with which I had become acquainted in the past, a company formerly known as JerryCo but now known as SciPlus. A salvage and surplus seller, they had a newsprint catalog full of hundreds of interesting items, each of which was accompanied by a line drawing and a quirky, amusing write-up. I could spend hours reading through the catalog, about electric motors and gears and lenses and things in which I had no interest whatsoever, just to chuckle at the jokes. Their catalog is on the Internet now, but it's still got the line drawings (and color photos for some items) and the quirky write-ups. And there's so much tempting gadgetry and gimmickery there that I could easily have blown $30, $40, $50 or more on the stuff—if I didn't have to worry about the upcoming convention trip. Ah, travel frugality is such sweet sorrow…