I've been buying so much on-sale lego lately, it's crazy. I have four boxes put aside for a rainy day, and each one was at least 30% off, up to 50% off. There had been five, but I opened one already.
I normally have zero boxes of unopened rainy day lego.
I have one trillion of those useless Friends minifigs by now. Couldn't care less until you try to take away a bow from their hair. Or even so much as touch them with your greasy fat hands.
There should be special vacuum cleaners for reckless vacuumers. With no motor, only a sound chip. Integrated into headphones they'd have to wear. Yes, that would be good.
@RegDwigнt It was the first non-yellow star wars fig and the first non-nba black person in Lego. Also only available in one kit which was very expensive at the time.
@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I think this was way before I learned that LEGO existed, for which I am thankful as the first SW wave was pathetic, and the second one not much better.
So I have a complicated mission. I got two Chrismas boxes for free at the LEGO Store, which I can fill up with Pick-A-Brick elements of my liking. I've never done that before, so this is really making me nervous.
I've already scanned the wall, did the list, checked it twice, but I still don't know how many of what I should be getting, plus they keep restocking it so my calculations are getting outdateder every day.
@KitFox well it was a "present" for spending 55 Euro.
@RegDwigнt well, how much variety does your PAB have? the ones around here are pretty small.
They pretty much have bricks, plates, something transparent, windshields, steering wheels, tires, doors, doorframes, and some modified brick I don't need.
It's relatively new, but rather ubiquitous across all product lines.
@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 or perhaps in reddish brown as pictured. I forget. It only comes in the two colors, and of one I have a bunch, and of the other none.
Also, the official rules claim that the lid of the box must close. But in practice I've seen them tape the boxes closed even if they can't really be said to be "closed"
@RegDwigнt Sorry dude. I'm afraid I can't help you with your "I have so much Lego the PAB is useless to me, even when I get two boxes for free" problem.
Right. It comes in five sets in black, of which I have three. It comes in twice that many sets in reddish brown, of which I have none, but will be getting the Ewok Village eventually.
> House prices [in Toronto] were up 5.2 per cent in 2013 compared to 2012, with the average selling price hitting $523,036 compared to $497,130 in 2012
anyway I don't think it would be worth the hassle to sell. It would seriously disrupt my life. So instead I live in fear that the market will collapse and disrupt it later.
There is no guarantee that the property, or the street, or the town, will so much as exist thirty years down the line. And I am saying that as someone who for his entire life has lived in cities that existed for a thousand years or longer.
@MattЭллен what? Germany is batshit insane about building a personal private my my my my my own home for absolutely everyone and his dog and his dog's car.
@RegDwigнt Around here, it generally makes financial sense to buy if you can afford it. You can get nicer places, for overall lower prices, than if you rent. But you need to have enough money up-front for the down-payment.
See above. Makes no sense unless I know that a) this is where I want to spend the rest of my life and b) it will not collapse in some random earthquake in five years.
I was paying $1000/month for renting a 750-sq-ft apt. I instead bought a 1000-sq-ft condo for $1200 mortgage + $300 condo fees. I paid it off in 5 years, and so then my monthly fees were $300. Then I sold it and got more than my money back.
Even if you buy at the same monthly rate as you rent: if you spend, say, $20,000 down on a house, then live there until it's paid off, paying $1000/month mortgage vs $1000/month for renting something else; once you sell the house anything you get back over $20000 is profit. The month-to-month costs were the same.
@MattЭллен It's just that it's one of those things where I constantly know at every step of the process someone's screwing me over and making a fortune off of me and other suckers like me in ways I could never imagine existed.
There are two problems with owning houses: 1. if interest rates jump too much your monthly mortgage payments might increase, and you might not be able to afford your house anymore. (However that could also cause rent increases). 2. If house prices fall, you might sell your house at a loss, or even foreclose, which means you lose money over all, which is bad.
@MattЭллен I dunno. I get to pick a place I like, most of the upkeep is not my duty, and I can move out any time to somewhere nicer or cheaper or nicer and cheaper. Try that as a full-fledged homeowner.
@RegDwigнt I got to pick a place I like. I can pay someone to do whatever upkeep I don't want to do personally (and don't be fooled, you are paying for that upkeep yourself), but yes, moving is a hassle, what with realtor fees and land-transfer taxes.
But finding something nicer and cheaper, in this city, ain't going to happen much. Even for rentals. vacancy rates are low and prices are sky-high. The only people who rent are the people who can't afford to buy, and they never will be able to afford to buy, because they pay too much rent and can't save up a down payment.
Also, if I wanted the benefits of owning AND renting, I'd get a condo, which I used to have, and really enjoyed. All the benefits of renting plus the benefits of owning. Also, all the fees of both.
But I never had to shovel snow or mow the lawn and there was a pool that was open all year.
@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 so 2 is the one I do not understand. At all. Why would you want to sell? Especially when the market is low? I thought the whole point of buying a home vs renting was not to ever move out again, especially not on short notice and when others dictate the prices.
There is no guarantee that the property, or the street, or the town, will so much as exist thirty years down the line. And I am saying that as someone who for his entire life has lived in cities that existed for a thousand years or longer.
@RegDwigнt Look. Feel free to spend your money on rent and never have anything to show for it at the end. It's your choice. But there are sound financial reasons for buying. There are risks to buying too much if you can't afford it. But the math is in favour of owning, at least here.
Why would I want to spend $1000/month on a tiny apt when I can have a house for $1200/month?
@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 well yes, except for the minor fact that this conversation would not exist if not for your fear that you don't, and that the math will not be in your favour in the end.
I am just moving with the flow, I am a complete noob so all I can do is offer counterarguments from a noob perspective.
Meanwhile on the main site, someone asks which words to capitalize in a title (again), and when provided with the canonical answer "it's a matter of style", says "no, that's not what I asked".
But at least I have shipped the package, so the day was not in vain.
@RegDwigнt yes, well, there are risks. The gains you make by paying off a mortgage instead of paying rent can be erased by certain kinds of problems. However, if you never owned and always rented, you'd never have had those gains in the first place.
Spending money you don't have on something that might drop in value any time depending on a zillion of variables in none of which you have any say? I don't know. That's not the kind of math that checked out when I studied math.
In the mean time, the credit guy does get a profit. This way or the other.
The drop in value matters only when you sell, though. If my house dropped in value and nothing else changed, I'd just keep it, keep paying it off, and weather out the dip.
@RegDwigнt Yes, credit costs money. But it also provides value.
Example: I buy stuff on my credit card and pay it off each month. That costs me $0 (not mentioned: the hidden transaction fees that everyone pays through higher prices).
@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I don't know what kind of credit card you have, but here you have to pay 16% interest as soon as your account is a single cent in the red. That's in addition to the 3% higher prices for yourself and everyone around you.
And in addition to the 40 or so bucks a year simply for having the card.
In fact, I have probably half-a-dozen credit cards, simply because getting the card is free, keeping it is free, and each card provides some benefit. like a discount a a certain store.
@RegDwigнt Who says I can't afford it? I'm getting literally FREE credit. NOT using free credit is stupid. I pay off the bill each month and never pay a single cent of interest or any fee.
Plus I get all sorts of benefits from using the card. 1-2% cash back. free insurance on car rentals. purchase protection. chargeback protection. fraud protection. The convenience of never having to carry cash. A nice tallied list of most of my purchases once a month.
@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 but it is not free credit. It is only free if you have covered it within 30 days. So all you do is run 30 days ahead of yourself. One paycheck. For your whole life. You could just as well dump all your cards, wait out that one month, and then proceed as usual.
@RegDwigнt Oh sure, the credit-card companies make lots of money. But that's simply because they don't let vendors give you a rebate for using cash or a cheaper payment method. I'm fairly sure that will be sorted out in 5-10 years. Meanwhile I get 2% back on all my gas and groceries and 1% back on everything else. What % back do you get for using cash?
And of course two thirds of your benefits don't exist outside of your market, where of course those guys can afford to offer them because everyone has ten credit cards.
As I said. Here, 40 Euro a year, plus 16% interest from second one, plus you have to pay money for getting money at the ATM, plus not everyone even accepts them.
It's like the whole cheque thing. Nobody understands it outside of North America, either. And nobody inside North America understands how life could possibly work without.
Ironically, I wanted to get a certain credit card, but they wouldn't let me because of some flaw in my credit history. I guessed it was because I hadn't had a card in my name for a while, so I first got a lower-end card, then one month later re-applied for the high-end card and got it.
@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 see, that's another thing that I always hate. Whenever I have a contract, any sort of contract, I immediately have to deal with shit. Even if it's a phone contract I've been having for the last 13 years with no problems whatsoever. Even then. One day, there will be some tiny problem, and I will have to call people and talk to people and nobody will be able to sort anything out and it will suck and I will hate my life. And that's one tiny thing.
So yeah. Whenever I can have three things to think about instead of five, that's good. Three things to think instead of zero, not so good.
Right now, I am in the annoying process of "proving" to my old IRA holder who is now my new IRA holder that my name is, in fact, my legal name that I am employed under and submitted on my paperwork.
My stance is that I am legally employed under that name. My employer saw my legal name on my SS card. Hardly my fault that the IRA holder helpfully reverted to my maiden name and is now making me change it.
Some software I am using has got the word "Glossarise" in it, which baffles me immensely. My spell checker hates it but googling for the word returns results for sites like Urban Dictionary but no reputable dictionaries or resources.
Since I am in the position where I work for the company that ...
@KitFox that's annoying. one more nail in the coffin of women-taking-their-husband's-lastname-when-getting-married: annoying paperwork that men never have to deal with.
DEFINITION OF SPORT
Physical activity that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often engaged in competitively.
A particular form of this activity.
An activity involving physical exertion and skill that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often undertaken competitive...
I just changed my avatar so that it wears lots of hats. Three, in fact. Mr. Shiny and Three Hats. Plus some extra hats for nohat, in case he changes his mind.
Actually I'm certain I'm in the top 5 for a couple more, but the sorting on the overview chart is not the same as on individual charts, so I fell off in a number of places.
Some software I am using has got the word "Glossarise" in it, which baffles me immensely. My spell checker hates it but googling for the word returns results for sites like Urban Dictionary but no reputable dictionaries or resources.
Since I am in the position where I work for the company that ...
English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…
English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…