What an expensive week this has been.
What have we bought?
1. Media Player and
2. 2.5" HDD - Bought this online on Tuesday from mwave.com.au. They
had a sale on the Western Digital WD TV HD Media Player, at around
$175. And I also got an LG 500Gb 2.5" portable hard drive, at $140.
Went to the Mwave offices in Lidcombe (it's local!) to pick it up. The
place is pretty much a warehouse, with a small room for a "public
shopfront". It's not really a retail outlet, since there's no items
there to look at and buy directly. Finally I'll be able to watch the
backlog of DivX files I've had over the past 2 years, and clear out
space on my main computer (only 4Gb available!).
3. Netbook - OMG, the perils of getting a redundancy, having $$$ in
the bank, and being at home browsing those "one bargain a day" sites.
At catchoftheday.com.au on Thursday they had a sale on the ASUS EEE
1000HE laptop, which is a new model with Atom N280 1.6Ghz, 1Gb RAM,
160Gb HDD, Wireless-N, Bluetooth, 10" screen, 92% size keyboard. Very
very nice. Couldn't resist a bargain at $619 (after $40 discount if
you used Paypal)! Current retail is around (according to Shopbot)
"Price range: $669.00 to $934.95 at 55 stores". So I got it, thinking
if it doesn't work out between us - I fear the small screen could be a
problem when working with an IDE - I can always sell it *and make a
profit*, but still way below retail prices!
4. Lanwmower - our GMC lawnmower carked it about a month ago, so got
ourselves to Bunnings on Friday and bought a Flymo lawnmower. I think
it's by Husqvarna, since that's the name on one of the stickers on the
box. Or maybe they're the importers? Anyway, it looks quite
"Scandinavian".. my son said "Big Red Car" when I carried the box
inside. My brother says it looks like a race car. It's the kind of
lawn mower that'd fit in at IKEA, if they sold em there. Was thinking
of getting this other, much smaller lawnmower also from Flymo, but
this was different because it was like *a hovercraft lawn mower*! It
floated on a bed of air, and cut the grass, but didn't have a
container for storing the clippings. I guess the clippings just stayed
on the ground and you had to rake it. Which means I'd have to get a
rake, and do more work? No thanks. Someday, I *will* get a
hovercraft-something. Hovercraft food processor? Hovercraft vegetable
slicing julienne tool. Yeah, someday, my hovacraft will come, boiee..
5. Steam Iron - Also on Friday, we got the Philips GC4420 steam iron
from Good Guys for $95, to replace our steam iron which I stupidly
dunked in a pail of water. People - *never* iron your clothes in the
bathroom. Stupid ironing board had a board cover that was oversize,
and covered that metal tray on the right side where you place the
iron. Anyway, I placed it there, but on its rear, so it was unstable
and fell in the bucket of water. And - this is what I moron you get
when you're sleep-deprived - I almost put my hand in the water to
retrieve the iron! All while it was plugged in to the outlet. Good
thing I stopped and thought, "Yeah, I should probably turn off the
power outlet first!" By which time the safety switch kicked in anyway
and all the electricity in the house turned off. So got on the forums
- thanks whirlpool.net.au forums - and word on the street is that
Tefal and Philips are the brands to go for. Also learned about this
extremely expensive - but allegedly excellent - brand called
LauraStar. Holy shit, their "systems" can cost up to $1400!! The irons
themselves are selling for $500+, after heavy discounting already. I
don't wanna know the "normal" price. Anyway, another brand name I can
fake and claim that I own, just like Lexus, Miele, Dyson and Apple.
Oh, I do have the latter two. Anyway, it has auto-stop (so it turns
off if you accidentally forget it lying around) and anti-calc system
(so you don't get that yucky particulate flakes coming out of the
steamer when you iron, thereby fucking up your just ironed clothes),
which are the most important features for me. Also had to be light,
since my mother-in-law does an unfair majority of the ironing around
here, so that kicked the GC 4630 out of the running (that had the
Ionic Steam feature). And this model also has Steam boost, so giving
out 100g instead of 40g of steam. Awesome.
6. Running shoes - Friday too, wife and I bought new running shoes at
Paul's Warehouse, Homebush. The bargains are not that extreme as the
ads make it out to be. Tons of stuff were selling for $100+ anyway.
How the fuck can they justify these prices for running shoes? It's not
like they now have cpus and memory foam and teflon. My old ones are 4
yrs old anyway, and looking ratty, so was a good time to get. Total
cost - $170.
All through the week I've been checking out deals on the iPhone
(unlimited broadband for $50 on Optus... please please) and the Nokia
E63 on 3 ($29/mo for 12 mos.. wow). Must forget all this and realise
I've survived this far without this anyway.
Okay, economy, get better!! I just paid you to do so. =)
