Buyers Remorse

The first time I heard this term was a couple years ago when I bought my iPod touch. I spent a couple hundred on the device and another eighty something on insurance. That was a pretty big chunk of change for me. Instantly when I walked out of the Apple store at South Coast Plaza I thought to myself, “What have I DONE?”

This thought was further etched in stone when I got home and told my dad. Now, trying to get my dad to spend money is like trying to get blood from a turnip, so I was preaching to the choir here. I believe his only comment was “Ahhh, buyers remorse.” Well, I still have that iPod and it has served me quite well in the years since. Not a bad investment although I should have waited another six or so months for the one with the camera. Oh well.

So, talk about buyers remorse. That story doesn’t hold a candle to this one. Most of you know (assuming my dad isn’t the ONLY person who reads this) that I work at Rock Creek Lakes Resort. One of the perks of working here is we get a discount on gear. So this past month I may have splurged a tinsey-weenie bit.

This was my logic: First, I wanted to replace my compass that was stolen out of Phil’s truck, second, what would compliment a compass more then a GPS unit?! I have always wanted a GPS so I bought the eTrex 20 by Garmin.

Here is the GPS tangent. I guess I was naive to think I could just turn the device on and low-n-be-hold, there’s all the maps, right? Wrong. I took it up to Patricia Bowl for its maiden voyage and was wondering “Why are there no topo lines on here? It’s a blank screen. Something is definitely wrong.” I went onto Garmin’s website to find out that OH! You have to BUY the maps you want. DUH! So there goes another hundred out the window. I go to upload it to the device and sayyyy whaaaa? It doesn’t fit? OH! You have to BUY a separate micro SD card to hold all that information! Why didn’t I think of that!

Aside from buying the device, you have to spend a small fortune just to get the thing to work. Granted, now I have a 1:24,000 scale map of ALL of California and Nevada, and I am very happy. It just took me three trips into Bishop and a headache.

It doesn’t stop there. I’m back from my tangent. While flipping through the Liberty catalogue you can guarantee that just about anyone will find something pointless that they need to buy. Damn good advertisement. Haha. Not, Damn-good advertisement! But, Dammmn that good advertisement! So what did I find next, the Bonnie & Clyde double sleeping bag. Awwwww. And it even says Bonnie on one side and Clyde on the other. A must have. Better get two camping pillows to go along with it right? And although that is the end of MY shopping spree, setting me back a pretty penny, Phil embarked on his own purchasing journey. “The nicest rod and reel” he says he will ever own. An investment he has been wanting to make for quite awhile.

So we needed to test out our new gear. We decided to hike into Hilton #2 at 8 p.m. What were we thinking? We beat the heat, but I don’t know if we will do that again.

Here Phil is getting his set-up put together. He had hopes of catching a big brown trout that night… but now we have another reason to go back. We were both ready to crawl into the tent but decided to fish a little and I took a few really cool long exposure pictures anyway.

The next morning, here I am trying to show off my muscles and take down the tent at the same time. Phil flatters me. Then we headed to the secret brown trout spot. Phil has to throw a few casts along the way. And hey! He even catches one, not surprising.

I love Hilton lakes. Phil fishes and I just lounge around looking really really good. I WAS partly productive however. I finished making a few pairs of earrings, went for a dip, and took pictures of my handsome guy doing his thaang, fish.

Here is a photo of my favorite pair of earring I’ve made. One of my first pairs.

It was a long slow hike out, but not with out a beautiful view. We may have had a case of buyers remorse, but I’m sure, even more then the iPod, that these were all items that were well worth the purchase.